I never knew what a great biology class having a dog would be. I never intended to ever have the conversations I'm forced to have now that my son is intending to breed this dog. He is certainly learning very quickly about male and female dogs and how things work. Not that he didn't understand it before, but now he really needs to understand it! I didn't sign up for that!!!! Oh well, just another part of our homeschool I guess. There is just way too much science going on for me to handle outside in the kennel.......
On a completely different topic, as I've started to talk with more and more women, I've started to notice a struggle that is more common than I first realized. I hear over and over the words, "My husband is really struggling.....with work, with finding work, wishing he were doing different work, out of work, depressed by work......." I think for most women, they think it's just their husband who is struggling, but I don't think that is the case at all. Way back in the Garden of Eden, when the consequences were handed down to Adam and Eve, God said to Adam, "cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; " (Gen 3:17).
I used to think it just meant you'll have to work your whole life and it will be hard. Nope. I think it means everything about finding work, getting work, doing work....all of it will be hard. And not just for the husband, but for everyone who is related or near the husband!
We had prayed all summer for direction from the Lord for my own husband concerning his work. Then, miracle of all miracles, we were provided for with a dream job, with dream hours. The irony? It has been hard!!!! The work itself isn't hard, it's quite easy so far, but the impact of taking this job when he has another full-time contract has started to reveal itself. He's exhausted! And usually when he works physically, he gets a morning or a day to recover at home. Not now. No matter how much pain he is in, he's required to get up and go which makes his physical recovery time much longer.
He could handle all this, and wasn't complaining, but we started to sense a low-level of grumpiness! Sometimes it would go to a higher level and we thought it was a little out of proportion. Finally, last week, he and I sat down and talked about it. He was grumpy and he didn't even know why. It turns out he has a certain level of pain he just lives with all the time, early stages of arthritis in one or two of his joints. Plus, he now is constantly having to organize his time to fit everything in, which he used to have to do before, but now it is just that much more intensified. He also still has to think of all the regular stuff such as bills, home repairs, car repairs......it's a lot of responsibility being a father of 8 and a husband to a high-maintenance woman like me!!!! All this was going on in his head and affecting him without any of us really understanding. All we saw was grumpy Daddy.
How can this be?! Didn't we pray for this job? Didn't God answer our prayers? Yes and yes. But this is what I mean. Even with the Lord providing so amazingly, there is still an element of the curse in our lives with respect to RM's work. Even with the seemingly perfect job, there is still a struggle. What then?!
What I noticed was that I could react to his grumpiness and be grumpy right back at him, which I tried and it, uh, didn't work. Or, I could be what I needed to be for him, which was his helpmeet. After we talked about the challenges that have come with this new job, everything was out in the open. Adam and Eve must have done this, too. Before the curse, all was well. After the curse, Adam now had thistles and thorns to deal with, sweat and blood. He must have been a bit grumpy, too! Was Eve just as grumpy or did they make a plan on how to handle things. Did she kick in to be his helpmeet the way God intended?
Talking about his challenges was half the battle. That's what I've noticed is the most important thing about being a wife - hearing the struggles of my husband relieves almost all the struggles. The thing about the curse is that the reality of it for a man never leaves. So what do you do then? We have learned to accept the reality that life, and especially work, is always going to be hard. Even with the perfect job. We've learned to talk about everything, even something as simple as being grumpy. For some mean, grumpiness is the precursor to depression. The word "grumpy" sounds funny, but if left to itself can become something much more serious. I think this is where we, as women, can be so helpful! We can make sure we cut grumpiness and depression off at the pass just by being an ear and acknowledging how hard work can be. It didn't change my husband's difficulties, but somehow it helped alleviate his stresses by having them heard.
I've heard from a number of women lately that their husbands are struggling in other areas related to work. For these men, they are taking jobs that pay the bills perhaps but are not the jobs they wish they could be in for the rest of their lives. This is such a hard place to be and there is no easy answer for that. My encouragement to them is to a fast either on their husband's behalf, especially if he isn't in a good place spiritually, or to do a fast together if he is open to that. What we've seen, though, is that no matter what, contentment is key. Learning to be content in the situation we find ourselves in is the best place to start. We shouldn't be so shocked that our husband's struggle with finding their "ideal" job. It's another thorn, another part of the painful process.
In a strange way, recognizing the curse will make us better wives. Satan will use our ignorance of the curse and turn it into a huge battle that we need not fight on our own. In our home, the job situation has not changed, but the spirit of grumpiness is gone. My husband wasn't even aware of what was going on. Now that it is out in the open and I'm aware and he's aware of the spiritual battle, we are more equipped to handle it. We're more sensitive to the other one's needs. We're less selfish and more committed to helping one another through this transition. We're aware that Satan was out to attack us through any way he could and he was using this amazing answer to prayer to get to us!
Gratitude is also the best way to handle any struggle our husbands are having. It might be hard at first to be thankful for the struggles we see them going through, but God can and is using them in ways we don't know. Sadly, the main thing God is doing is sanctifying us through them! I say sadly, because it shouldn't take hard times to teach us, but it does. No one enjoys that process, but it is always a good thing when we are developing the character God longs for us to have. It might be really hard to find something to be grateful for, but with practice God can show us things to thank Him for and then......the miracle is imminent....my favourite saying from Ann Voskamp. I say, "practice", because we can also practice bad habits, such as being miserable and grumpy ourselves. It is easy to get really good at being an awful wife and it takes a lot more effort to be a good wife.
So, if I could talk to all those women who want out or who are so unhappy in their situations or who would like a "replacement husband", press on! The curse that came along so many years ago may not change until Christ returns, but God has given us such a great responsibility in the meantime to be the best helpmeets we can be and He's also given us His greatest resource - Himself, to help us be strong, loving and patient wives. When I was feeling this undercurrent of frustration last week and we hadn't talked about it yet, I just prayed, asking the Lord to help me to know how to be a good wife and I prayed that the wall I was afraid would form between him and I would be broken down. It was shortly after that an opportunity came up to talk about how we were both feeling. I didn't create the scenario, God did. I hadn't known how to talk about it, God worked it all out. It wasn't a hard conversation, it was a great conversation.
One of the best verses in the Bible on this topic is from Proverbs 14:1, "The wisest of women builds her house, but folly with her own hands tears it down." I want to be the "wisest of women" not a woman who tears down her house "with her own hands".
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