With an additional wife and her additional income, even small, that would free up the husband to have more time with the family.
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Support Advice for supporting first wife in accepting polygyny.
- Thread starter Stuckinthewoods
- Start date
With an additional wife and her additional income, even small, that would free up the husband to have more time with the family.
What he is describing is the same thing I experienced as a first and only (for 25 years) wife. I cooked, cared for animals, cared for children, nursed the babies, anwered the business phone, worked in the garden. In the summer I was too exhausted for intimacy by the time the chores were done and the kids were in bed. I remember very distinctly feeling that I could have more QUALITY time with my husband if someone else was here to help....and she might also get more QUALITY time than she would as an only wife.
I was never wanting less of my husband, but rather thought mutual support would be a benefit for all involved.
It takes time to establish a business. It takes time to raise children to ages where they can be relied on to take care of their chores without supervision and following up on them. Havin a large family means going back to baby stages every couple of years.
Everyone has the same number of hours in a day. The gain is that it doesn't take twice as long to make twice as much food, and an extra "grown up" on the team is way more + than - for sure!
I wasn't commenting housework, but his work. He has two side businesses. His work is minimum 60, maybe reaching 80 hours if he had some longer travel and overtime. He didn't mentioned he needs both side businesses for survival.
I understand wanting to start your own business and control your destiny, but two is too much. Better to concentrate on one.
And they certainly eat free time on weekend.
bigonlife1981
Member
I hear what your saying, but in this day and age it really depends on what type of businesses He is running and what systems He can implement to remove more of his time from them, maybe a second wife will help with this or like your saying maybe this is something that will be a problem to solve first? I guess we don't know enough about it all?
If your wife isn't on board, she isn't on board. Do not try to coerce her, persuade her, trick her, etc.
"She holds that she would be miserable for the rest of her life if there was another woman in the house that I was married to."
That is entirely valid. Plural marriage is not for everyone. Respect that, or you might find yourself with 0 wives.
" She doesn't feel it is the direction she wants, therefore it can't be for us."
Again, it isn't for "us" if she isn't on board; it might be for *you*, but if she isn't interested, it isn't "for us". Recognize that, or you might find yourself with 0 wives.
"As you can tell, she is rather strong willed (which is not necessarily a bad thing, except that now I think it is starting to make her disrespect my headship over her)"
Whoa, whoa, whoa. Your wife is presumably an adult; if she does not want to enter into a plural marriage, that is fully her right. She is not disrespecting you by not wanting to jump into something that you've decided after the fact. Especially something as radical as bringing home another wife. Polygamy is, and always has been, in the minority. Expecting a random woman to just be fine with it, and thinking that she is disrespecting you for not going "oh yes baby, let's do it, let's do it right now, I'm fully on board" is more you disrespecting her agency than anything.
"She holds that she would be miserable for the rest of her life if there was another woman in the house that I was married to."
That is entirely valid. Plural marriage is not for everyone. Respect that, or you might find yourself with 0 wives.
" She doesn't feel it is the direction she wants, therefore it can't be for us."
Again, it isn't for "us" if she isn't on board; it might be for *you*, but if she isn't interested, it isn't "for us". Recognize that, or you might find yourself with 0 wives.
"As you can tell, she is rather strong willed (which is not necessarily a bad thing, except that now I think it is starting to make her disrespect my headship over her)"
Whoa, whoa, whoa. Your wife is presumably an adult; if she does not want to enter into a plural marriage, that is fully her right. She is not disrespecting you by not wanting to jump into something that you've decided after the fact. Especially something as radical as bringing home another wife. Polygamy is, and always has been, in the minority. Expecting a random woman to just be fine with it, and thinking that she is disrespecting you for not going "oh yes baby, let's do it, let's do it right now, I'm fully on board" is more you disrespecting her agency than anything.
I hear you, brother, I absolutely don't want to lose my wife.
I believe she does have agency. I am trying to come to terms with this though. I recognize that taking time has value. But if a womans agency veto mans agency/leadership, is there not a problem? I see lots of them. I do not want to be a tyrant nor a doormat. But agency has to be held within the limits imposed by reality. Who can provide a full picture of those? Location, personal attributes, budget, etc? I am free to go to the moon, but not I I am not a trained astronot with a rocket, crew, and fuel supply. So I don't spend a lot of time harping about that particular freedom. The issue seems to mee to be failure on the part of the first wife to perceive reality as it now is. Yes she needs time, grace, support, and an occadional reality check. But she will never see realityif agency is a card she can playto create her own preferred reality at the expense of her HEAD. please make it make sense.
Thank you, Jolene! I will check it out!
I will check this out as well, thanks Megan!My own meager contribution is this blog that I no longer update.
Ok, so theres a lot of back-and-forth on this issue it seems- yes I have two side businesses that I am trying to juggle. Side business #1 is very practical and fairly lucritive, so that is the one that makes the extra money that we need () Side business #2 doesn't make much money to be honest, but I am trying to be a good steward to something that God has placed on my heart to do.Recurring themes for successful poly families.
Okay, right here you are stating a practical reason for seeking a plural and this is also a recurring theme for successful poly families. No kidding, it is NOT selfish to add a plural so she can help with the household and the family! There are women out there who need this in their lives to feel meaningful.
You help her by providing her with a home and by allowing her to make meaningful contributions to your family and she helps you and your wife by doing things neither of you has time to do. Very prudent and very practical.
Business #1 might actually have the ability to actually go full-time- there have been some developments lately, and that would be a blessing. My wife and I have already talked about it that it would be awesome if she were able to help me out sometimes: she is a hard worker, and we would get to spend more time together: win=win. The problem for this is babysitting and maintaining a household, and someone to help keep the books would also be ahuge boon.
Business #2 is mostly done from home and in the evenings, except for when I am a vendor at events. For these, my family always joins me for at least a portion of the time. We are firm believers in spending as much time together as a family as possible.
Additionally, we are slowly building a homestead on the small property that we have, and dream of having a farmette someday.
With the way our life is structured, it seems highly likely that our lives would result in less (practical) stress, more of my time being allocated to business/homestead-building endeavors (while still prioritizing time spent with all family members), and more time for my wife to be on top of all the home-making tasks that she desires to be on top of. I find it likely that this would result in more quality-time in general, although some, of course, would be split between two women.
You're welcome!I am not at all going to assert a cause and effect relationship here but our new friend @Stuckinthewoods pointed out something I had never consciously considered until he mentioned it:
Scratch cooking.
It isn't so much a requirement for success but maybe it is an indicator that a woman is willing to put more of her own effort and her own skill into perhaps mundane tasks.
Interesting. Thank you for this interesting insight SITW!!!
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Husband and sons do tree trimming and removal here. Rope and saddle technical removals are something they are extremely proficient at. They also trim properly so the trees keep their natural beauty. It does pay well.....and a long time ago I used to help with jobs. I answrred the business phone for over 20 years too. In 2021 he hired a single mom to take and make calls and sent out estimates and invoices....and schedule work. A little over a year later she accepted a "permanent position" and became his wife. Now they have a couple cute little ones growing up.
Hah, thats awesome! Poly arborists unite. It's hard work, but very satisfying.
I am going to push back on some of what you have said here. It is true that our wives have legal options at their disposal and we should be very aware of them. That said, your take seems to be that if his wife does not want him to take another wife, then that is her call. That is not how submission looks. Does the church have any say over God? The Bridegroom coming back for his brides? Do we get veto power over him?
Our relationship is to reflect that relationship. He has ultimate authority over us and we sign on knowing that there are things coming that we don't yet know about. Changes that we may not like. In fact, Christ tells us that there will be things that come upon us that we will not like due to our choosing to bind ourselves to him.
A wise leader will give direction and then address concerns. He will give direction and then establish the environment for his will to be carried out. A wise leader may loose a follower every now and then because some followers weren't real followers, they were simply going in the same direction for a period of time and it appeared that they were followers....
There is never a problem if someone doesn't want to do something another person wants them to do. Women aren't property, they aren't slaves, if she doesn't want to participate in polygamy, she has every right to say no and/or leave the marriage if the husband chooses to pursue it.
There are people on this forum who 100% act like women can't do anything unless the husband says so, can't believe anything unless the husband says so, can't think anything unless the husband says so. This couldn't be further from the truth and isn't healthy.
The same people that are like "My wife won't let me take more wives, I'm outraged, that isn't her hcoice" are the same people that come back "My wife left me, what dod I do wrong, please help, please pray for me, I don't understand why she left", well, maybe because you were treating her like property and not a human being.
The reality is she does not want to participate in polygamy. She did not enter the marriage with the expectation of polygamy. The reality is she does not have to participate in polygamy or be happy about her husband wanting to live it.
She's a human being, not a robot purchased from a Sears catalog.
Sears is still publishing a catalog? I want one!!! With Robots also!?!?! WhhoooEEEEEE!
All kidding aside.... The Sears catalog was AWESOME for us when I was a child.
You have a point, and so does she. But viewed in isolation there is no big picture acknowledgment of the blueprint of our Creator. A bird can be happy in its cage. I left the cage door open for hours before the bird even ventured to perch on the oone doorframe.
It is no ones job to keep all the gates closed just because blindness of mind or spirit cannot perceive amy benefit in movin out toward the ideal we were created to live, embrace, or at least come to terms with.
There is need of patience and gentleness on t he one part, but somehow the bigger picture needs to be painted, showcased, and valued. Not all are called to participate, but none will realize the fulfillment of their destinywhile denying the possibility that there is a path which could be taken and that it was insyalled by our designer Who knows better than any of us what good is and what could bring joy and benefit.
We can hear the perspective of someone we care about without forsaking our own or being relieved of our duty to wash, teach, lead, and build.
Or so it seems to me.
The Christmas one was the greatest thing ever.Sears is still publishing a catalog? I want one!!! With Robots also!?!?! WhhoooEEEEEE!
All kidding aside.... The Sears catalog was AWESOME for us when I was a child.
We only cared about ogling the girls in underwear.
Prehistoric porn.
What about National Geo-pornigraphic?
If you understand these references, then you just might be old.