Men Screw Up

Men screw up.  I know it.  You know it.  A lot of women are willing to stand around and tell you how their men screw up and exactly how often.  The first few years Daniel and I were together I worked in an office building where most of the women there didn't have enough to do.  They were like children or dogs in that they needed to go outside and get some energy out.  I honestly think they didn't have enough to do.  Constantly I had to sidestep a circle of these harpies because the very loud topic of conversation was almost invariably What My Husband Did/Didn't Do This Week.  I would say 90% of that entire building's women were like this and I came across this type of conversation almost every single day.
                                                                                      
Our culture has taught us through characters like Tim "the Tool-Man" Taylor that men just can't be trusted to do anything by themselves.   They are like babies and cannot be trusted with money, to find the sugar in the kitchen, to separate the whites from the darks in the laundry room...they can't even manage to take the trash out once a week.  Women are taught that men are incapable cavemen who all share the same brain cell.  Heaven forbid they try to fix the computer so hard earned money isn't given to someone outside of the household.  They might blow it up!
                        
The worst part of being a woman in America is having to go through the grocery store check out line to discover you aren't what men want.  Cosmopolitan tells you you have to be 110 pounds and have gorgeous, thick hair, flawless skin, and hunter-green eyes.  Movies tell us the same thing.  So do commercials.  So does everything else out there women run into where there is a woman pictured.  Men are being taught that the perfect woman has a career and keeps a house like those in Better Homes and Gardens.  She can hunt, fish, and trap.  She has a doctorate in children's psychology.  She is both a virgin and a whore.  How horrible that women develop complexes because of this type of brain washing because there is no way we can even compete.
           
Can you relate to how a man must feel seeing what his gender specific role is?  He must make $500k a year, drive a cherry sports car, never lose his hair, always perform perfectly in bed, change the baby's diapers and do the midnight feeding, fix the water heater, maintain a 3% body fat, etc etc etc.  The paradox is an American male model wears feminine jeans and has to ask his wife for $5.00.

Daniel isn't perfect.  He is incapable of helping me around the house every week because he works very hard in very hard conditions.  He works 11 hours a day, 5 days a week and puts in 9 hours on a typical Saturday.  His heart is willing but his body is weak.  He cannot do the dishes after supper every night.  Even when he only worked 40 hours a week I still did not expect any help from him with my job.  If I'm working 40 hours a week on our home, he shouldn't have to do the dishes, should he?  I put in 7 hours during the day while he is at work.  The last hour is done when he is home...getting dinner on the table, doing the dishes, etc.  I just don't expect him to do the housework.  Yes he helps here and there and I'm grateful when he does, but his role in our home doesn't involve keeping the house.


A while back our car broke down.  All the signs were saying it had a blown head gasket.  Daniel had never worked on a car before really.  He changed the oil, changed an occasional tire, worked with his dad a bit when he was a kid...but that was the extent of his experience.  Money was tight and we couldn't really afford to fork over the cash to purchase another car and we certainly didn't want to take on a car payment.  Daniel had to fix it.  He looked up videos on YouTube to learn what was wrong and how to fix it.  He had the car taken apart down to the block.  He fixed it.

Was I nervous?  For two days our car was torn apart with a hundred pieces out in the yard laying on the ground and he was watching some guy on YouTube.  What do you think?  There was a part of me that even thought he might make it worse.  I'm sure I even voiced a nervous opposition in the beginning but the bottom line is he made a decision that he was going to try and fix it.  Who am I to stand in his way?  Yes, having no vehicle would have affected me too, but he wanted to try.    

That was a year ago and it's still fixed.  Can you imagine what would have happened had I not "allowed" him to try and fix it?  We would have been saddled with a car payment we really couldn't have afforded.  Flash forward to a year later and I might have started resenting him and his inability to fix a car.  I would have thought, "After all, it's his fault we had to get another vehicle".  So our relationship and finances would be on shaky ground right now because of my inability to let him try something new and complex.  We need to allow men to do things in life.  They, after all, have a life with goals, wants, and needs.  If your husband wants to do something, let him do it.  

What would my thinking been if he been unable to repair it?  Have some grace and mercy, ladies.  Failing is not a flaw of Daniel's.  Failing is something that all humans do.  So he would have failed.  At least he tried and probably would have learned something in the process for the next time our car broke down.  He does fail occasionally and sometimes that failure costs us time, money, and living uncomfortably.  We are yoked together.  What we do affects the other person.  I need to have some grace first and mercy second.  I need to not point out his failures.  He knows.  He doesn't need me to tell him.  He is not a child.
                                          
If you still think your husband incapable, think about what he does at work.  I know a man whose career was building things.  He started out painting houses.  Then he built houses.  Later in life he was in charge of building much bigger things.  Something else...he reads quantum physics books just for fun.

His wife is a beautiful, capable person in her own right.  An amazing woman who has accomplished much in her life who, even under the most stressful circumstances, displays grace and strength.  She is giving and merciful.  Her house is run efficiently and her children love her.  Her one flaw is she will not allow her capable husband (the man who reads quantum physics books...just for fun) to try to fix their car, their computer, or anything too complex.    Probably because he has failed in the past and many, many times. 

The point is, even the best of women are predisposed to not allowing our husbands to do things.  We have a fear that they will ruin our finances and lives because of the fact that we are yoked with them so we want to control them and in this way we will not suffer the consequences of their actions.  Yes, men make mistakes and some of them monumental affecting their wives lives for years.  That's not to say men are incapable of fixing complex things.  This poor man who has built millions and millions of dollars worth of buildings now believes himself incapable of even changing out an alternator because his self-confidence won't allow him to do so.  His wife need not say much of anything anymore.  She has little fear he will try to repair anything more than maybe a leaky faucet because she has made him truly believe he is incompetent.
                                        
There is a man Daniel works with whose wife will not allow him to have any money on his person.  I suspect she controls all the finances and what money he has she alone allows him to possess.  This is probably because he is bad with money and has made some pretty big mistakes.  However, if he never has any money how is he going to learn to manage it properly?  It's a sad state of affairs when a grown man is unable to have the chance to  learn to sock a little money away.  Perhaps he would be able to surprise her one day by taking her out to dinner, or bringing her home some flowers if he were but allowed to keep a little of his paycheck.  Since he is never allowed to have $20 in his wallet she will never know the joy of having that simple proof that he thinks about her and wants to do nice things for her.  All he can do at this point is tell her.

"My husband messes up constantly.  I give him money and he blows it.  We are going to lose our house if I let him manage our money."

 Firstly, don't "give him money".  He works hard and that is his money, also.  Both in a marriage need to take part in the house budget.  The wife needs to have a say, and so does the husband.  I believe in submitting to your husband, so if he says "we're going to blow $300 at Walmart this week on crap" then, well, I guess we're taking a trip to Walmart.  Before this trip I will voice a complaint and hope he sees things my way, but in practice I'm not always there or I can forget how much money we truly have to blow.

Secondly, well then I guess you are going to lose your house.  People do live in tents you know.  You have to be content with what you have and what your husband provides.  Daniel was laid off this past year and times were hard for us.  To the point I looked at tents and thought maybe it might come to that.  I would have been uncomfortable but happy because we would still be going through the adventure of life together.


Step back and love your husband enough to allow him to live life.  It's short and he won't get another chance to live it over again.  Don't make him feel bad for the mistakes he makes when he spends too much money.  A hen pecked husband is a sorry sight.  Let him keep trying even when he keeps failing.  He is a grown man in his own right, and not your child or your dog.  Be happy with what he provides just as you would want him happy with the fact that you are not an heiress with a perfect body keeping a perfectly clean house.