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How recognizing you are people first and gender second can save your relationship.
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So I can imagine what you’re thinking – what’s a married lesbian doing talking about blokes? It’s all about the estrogen for your lot, right?
Well, right, and wrong. I’ve been reading GMP for a long while now, in part because I’m a feminist and so I want to understand more about the struggles men face so I can help out on the equality front and, in part, because I find so much of the content about men’s jobs – fatherhood and husbanding – apply to my wife and me. As lesbians, we don’t get those handy gender role job descriptions and welcome packs that straight couples often get on their wedding days, the one with rubber gloves and instructions on the perfect nagging pitch or the one with a BBQ apron and a masterclass on looking confused (whaddya mean that doesn’t happen?). I think we make a good control group on marriage, especially for guys, because we enjoy all the highs and lows of loving (and being loved by) women while facing all the highs and lows of being women too. And I’ve got news for you, – men and women aren’t any one set of things defined by biology. It’s time to rip up the rule book.
Be People First, Men and Women Second
If you can learn one thing from your friends in the LGBTQ community, it’s that we’re all people first, gender second. We manage to be both providers and receivers, emotional wingnuts and stoic rocks, sewers and hammerers. I’m not saying this to brag, because my marriage is as much a work in progress as anybody’s, but I want you to think differently about how you view yourself and your spouse. It’s all too easy to think your wife is nagging, because we’re told this is what wives do, rather than just asking you to do something you haven’t done yet, or to think your girlfriend messed up that parking job because her ovaries got in the way. Next time you throw up your hands and blame your lady’s behavior on that extra chromosome leg*, ask yourself if it would be so irrational if your friend was doing it instead. I’ve found this to be a wonderful technique for diffusing all manner of tension – if it were a friend, particularly a dude friend, how would you react?
*On the other side of the coin, I hear a lot of women rail on their husbands for being ‘such a bloke’ or doing ‘such a man thing’ when failing to live up to their expectations. This is the opposite of cool and should be challenged every time.
Me Man, Me Hunt
We all read and see a lot about how guys are meant to be aggressive, initiators, strong, silent, responsible for money/sex/creating intimacy/solving world hunger. Their wives and partners are put in boxes and on pedestals, made out to be everything from perfection to harpies, and all-round framed as passive yet demanding wanters. There’s a lot of love out there for stereotypes, but take them in to your relationship at your peril.
If typical gender roles work for you and your missus – more power to you. I know some gay couples who have picked a gender role each and love it. But, as the old adage goes, to assume makes an ass out of you and me.
(1) Don’t assume you have to shoulder all the burdens because yours are physically broader.
(2) Don’t assume you can’t or shouldn’t know as much about what’s going down with your partner’s pregnancy as she does.
(3) Don’t assume she doesn’t want to hang out with your friends or hold you when you’re sad.
(4) And definitely don’t assume she doesn’t want to have sex because “women want less sex than men.”
It’s never too early or too late in your relationship to challenge your preconceptions. Check in with your partner the next time something doesn’t seem smart for both of you – it starts feeling a little ridiculous to flat out ask your wife if she’s ok being the breadwinner or that you always do the driving, but it gets easier and those conversations can go in some really good directions. Even if you’ve had this long-standing arrangement that you’re always the one who cooks, that 5-second check-in gives everyone a safe space to challenge the status quo.
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I love reading GMP because it reminds me that we don’t have a woman-woman marriage, we have a person-person marriage. Challenge what the world has told you about yourself and your partner, because you’re just two people, two people with your own preferences and personalities. And it’s not your uglies that brought you together (or might be tearing you apart), it’s those preferences and personalities that make your love and can keep it strong.
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–Photo: kevinomara/Flickr
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