AuntyN's blog triggered me to blog about this…my perspective of a marriage, a failed marriage, a happy marriage. And my perspective of women in a marriage, our rights, our 'wrongs'.
Having survived a nasty divorce some 5 and a half years back, it had taught me a lot in life. It had made me realize that I am not helpless, that the failure was not my fault (which contributed to the divorce, but the fact still stays that I was stupid then!). That my kids come FIRST in any situation.
Marriage is a gamble, as many of us know. I envy those who had been married for many years and still loving each other, like my parents. They love and 'hate' each other at the same time, which is so adorable to my eyes.
I watched Dr Phil last night (here I go again, tak habis2 Dr Phil!). It was entitled 'WifeStyle'…a husband who wants his wife to dress this way, cook this way and talk this way, while staying at home and caring for their 3 tiny kids. Dr Phil says,'Now, you said that you wanted your wife to wear thigh high boots when you're around, cook 'A' grade food and that she is only 75% of your standard? Tell me, who are you to judge her like that? How many % have you contributed to the marriage to help her cook, clean and care for the kids?'. I guess I do not have to elaborate more on this, as we all should know what the answer would be…helping each other. A marriage is not run by just a husband or just a wife kan?
Last week on Dr Phil, was also another topic on wives being abused and controlled by their husbands. My question is, how could that happen? The answers are always in the wives, for enduring such suffering and pain and hurt which they do not deserve at all. Some wives have been married for so long and they do not walk away because of their kids and I truly respect women who are like that, for the sake of their kids and again I pray that they will literally survive the abuse.
I am not pro divorce but I am pro active. I don’t like to play victim in a situation that takes two to play. Maybe I am strong, maybe I know what I am doing but most women don’t and are not as strong as I am…and I don’t blame them at all.
I have helped a best friend go through a divorce. Took her 6 months to decide (I did not suggest her of any decision). I was there to be her backbone, to coax her, care for her son, give her my shoulder for her to cry on and try to heal her hurt. That’s as much as I can do as a friend. Her decision to be divorced or her monetary tussle with the ex husband was not for me to decide for her, but she could always count on me for support and love.
My point in this is, we are human beings with equal ability. As long as we know our rights as a muslim wife (please do not forget that), do not be afraid to stand up for your rights and do not be afraid to save yourself from any situation. Hak kita sebagai seorang isteri.
To AuntyN's sister, my doa's and my heart to you. At least if you decided to 'walk away', you knew that you did it for yourself, knowing still that your son comes first. Stay strong and positive, as the road could be longer that you might think. Only Allah will show you the path and give you the ultimate strength that you will need in times of need.
Each time when I hear the word 'divorce', it still shudders me. I surely do not want my friends to experience what I went through but if it ever happens to a friend, I will always be here to support. Lots of support!
Please share with me your thoughts in this...your thoughts about marriage, about being the wife or simply about being a woman.
PS. My kids still feel the remnants of the divorce. Now that they're bigger, they sometimes say that they have the right to know what went wrong. My explanation? I say that I was too young and silly then…and that noone should ever control your life.
Having survived a nasty divorce some 5 and a half years back, it had taught me a lot in life. It had made me realize that I am not helpless, that the failure was not my fault (which contributed to the divorce, but the fact still stays that I was stupid then!). That my kids come FIRST in any situation.
Marriage is a gamble, as many of us know. I envy those who had been married for many years and still loving each other, like my parents. They love and 'hate' each other at the same time, which is so adorable to my eyes.
I watched Dr Phil last night (here I go again, tak habis2 Dr Phil!). It was entitled 'WifeStyle'…a husband who wants his wife to dress this way, cook this way and talk this way, while staying at home and caring for their 3 tiny kids. Dr Phil says,'Now, you said that you wanted your wife to wear thigh high boots when you're around, cook 'A' grade food and that she is only 75% of your standard? Tell me, who are you to judge her like that? How many % have you contributed to the marriage to help her cook, clean and care for the kids?'. I guess I do not have to elaborate more on this, as we all should know what the answer would be…helping each other. A marriage is not run by just a husband or just a wife kan?
Last week on Dr Phil, was also another topic on wives being abused and controlled by their husbands. My question is, how could that happen? The answers are always in the wives, for enduring such suffering and pain and hurt which they do not deserve at all. Some wives have been married for so long and they do not walk away because of their kids and I truly respect women who are like that, for the sake of their kids and again I pray that they will literally survive the abuse.
I am not pro divorce but I am pro active. I don’t like to play victim in a situation that takes two to play. Maybe I am strong, maybe I know what I am doing but most women don’t and are not as strong as I am…and I don’t blame them at all.
I have helped a best friend go through a divorce. Took her 6 months to decide (I did not suggest her of any decision). I was there to be her backbone, to coax her, care for her son, give her my shoulder for her to cry on and try to heal her hurt. That’s as much as I can do as a friend. Her decision to be divorced or her monetary tussle with the ex husband was not for me to decide for her, but she could always count on me for support and love.
My point in this is, we are human beings with equal ability. As long as we know our rights as a muslim wife (please do not forget that), do not be afraid to stand up for your rights and do not be afraid to save yourself from any situation. Hak kita sebagai seorang isteri.
To AuntyN's sister, my doa's and my heart to you. At least if you decided to 'walk away', you knew that you did it for yourself, knowing still that your son comes first. Stay strong and positive, as the road could be longer that you might think. Only Allah will show you the path and give you the ultimate strength that you will need in times of need.
Each time when I hear the word 'divorce', it still shudders me. I surely do not want my friends to experience what I went through but if it ever happens to a friend, I will always be here to support. Lots of support!
Please share with me your thoughts in this...your thoughts about marriage, about being the wife or simply about being a woman.
PS. My kids still feel the remnants of the divorce. Now that they're bigger, they sometimes say that they have the right to know what went wrong. My explanation? I say that I was too young and silly then…and that noone should ever control your life.
12 comments:
i have always believed in jodoh, but if it does not work out a few years in,despite having tried everything, it just means, our time with that person is up, as with everything in this life. so we cannot deny that person and ourselves the chance to be happy, even if it means going separate ways. but for the children, their birth parents would always be mom and dad and nothing less. should both of them remarry, the children benefit by gaining more people to love and be loved.
your life,twin, is so inspiring. you have grown from strength to strength, all must be bcuz u have found the right man that brings out the best in you. from what u have told me, encik daud is such a darling to have embraced the ppl you love most just like his own.
being a woman, i personally think socially, we do have to conform to gender-specific roles to a certain extent. there are certain things that we do better than men, yet what men are predisposed to do, they ought to do it for us(macam feminist gitu eh, the statement? but i am not saying we are the superior sex).On the other hand, there is always the converging symbiotic points that require us to complement each other.
being a wife, for me, it is a licence to be treated like a bratty, whiny principessa.
Nah, seriously, i think my role is to be an active part of a team. the family is like a factory, all systems must be up in order to be productive.
Twin, well u know that its not all rosey :)
I still remember my 2nd wedding day. I was shivering, so scared that I would make the same mistake over again. Would I have the energy to have another marriage? Can I afford to make another mistake? Would my marriage be happy?
I think I married my husband because of how he treated my kids when we first met. One of my criteria if I were to ever remarry, was for that person to love me…and my kids, not to ever rip us apart and love us as a unit. Alhamdulilah, it was like a fairy tale kan? But kata orang tuh, lain org lain ragam…this marriage is very different.
It has its difficulties and differences, unlike other marriages which goes on auto pilot. It took us some time to sit down and discuss, and fight and argue and then agree upon how to run our marriage. Some of the western (being open minded and trust ur husband no matter how 'friendly' he gets, blah!) and some of the eastern (embracing islam and learning our culture) and we're still learning from each other.
I can say that my marriage is good. Very good that I feel the partnership between us. No power trips, noone saying 'u have to obey me' or anything like that.
My previous marriage must have taught me to be more confident of myself, to speak up when needed and to learn to control my bull headedness (I still have this problem).
If we define house chores according to their nature of sexes (like cooking for women and holding the wrench for men), then I would have to cook everyday after work hehehe. The husband cooks 5-6 times a week just because he works from home and it would be so much easier to have food on the table when I am home and have an early dinner than having to wait another 1.5 hrs for dinner.
But then again, I have seen marriages breaking up after 25 years. All of a sudden, the cupid arrow just broke and detached one of the hearts huh? So this comes back to the fact that marriage is a gamble. To me, I am so thankful to Allah that my marriage is still a happy one, insyaAllah till the end of our lives.
Marriage is sacrosanct. But I think a lot of us tend to not TRULY understand what it's all about. Sometimes, one cannot even look to one's parents or family for examples.
Everybody of course will go into a marriage wanting what is best for that marriage, but the difficult thing then is establishing and determining what actually works for that specific marriage. One man's meat is another man's poison, and all that stuff.
My personal opinion also is that sometimes we allow our culture and traditional backgrounds to encroach too much into the institution. I use the example of Malay men, as Muslims. All too often, we hear of Malay men ill-treating their wives (much like AuntyN's sister's case and the long comments I wrote there).
Not to say that non-Malay men don't ill treat their wives, but for the Malay men - who are also Muslims, to me have NO excuse to behave the way they do.
They misunderstand the role of women in Islam, and fail to see how the Prophet s.a.w treated all his wives. Some go so far as to use the religion to gratify their lusty pursuits or to misbehave/ill-treat the wife.
Of course, I'm generalising .. not all Muslim Malay men are like that. But there ARE those who are.
Women also should not compare themselves to their other friends in terms of marriage and what they have or don't have. What you have, and have worked for, God has given you. Simple as that. Try as best as you can, and like you said, DON'T forget your role as a Muslim wife (which is your primary role) and be smart, but not selfish.
Yes, divorce is a painful, painful thing. But then again, I truly believe that God won't put us through hell and back (on this earth) if there was no lesson or take-away for us at the end of it.
"Verily, with every difficult, there is relief. With every difficulty, there is relief". One of my most favourite verses from the Quran.
We just need to realise, and then "see". Kan?
blabs, very inspirational comment.
muslim men use the religion to empower their egoism. like what my beloved ayu said 'if a man asked me if i can cook, i am going to ask him if he can be an imam?' hehehe.
the derhaka part and the phrase saying 'sebagai isteri, etc etc' was too much for me to take in my first marriage. i was like 'come on man, dont u have anything else to say?'. he did not even participate in the kids educational activities, did not even want to go to religious classes with me...so whats that about isteri derhaka and all?
non muslim men can be abusive. but they do it because they want to. it hurts to see such abuse, the wife being patient, but the husband naik kepala.
i am not saying that i am a good wife. my husband keeps saying that i am his partner, his best friend and not his 'wife' who has to keep saying yes and bow down when hes in front of me.
but i still believe in the theory of loving myself before i can afford to love others. just in case the marriage turns bad, we have to save ourselves and our kids and not let us betray ourselves kan?
Gosh... this is such an interesting post. I totally agree with you Ely... "muslim men use the religion to empower their egoism"
My x was like that. I backed out of marrying him 3 months before the wedding and it was the best decision ever. Had I married him, I would not even have lasted 2 months. I could not stand the whole bow down to ur husbands just because u r a muslim wife, u have minimal rights blah blah blah. Actually, religion never stated these things, its exactly your statement Ely, as you described it so well, that made them like that. BASTARDS.
When I found my hubby, I just know that he was the right one. what I call it is "we fit each other like a glove" Our goods and bads just works well with the 2 of us. We are not perfect, we don have a perfect marriage, but we just mesh well. Argue well too hehe...
Thank you for the post.
lin, i thank you for coming to my blog and commenting on this. i knwo that i would not get too uch response fm this posting as it requires indepth thinking kan?
u have made a good choice into not marrying ur ex before it was too late...like me. believe it or not, it took me 9 years and 2 kids later to have the guts to say that i quit. i could not continue with a marriage that dictated me what to do, what i should do and how i should behave 99% of the time.
thank you again :)
Wow, after reading this entry and all the comments, I sat down and felt sad. I dont know much about malay/muslim men and as I am reading more blog, they become more scary to me.
I have 21 and 20 year old daughters, they have futures and all these talks of divorces really scares me!
kak lela, memang betul, i shudder when i think abt my kids too. tapikan, what we can do is berdoa so that they will make the right choice kan?
All I can say Ely is, marriage is hard work, very very hard work! If anyone jumps into a marriage thinking they'll live happily ever after just like that, they're in for a very nasty surprise.
thats right! marriage is not a 'turn key' mechanism. u have to work and work hard for it. its not a fairy tale either right?
getting married is hard work (you know lah the Malay kepoh-kepoh style - kenduri lah itu lah ini lah).
staying happy in a marriage is even hard work - and hvg an egoistic husband which interpret religion-dia-punya-style make thing 100X harder.
but yeah ! as you say - sayangi diri sendiri dulu dan be as independent financially as possible.
-ninuk
ninuk, i like it when u mentioned the big wedding kenduri and all! that is hardwork!
but u know what? not many women love themselves enough to rescue them from any abuse...physically or mentally...betul tak?
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