#rishta

It has been a year since we became husband and wife. And our one year anniversary we’re spending over 3000 miles apart. To say that I am not upset would be a lie. I know the situation is not his fault, but I’m still allowed to be upset. Not at him. At the situation. 

I feel like marriage just bought a different dimension to our relationship. In the years that I knew him prior I never felt this connected to him. Or maybe I did not allow myself to feel this connected. It is weird because I never thought I could love someone this much. He is not only my best friend, but my biggest supporter, my shoulder to cry on, my biggest cheerleader and the place my heart feels at home. 

The last year feels like a dream. For the first 6 months we were just in awe of being able to be with each other. Every dawaat we went to, every wedding we attended, every family outing we went to, every time my mum cooked for him and every time my dad asked after him, felt surreal. Of course there was tears from learning to live with another person, and having a long-distance relationship but at the end we were just very grateful to be able to have those issues.

Growing up as the eldest, especially in an ethnic household, forces you to mature quicker. You’re constantly on your best behaviour. The honour of the family rested on your actions. You sibling’s future choices depended on you. You became the second mum, and essentially had to think about everyone else before yourself. You became an ear for whoever needed it. So your worries and tears were yours alone. Behind closed doors, the tears and worries were dealt with. Mostly through writing everything down (how this blog started). As I got older and the problems and stress got more complex, I started to realise how lonely I was despite the chaos around me. 

The “eldest daughter” mentality shaped my spouse search. I don’t think I have enough time to divulge into that but I will at some point. I met my husband at a time where I was ending something with a “rishta potential” and as you can imagine there was immense stress around that situation. One of my first messages to him were that I wanted only to stay friends, and he responded with until we fall in love then we’ll take it from there. Well looks like, we fell it love and it ended in a marriage. Alhamdulillah x1000. After all the tears, heartbreak, prayers and lots of sabr, we made it. I’m in love with our love story and may Allah protect it and bless it. Say MashaAllah please.

More than half the men in Generation X and the Baby Boom said that when they left HBS, they expected that their careers would take priority over their spouses’ or partners’. Meanwhile, the vast majority of women across racial groups and generations anticipated that their careers would rank equally with those of their partners.

Close to three-quarters of Gen X and Baby Boom men reported that their careers had indeed taken precedence—more than had originally expected this arrangement. 

We had asked a parallel set of questions about child care: How had graduates who were expecting to have partners and children (91%) anticipated dividing child care responsibilities when they left HBS, and how did they actually divide them? Across the board, we found expectations on this dimension to be much more traditional than those regarding career priority. At the time they graduated from HBS, more than three-quarters of men expected that their partners would do the lion’s share of child care. Black men were somewhat less likely to expect such an arrangement. Meanwhile, about half the women expected that they would take on the majority of this work. Latinas were the least likely, at 40%, to have expected to shoulder most of the child care.

Whatever the explanation, this disconnect exacts a psychic cost—for both women and men. Women who started out with egalitarian expectations but ended up in more-traditional arrangements felt less satisfied with how their careers have progressed than did women who both expected and experienced egalitarian partnerships at home. And in general, women tended to be less satisfied than men with their career growth—except for those whose careers and child care responsibilities were seen as equal to their partners’.

Nevertheless, like their predecessors, the youngest men have expectations more traditional than those of their female peers. Whereas three-quarters of Millennial women anticipate that their careers will be at least as important as their partners’, half the men in their generation expect that their own careers will take priority. And whereas two-thirds of Millennial men expect that their partners will handle the majority of child care, just under half—42%—of Millennial women expect that they themselves will do so.

We can’t help noting that 42% is still a sizable proportion, and these young women may find—as Gen X and Baby Boom women apparently did—that shouldering most of the child rearing hinders equal career importance. Only 10% of the Millennial graduates have children, and they are still early in their careers, so we do not yet know how these mismatched expectations will ultimately play out. But if previous generations are any indication, change won’t occur soon.

I'm always posting this study and always bringing it up when people try to convince me to get married. It's not just about career for me, but about being seen as an agent of my own life. I resent the idea that I should make every decision about my own life according to what would be convenient for an imaginary husband. Has a boy ever thought he should pick a job with part time potential so he can father children some day?

I'm not interested in being a helpmeet, I'm not interested in doing the lion's share of domestic work and childcare in addition to my job (perhaps the man will magnanimously proclaim that I can simply quit my job if I find it all too stressful? 🙄).

Kitna ajeeb hai

Rishta us se

Dur reh ke bhi

Is dil ki

Gehraaion mein

Kahin rehta hai

Ye roshni

Jab

Mere dil ke

Zakhmon se chan ke

Utarti hai

To

Sitara ban ke

Uski ankhon mein

Felt bored, might delete my Shaadi.com account later.