What I find most interesting is the lack of conversation about the Trad Husband. Because how can you have a Trad Wife without one? It's a little like having a bicycle without the wheels.
If a Trad Wife is a woman who embraces traditional gender roles and commits herself to being a stay-at-home mother and taking on all of the responsibilies for managing a household, what does the role of her partner look like? And what is the contract that they need to have to allows both people to be successful in these roles?
My mother was a Trad Wife, before there was the need to assign a name to this role. When she was pregnant with me, married and living with my father in New York City in the 1960's, she worked as an editor at R. J. Reynolds. My father insisted she quit work so that she could stay home and raise me (and later my brother). He was self-employed as a painter/construction worker. He also insisted that the City was no place to raise children. So he moved us back to the family farm in northeastern, rural Pennsylvania.
As is often the case, I did not appreciate everything my mother did for us until much, much later in life. Her job was not 9 to 5. She never had a day off. She took care of me and my brother, she cooked the meals, cleaned the house, did the laundry. And because it was a farm, this woman who was a born city girl found herself caring for animals (chickens, ducks, geese, cows) and tending vegetable and flower gardens.
My father found a job as a mechanic at the Protor & Gamble papermill. He worked 40 hours a week, although often he was on call if key machinery needed repair and there wasn't anyone available and/or with the skills to do the repair. On this days off, usually the weekend, he did repairs around the house and farm, maintained the car, and did what he termed "bull work," the chores that required brute strength. He also drank. A lot.
My mother managed the money. Being a child born during the Great Depression and having grown up in abject poverity in the City, she was extremely frugle and wasted nothing. We recycled and reused before those were aspirational terms.
That was how things were for us. I never questioned whether that was a life she was content with. "Content" wasn't something people of that generation expected, let alone "Happy."
What my mother did not have was financial independence. I did not fully appreciate this or its implications until I was a teenager. By then, their marriage was barely functional, mainly because my father's alcoholism had worsened. And then, one day, something happened and our lives were never the same. To this day neither my brother nor I are sure what actually did happen, although we have speculated. Because having put up with so much, apparently my mother did have a breaking point. And that point happened while we were all at a county fair.
My brother and I had been having a great time at the fair. We had gone our separate ways and been riding rides and playing carnival games with our friends. But whiles we were having fun, my father Did Something. Or he got cauhgt having Done Something. Regardless, suddently it was time to go. Withouth any fanfare, my mother hustled us away from our friends and into the car, where she in cold fury begain driving home.
And she told us she was going to leave. She had finally Had Enough.
I don't remember a lot from that car ride, expect feeling terrified. She was talking about taking us and moving out. Our life as we knew it felt stood at a precipice. And it was a long way down. And at the same time, I felt relief. Life with my father was chaotic, scary, and isolating. Maybe I loved him (he was my father, after all), but I sure did not like him. The future felt terrifying, because it was unknown, but it sure had to be better than the insanity we were living in.
But then, as she ranted and raved, a realization hit me. Hard. I felt it in my chest: she couldn't leave. She had no family, no place to go to, and no money. She was trapped. That realization dawned over my mother too, because the more she talk, the clearer her situation became.
She (and we) ended up staying. But she kicked my father out of their bedroom. He slept in the spare bedroom from then on. And while the frostiness between them slowly thawed and they found some acceptable stasis, they never fully recovered.
So, let's talk about the other half of the Trad Wife equation: the Trad Husband.
Following the template for what makes a "traditional wife," here is what seems to me to be the requirements for a "traditional" husband": Provides security (food, shelter, clothing, heathcare, income) Peforms "traditional" male chores: house repairs, lawn maintenance, automobile maintenance, etc. Functions as a male role model for sons (and daughters)
But there needs to be more. Certainly the expectation for both the Trad Wife and Husband is fidelity and the expectation that they will remain married, in sickness and in health. Practicaly speaking, affairs happen, on both sides. I think what that means is that irrespective of infidelity, the couple needs to remain married. And if despite best efforts and intentions divorce in ineviable? No Pre-nups allowed. Divorce for a Trad Wife can be financially catastrophic if she has never been in the workforce or has left it to take on the traditional wife role. In addition to committing to "forsake all others," there needs to be a commitment to continued security (feed, shelter, clothing, healthcare, income). Because that is the compensation that a Trad Wife deserves. Because she is making a sacrifice by making herself financially depdendent.
Maybe the traditional wedding vows of "love, honor, and cherish" need to be amendeed. Love, honor, cherish, and support.
I'm not saying that I have or ever had what it take to be a Trad Wife. I certainly never had the desire to be one. But my mother did. I don't know if she or my brother and I would have been happier if she had been able to leave. But she did keep her part of the vows. And maybe that was good enough. In the end, it has to be.