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Hoosier_Daddy
Guest
That’s all true.
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Have to agree with HD on this point. There seems to be this underlying attitude that the woman is passive in any decision to have a child. I totally agree that the man should bend over backwards to help out his wife during pregnancy. But this should really be no different from any other time. The same attitude of service should prevail all the time. It is rather demeaning, whether it’s meant to be or not, to say that the woman merely “gives” the man children. Nobody is disputing the biological fact that a woman carries babies and men can’t. But it’s not our fault. That’s how God designed humans. Is seems that there’s a certain level of oneupmanship going on here to the effect of “women have babies, you men have it good and you should be happy we give you babies.”
I’m sure women feel as much attachment and responsibility to their children as men, if not more.
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Xantippe
Guest
Well, it’s easy for the “same attitude of service should prevail all the time” to turn into not providing necessary extra help when it’s needed.
I’m reminded of a friend’s husband who thinks he shouldn’t have to get her birthday or Christmas presents, as he pays her student loan every month, so that should be gift enough…
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EasterJoy
Guest
*Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us exercise them: if prophecy, in proportion to the faith; if ministry, in ministering; if one is a teacher, in teaching; if one exhorts, in exhortation; if one contributes, in generosity; if one is over others,with diligence; if one does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.
Let love be sincere; hate what is evil, hold on to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; anticipate one another in showing honor. Do not grow slack in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, endure in affliction, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the holy ones, exercise hospitality.*
(Rom 12:6-13)
My general thinking is this: as Christians, it pays to be merciful. Knowing ourselves to be needy and lacking the power to live the Christian life out of our own resources, it follows that we ought to expect ourselves cover for the faults and needs of others. It is better to do that without going through the exercise of judging whether they have a legitimate excuse or not. It is also better to confront our own shortcomings without reference to whether we could make an excuse for ourselves or not…except…
The “exception” to that blanket rule? Learning about the things that can sometimes make one or other of us less capable of exercising mastery over ourselves or less capable of taking care of ourselves or others as we would normally do helps us to anticipate those needs, recognize them when they arise, and compensate for them in charity and (in the case of our own needs) in humble honesty.
The difficulties that can but do not always go with pregnancy certainly fall into the category of things that will be handled more gracefully if there is some advance education and some on-the-spot anticipation of an unusual need. One point of education I would add is this: the physical and emotional challenges of pregnancy are very difficult to predict. The capacity of a pregnant woman can change drastically not just from one pregnancy to the next but from one trimester to the next and even sometimes one moment to the next in the same pregnancy. Don’t take for granted that you “know” what demands a particular pregnant woman will experience,* even if that pregnant woman is you and you’ve been through many previous pregnancies*. Every day in pregnancy is a new ballgame. Stay ready for the demands that biological necessity will dictate.
This is just one of the needs that our brothers and sisters might have, though. As good as we might become at anticipating the needs of others, we aren’t mind readers, we don’t have a crystal ball, and we aren’t gods. We all have limitations that we don’t know fully and cannot predict. It pays to throw a good dose of humility in with the mercy, because “there but for the grace of God go I.”
Let love be sincere; hate what is evil, hold on to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; anticipate one another in showing honor. Do not grow slack in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, endure in affliction, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the holy ones, exercise hospitality.*
(Rom 12:6-13)
My general thinking is this: as Christians, it pays to be merciful. Knowing ourselves to be needy and lacking the power to live the Christian life out of our own resources, it follows that we ought to expect ourselves cover for the faults and needs of others. It is better to do that without going through the exercise of judging whether they have a legitimate excuse or not. It is also better to confront our own shortcomings without reference to whether we could make an excuse for ourselves or not…except…
The “exception” to that blanket rule? Learning about the things that can sometimes make one or other of us less capable of exercising mastery over ourselves or less capable of taking care of ourselves or others as we would normally do helps us to anticipate those needs, recognize them when they arise, and compensate for them in charity and (in the case of our own needs) in humble honesty.
The difficulties that can but do not always go with pregnancy certainly fall into the category of things that will be handled more gracefully if there is some advance education and some on-the-spot anticipation of an unusual need. One point of education I would add is this: the physical and emotional challenges of pregnancy are very difficult to predict. The capacity of a pregnant woman can change drastically not just from one pregnancy to the next but from one trimester to the next and even sometimes one moment to the next in the same pregnancy. Don’t take for granted that you “know” what demands a particular pregnant woman will experience,* even if that pregnant woman is you and you’ve been through many previous pregnancies*. Every day in pregnancy is a new ballgame. Stay ready for the demands that biological necessity will dictate.
This is just one of the needs that our brothers and sisters might have, though. As good as we might become at anticipating the needs of others, we aren’t mind readers, we don’t have a crystal ball, and we aren’t gods. We all have limitations that we don’t know fully and cannot predict. It pays to throw a good dose of humility in with the mercy, because “there but for the grace of God go I.”
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Xantippe
Guest
Right. I find that being more (I’m sorry to use this term!) self-aware is helpful in maintaining emotional equilibrium.
To use a non-hormonal example, I find that a lot of situations seem much less tragic after lunch and dinner than before lunch and dinner. So, no big controversial discussions before lunch or dinner, if it can be avoided!
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EasterJoy
Guest
At our house, we watch out for how the emotions are operating after 4:30 in the afternoon, so much so that “it’s after 4:30” is our code for “one or both of us are not at our best; this discussion can and should wait until later.” It’s kind of nice, because the phrase suffices regardless of why we’re not at our best, without reference to hormones or whatnot.
Let’s face it: when you’re descending into irrationality or emotional excess or anything else that interferes with your decision-making, the last thing you have the patience for is a calmly-delivered amateur diagnosis of where the obstacle to the “proper” operation of your brain is coming from.
Well that’s not the same attitude of service then. It’s a lousy attitude of service. Not really an attitude of service at all. Same attitude would imply rising to whatever the occasion might require.
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EasterJoy
Guest
I think that was the point meant by giving the example, yes.
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Xantippe
Guest
Right. But it’s easy to deceive oneself into believing that one is delivering A+ husbanding or wifing when it’s actually more like C-/D work–certainly way easier than actually doing A+ work all the time.
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Xantippe
Guest
We find that late at night can also be bad. (Beware “discussions” that start about half an hour before bedtime.)
How about just going to bed and talking about it tomorrow?
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Allegra
Guest
Both spouses should be prepared to take on more responsibilities and be patient with irritability if the other spouse become incapacitated for any reason. Pregnancy is just one of the more common circumstances that merit that extra service.
Exactly.
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ahollars
Guest
Ladies, if you wouldn’t tolerate something from a man, then it’s not okay for you, no matter what your medical status. Pregnancy is not a disease. There’s not a man alive who gets away with blaming his hormones when something out-of-character happens. There is a point when a husband can say, “You know what? You need a reality check.”
I’ve watched 5 pregnancies with my wife. Not once was anything about her behavior different, other than her physical limitations. Prior to our marriage, she went through her first pregnancy while on active duty in the Army. I’d like to see that from the naysayers on here.My willingness to share the load and ease the burden is defined only by my wife’s expectations and needs. It is no one else’s business to set arbitrary standards for men outside of their own families.
Threads like this amuse me. Many of the women here seem to forget that this website can be a vacuum chamber at times. Then again, maybe we just have that kind of marriage.
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TCEL
Guest
I agree with others who say it depends on the woman. I was very unprepared for the sheer exhaustion and fog I was in. I grew up with brothers, so I was completely clueless about the effects of pregnancy, and I don’t remember much of my first trimester, except that I could eat raw carrots and grapes, and occasionally sausage. But oh my, the fog I was in. I was so embarrassed because I was exhausted by lifting a grocery bag. At mass, I went into an exhausted daze, and had to lean on my husband. Pregnancy exhaustion was different than newborn exhaustion. This sounds wimpy, but I was very glad I wasn’t employed in a way that required important decision making. I felt constantly drugged. Very mellow, though, except for the last trimester. Then I found myself experiencing unrepentant anger, which was a new feeling for me. The experience prompted me to plan on subsequent children only after fairly established potty-training.
I also decided that if I ever start a charity, it will be a dietary service for poor pregnant women, so they have an option to eat something that doesn’t make them vomit. I was volunteering at a pregnancy-help clinic at the time, and I made the practical suggestion they have anti-nausea sucking candy. The next time I came in, they said that was a good suggestion, and that a woman had some the day they put it out.
On the other hand, my friend didn’t really have any sickness. But you can bet that I think pregnant women need a sympathetic helping hand. Not a cart-blanche of course, but awareness, and only if they signal they want it. I felt like a total oaf. It was very humbling.
I also decided that if I ever start a charity, it will be a dietary service for poor pregnant women, so they have an option to eat something that doesn’t make them vomit. I was volunteering at a pregnancy-help clinic at the time, and I made the practical suggestion they have anti-nausea sucking candy. The next time I came in, they said that was a good suggestion, and that a woman had some the day they put it out.
On the other hand, my friend didn’t really have any sickness. But you can bet that I think pregnant women need a sympathetic helping hand. Not a cart-blanche of course, but awareness, and only if they signal they want it. I felt like a total oaf. It was very humbling.
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Xantippe
Guest
Yeah. I always find myself suddenly zippier and more alert pretty much as soon as I have the baby. I come home and want to zip around picking up stuff and doing laundry.
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EasterJoy
Guest
Just because a woman is capable of having her baby in the morning and getting back out to the harvest by afternoon does not mean she wouldn’t have appreciated it if you got your hind end out of your seat on the bus when she was 36 weeks along and let her sit in it, instead.
Ladies, if you wouldn’t tolerate something from a man, then it’s not okay for you, no matter what your medical status. Pregnancy is not a disease. There’s not a man alive who gets away with blaming his hormones when something out-of-character happens. There is a point when a husband can say, “You know what? You need a reality check.”
I’ve watched 5 pregnancies with my wife. Not once was anything about her behavior different, other than her physical limitations. Prior to our marriage, she went through her first pregnancy while on active duty in the Army. I’d like to see that from the naysayers on here.My willingness to share the load and ease the burden is defined only by my wife’s expectations and needs. It is no one else’s business to set arbitrary standards for men outside of their own families.
Threads like this amuse me. Many of the women here seem to forget that this website can be a vacuum chamber at times. Then again, maybe we just have that kind of marriage.
There are plenty of men alive who get a pass on irritable behavior because they are under a particular stress, such as having had to go without sleep. You may even be one of them. Many spouses, both husbands and wives, make this kind of adjustment without making some point out of having made the adjustment, even to the object of their graciousness. One hopes that most of them have spouses who realize they were given extra room and who appreciate it instead of feeling it was no big deal and only what they were entitled to have. But yes, working that out is something between the spouses.
This thread is about when the general public of Christians ought to give pregnant women a pass. I’d say that looking for ways to bear the burdens of others is a general work that Christians ought to look to do. Seeing that a woman you don’t even know but who looks to be late in pregnancy might be able to use your seat on mass transit is certainly part of that. If she’s irritable, it won’t kill you to assume that her condition might have contributed to that, rather than that she is just someone who lets herself express her annoyance to whomever she wants whenever she wants. Maybe she is, but it won’t kill you to think better of her and give her the benefit of the doubt, either. (Would it?)
At any rate, tolerating the faults and burdens of others is part of the expected work of belonging to Christ. I can give you chapter and verse, if you want, but you and I both know it is, so why even go there?
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TCEL
Guest
I had to work hard to remind myself that my anger wasn’t rational. When I told my husband about this sudden new development, he laughed. “That’s what it’s like being a guy.” I did end up having a boy. Maybe it was testosterone. I don’t know.
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Xantippe
Guest
Right.
In fact, it’s pretty much standard to tell kids, “We need to leave daddy alone right now because he’s doing taxes/finishing up grading/working/got a headache/whatever.”
I certainly heard that sort of thing a lot from my mom when I was a kid.
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Anglewannabe
Guest
huh? When did any woman on this thread say she was not sympathetic to her husband? Please quote exactly where a woman said she had not consideration for her husband when he was feeling well emotionally or physically
No, but it sure can have a lot of effects on a woman
That’s because men don’t have pregnancies or PMS. But I know a lot of men (not all) who will blow their temper and feel that it was their right because they were mad
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pensmama87
Guest
I give my husband (and children) much more leniency when they are hungry, sick, stressed, or tired. Considering that pregnancy for a lot of women means feeling a lot more of all of those things, it makes sense that some leniency would be given for an irritated word or other forgetting of minor social graces. 
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