I am married, but not always happily. We have been married for 27 years and have 5 children.
I homeschooled all the children starting when my first born was going into the 2nd grade. They are grown now, all confident healthy adults. They are now forming their own families and healthy marriages. My husband and I live on one acre, where we do a little bit of homesteading. I am a Christian woman, although have not always been.
I describe myself as a former feminist, however, was not very deep into the movement. I was kind of ignorant to the lies of feminism. This is because I didn’t think it through for a while. I just leaned toward feminism because of how I was raised. My mom and I did not have a good relationship. She was reclusive and unhealthy emotionally. I was not encouraged by her in any way. She would make comments like, “you should be a model, you are so tall and thin.” She focused on my looks rather than how precious I was as a female. My Dad never built me up as a person, nor as a beautiful woman. He never encouraged my soft, precious side of being a woman. When I was coming out of my teen years, I felt I had to be strong, independent, in charge. My father told me, “college is for smart, rich people and you are neither.” I just accepted that as true and never thought that much of it.
In my twenties, once while hanging out with friends, I just made the comment, “I am not a smart person.” My friend’s older sister said, “What do you mean by that? You are a smart person. You are a strong, smart person.” This was the first time I ever heard this.
After we married, I chose to stay home with my first child, and then had a second child and we moved into our home. When the first two children were babies, I first started seeing the damaging lies of the feminists. I had some friends who were pushy and outspoken about feminism and the choices we make. But they always seemed unhappy to me. It was like they were fighting against what they naturally needed. While fighting to be the leaders of their home, and trying to be strong women, they remained unfulfilled and frustrated.
My own marriage was struggling. We were either fighting or not talking. Our relationship lacked respect. We didn’t understand that we were different and needed certain things from our marriage. He needed respect and I needed to feel cared for, listened to.
I definitely believe women are as important as men and capable of leading a home. However, I believe men are the leaders of their home and I enjoy being the softer partner. It was as though my friends were striving to be the leaders of their homes yet what they really were missing and wanting was for their husbands to love and comfort them, but their actions were pushing them away.
A nurse I knew who worked for Planned Parenthood mentioned to me one of her clients coming in. “That is so sad,” I said. She said, “Why?”
“I wish they wouldn’t have the abortion. It is just so sad,” I replied. She responded, “that is her choice.” I mentioned adoption as an option. She kept talking with me until she got me to say it was “her choice.” Looking back, I see how I cowered and gave in to peer pressure. It was about that time we started attending church, and from our pastor, for the first time, I began to learn about how precious it is to be a woman. It wasn’t just his teachings from the Bible, it was his love for his own wife and appreciation for women. He loves his wife and credits her with being able to calm him down when he gets wound up. He talks about how valuable a woman is in the marriage relationship.
That is when I started understanding how God views women. A lot of people think that the Bible diminishes women. The culture of that day may lead people to think that way. But God does not view women as the lesser sex. We are just different from men. We are strong, but our strengths are different. Women are smart; we are naturally more emotional. Our husbands are more logic focused. We are different but one is not less important than the other. Women and men make a great team in a marriage. This idea gave me great peace… it allowed me to be what I wanted to be.
When we started going to church it was obvious that our marriage was very broken and I was trying to figure out the steps for leaving my husband. Within a year of becoming a Christian, and counseling with our pastor, we became an example to others around us of what a marriage should be. It was a miracle.
I have now found other women who now think like me. It is easy to find other women in my church that understand feminism is a big fat lie. Harder to find that outside of church.
As our marriage improved, we had a third child and then twins. Because of the freedom that I now had, I was a better mom, more confident and content, I was where I knew I should be and wanted to be.
There were some hard times, for me personally. There were areas that I needed to change. Change is hard, but it is a choice. With my new beliefs, I chose to make those changes.
What ways did I change? I started allowing my husband to make decisions. I relinquished control. I began to view being a stay-at-home-mom as a gift, not a job. I was welcoming my husband’s attention, embracing him, and allowing myself to be softer. Previously, I would brush him off when he got affectionate. I felt he was treating me as a piece of meat. When I realized he was loving me as a woman, it felt good. Men go into self-preservation to guard themselves from being hurt. When we reject their physical touch, they are being trained to be less affectionate. We fight them off, then they are not loving and wanting us. It is a vicious circle. I have now broken that vicious circle in our marriage.
My husband is so much happier now. We are just so content. We are happier as individuals, and our marriage is a happy place. We prefer each other. We choose and want to be together.
These feminist ideas are so ingrained. People in our culture are passionately angry at the Christian worldview. Abortions cause trauma on top of the trauma. I know women who have chosen abortion and 40 years later are still hurt by it. They have gone through healing and forgiveness, but they are still hurting.
I know of one woman who had a baby out of wedlock. He was her healing. He is such a blessing to his family, a gift to the world, and I can’t imagine the world without him.
In my view there are other feminist ideas that are foiling women’s attempts at happiness. Pornography has stolen so much from women and men. It has perverted the special relationship between husband and wife. It is wrong for men to do these things, and women should not follow them into this practice. Freedom in sexuality is important but belongs within marriage.
When I didn’t understand the beauty of marriage, before I was married, I made the wrong choices. And, every time you give yourself to somebody in that intimate way, you are giving a piece of yourself away. You are not making yourself stronger, you are tearing yourself down. You are building up walls, becoming hard and hurt. It is this behavior that steals your freedom of sex within marriage.
It was not until I rejected feminism that I felt sexier, more confident, liberated, more free to be a woman.
This story was submitted by a happily married homesteader and mom of 5.
