We've just hosted grandaughters second birthday party (our garden is bigger than theirs) for 30 adults and 20 children. Not one family consisted of married parents and children of that marriage alone-including our daughter who has 1 child and another expected any day.She has been with her partner for 13 years, and has not married. That set me thinking. What's going to be the outcome of all this? We had most permutations, partners not married with children, married couples with step children and children of their union, a lesbian couple with twins and another expected, younger women married to older men with grown up families, now on second families, in fact I think we and the other grandparents to the birthday girl were the only people there who had 'normal' (I have a feeling that is going to be the catylist) families.
People will have such large fragmented families in years to come, will there still be family life as we know it? It bothers me somewhat I have to say.
Emaggie, your lament has come many years too late, and we have reached a situation from which it will be almost impossible to recover. The problem started in the `Swinging Sixties`, when we heard that we `had never had it so good`, and the advent of the pill allowed a sexual freedom that had never existed before. The subsequent relaxations in the Divorce Laws over the last 25 years, followed by 12 years of a government intent on destroying marriage by both fiscal and other measures has resulted in a situation where as many children are born out of wedlock as in, fewer and fewer children will have the benefit of living with both natural parents until coming of age, and the principles of Right and Wrong have become so blurred as to become almost meaningless.
There is overwhelming evidence that couples in `partnerships`are less likely to remain together than married couples, that children of broken marriages are more likely to suffer emotional or other problems than those of stable marriages, and that children of single mothers are at greater risk of becoming criminals, but unfortunately the old belief in the concept of "Responsibility" has now been abolished in favour of "Rights" - everyone has the right to do as he or she wishes without any responsibility for the results of those actions to anybody else, and this abdication of responsibility applies throughout the whole spectrum of society, from responsibilities in marriage to responsibilities for badly behaved children and respect for other people`s property.
Unless and until people can be persuaded or co-erced into acknowledging once again the concept of responsibility as opposed to rights then families will continue to fragment, and family life as we know it will cease to exist except in a small minority who will, no doubt, come to be considered by Social Workers as holding unfashionable views which render them unsuitable to be parents.
Well I'm pleased to hold unfashionable views... being the white sheep in the family... the only one of five not divorced/split from partner... and with two almost grown up children to show for it... :-X
the little girl in question is very lucky to have 50 people to celebrate her second birthday with her,happy birthday to her and hope all had a great day,did the rain stay away?
Read this post over and over again and thought twice about posting something.
Hubby and I are coming up to our 32 years of marriage in August. Our children have said they hope to aspire to the same in years to come.
We have nieces who have been with their partners for many years with children of their own now.
Maybe I'm old-fashioned but occasionally I ask the question "Why don't you get married?"
Two answers seem to come to the fore:
1) It cost's so much money now and we could put that to better use
2) It's a piece of paper and we don't need that to show how committed to each other we are
Kepouros I would have agreed with you totally, possibly 10 years ago, about certain aspects you comment on. I remember the 60's very well, went through the decline of the married couples allowance and Miras too, but we made it through.
But..............................
It's important to reflect on what our grandparents said about our generation.
Time marches on and we can only hope some of our values will remain with our children - the main thing being happy.
Linda
We have been married for 42 years. Soon after we got married the divorce laws were changed & there were several divorces of coupled married at the same time as us. We have three daughters, all married, the eldest for 17 years the other two for 5years. They all lived together before getting married. When our youngest went to the high school, she is now 30, there were very few children in her class whose parents hadn't divorced.
I think like children born out of wedlock the stigma has gone from "living over the brush". does anyone know where that phrase comes from? It was always said in hushed tones if the subject arose. There are 5 houses opposite us & only one couple are married. Perhaps some are worried about making the same mistake as their parents. The answers would be varied if the question were asked. I remember a neighbour whose relative had just separated saying it's better to come from a broken home than to live in one!
Quoteit's better to come from a broken home than to live in one
Agree with this quote. If my parents had lived together before marriage they would have realised very quickly that they were totally incompatible. My mother is very untidy and a compulsive hoarder and my father is obsessively tidy to the point of OCD. They both have very bad tempers, which turned family life into a war zone for much of the time! They stayed together "for the sake of the kids" but are both much happier now they are divorced.
As for it all going wrong with the introduction of the pill.. ask any woman who was forced to give up her baby for adoption, some of the stories are absolutely tragic. Women were ostracised from these "loving families", blackmailed, given no financial help, and sectioned in mental hospitals.
Emaggie - rather than it being fragmented, it sounds like you have a happy extended family, which is great!
phew trying to say what i wanted only to find lewic has said it for me.
i am how ever married after 19 years with 2 children of our own,
normal? not sure, have the girls now and a little boy for 5 more days
lbb
Tone and I couldn't wait to get married cos He had lost his wife and I had a divorce. We have been together for 41 years now. None of our 5 children are married.In some cases I'm glad that they didn't cos the partnerships didn't work out. I think women these days are more independent and don't have to rely on having a husband to keep them cos even if they part they still can claim half of their property and such. In the old days you didn't stand a chance without that piece of paper. My opinion is if it ain't broke then why mend it
... plus these days a woman (or occasionally a man) doesn't have to stay home & put up with violence or mental cruelty or whatever... (unlike the good old days). It's all very well to say that things used to be better, but if you haven't got a time machine it's not very useful!
I love the idea of sex being invented in the 60's - both of my parents were conceived in the 40's and both were born prior to the marriage of their parents (much to the shame of the parents). When we were children, the arguing stopped when they ran out of plates to throw at each other. It would have been lunacy for them to stay together.
It's not great, but being miserable is such a waste of life.
Quote from: OllieC on June 22, 2009, 09:22:21
being miserable is such a waste of life.
I'd echo that one!
Besides it sounds like your granddaughter is very much loved and that having so many people to celebrate is a bonus. Celebrate the good things in life !
1066
hi,
This is an interesting thread ;D Well let me chuck myself in here ::) Me and my partner have been together 11 Yrs and are not married even though we have never doubted we are in our hearts.
We have 3 children together and are very happy both of us have our faults weaknesses and strengths which make us a good match IMO.
Over the years we have been asked many times why were not married simple answer Were happy as we are if in the future we decide to get married we will. I wouldn't worry about the younger generation not believing in marriage. The one and only person that continues to ask when were getting married is our 9 yr old son.
I cant think of anything worse than starting married life with a huge debt due to a huge wedding which in turn causes arguments then divorce!! I think in todays times people tend to get to tied up in the wedding day and not the union there forging! Its bound to cause friction.
What i find crazy is couples that live together as a couple with children but still separate there finances as if there single? We have a few friends like this when I've asked them why they simply don't know!
These of course are just my opinion's ;D
Lucy
Lucy
i am divorced and re married but of my family i am the only one, my sister and hubby have been happily married for years and although not married my brother and his partner have never married but they have never felt they could afford it and when they seriously considered it my mum alledgedly tried to interfere so they never did it.
My hubby and i lived together for 6 years and always said we would never get married having both done it before, we have 3 children between us and never felt we needed to, however one day he asked me what i would say if he asked me and we got married. we said it would never make any difference to us but it definatly has we are very much closer(if we could be) and it is brilliant
I'd hate to judge - i am not qualified
but i know i'd hate to be starting out life with my partner now
there are so many distractions and the social norms that kept marriages going are undermined
in my day being married is like two people cast adrift in the middle of the ocean -
you stick together!
in hindsight - for us being together for 36 years is about tenacity and good luck
good parenting is not about the term served -its about the attitudes and ethos and good luck
Really interesting thread this.
Interesting what you said Debster about marriage changing things.......I think that can work both for and against a relationship. We had two sets of friends who had very long term relationships and kids together, then got married. Both relationships broke up about two years later, quite acrimoniously. At the time, I think the Millennium had something a bit to do with it, we know so many couples who seemed to have a bit of a life appraisal around that time, and I guess it didn't include each other..... :-\
I always swore I would never get married, it was only a bit of paper etc.etc. as I am not religious. But then got to late 20's living with boyfriend and started to think about kids and to my amazement started feeling I wanted to be married first! Even more amazing, OH wanted that too.....19 years and two kids later, well, he's the only bloke that will put up with me!! ;D ;D ;D
As a midwife, I've definitely noticed a shift over the last 25 years in terms of fewer couples married before a babies birth, or having really complex lives and relationships....inter familial surrogacy, 2nd and third marriages etc. You learn to be extremely careful and never make any assumptions who is with a woman in labour....it could be a friend, dad, grandad, brother, same sex partner, mum, prison officer, social worker, interpreter, asylum seeker support person ....you name it, I've probably seen it!
But unlike Emaggies family, one of the the downsides of this seems to be a paucity of the extended families that are so useful and supportive for new parents. So many people seem to live away from their birthplace or have little contact with their families of any sort, we see a lot of isolated new parents and a lot of resources are now directed at trying to make up for that in the maternity services.
Quote from: Kepouros on June 21, 2009, 23:15:00
Unless and until people can be persuaded or co-erced into acknowledging once again the concept of responsibility as opposed to rights then families will continue to fragment, and family life as we know it will cease to exist except in a small minority who will, no doubt, come to be considered by Social Workers as holding unfashionable views which render them unsuitable to be parents.
Very worrying, but sadly a reality to come I think. Just remembered something a young teacher told me recently, she could not say to a pupil " my Mother gave it to me", she had to refer to her Mother as 'my grown-up' :o which says it all really.
I can't say that not being married worries me overly, though I do think Daxzen's comment 'in my day being married is like two people cast adrift in the middle of the ocean - you stick together!'was very true for many of us. It's the children who have several sets of parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters with different fathers or mothers, just so many of them it seems. Probably half of the children here on Saturday had half siblings.
These were the friends of my daughter and her partner, not ours. We were married in '73 and there are very few separations or divorces in our families and amongst our friends. That is not meant to sound as though I am crowing, it's just how it is. I can remember phoning home after a year of wedded agro, and my mother saying 'you made your bed' etc., so I did and we're still a partnership.
This is a very interesting thread! I am married (5 years in April) but we didn't "get around to it" until my first child was almost two. My OH seperated from his first wife four years before we got together, then got around to the divorce when I was pregnant. Everyone gets on and interestingly both my step-children (girls 18 and 26) and my children (boys 6 and 4) all consider themselves as brothers and sisters - no-one considers the half-sibling bit.
As Debp says, it can get interesting to work out what is going through peoples minds when you describe your family! Recently my youngest did an Easter card at playgroup and the assistant there asked my how many children I had. I answered two", because I have two, and she then asked me who the two girls he had named were, so I had to go on to explain about step-sisters who he calls sisters who are my husbands children but not mine.
For us, we wanted to be married, I think, partly because we knew we were both "on our own" in certain family respects:- my husband has lost both his parents and I have lost my Mum many years ago, and have a cool relationship with my Dad and step-mum. We both wanted a stong family and commitment for each other and for our children together. Perhaps when you are top of the family chain it makes you think about the responsibility differently? I certainly feel different from a lot of young Mums who have their own Mums living round the corner and helping them out regularly.
I am fairly ambivalent about marriage in general - if people are ready to do it and have the money, it is like the icing on the cake. Without it you can still have a very good cake! I do get annoyed, however, by the government making special cases out of single parents and giving them so many special funds. So often they seem to milk it and for me, who has had my struggles with my husband working away and no family to help out I think everyone has their trials and no special cases should be given extras. Perhaps then we will have less huge, fragmented families relying on benefits?
I am still annoyed at the Teacher (Head of my son's year) who claimed my son's problems at school (being bullied mainly) were caused because I was no longer married to his father!!
I am married but I didn't jump head first into the second marriage I was very cautious the second time because after i married the first time Mr Nice turned into Mr Really Horrible literally overnight, he seemed to think I had become his possession.
I lived with my current husband about 3 years before we got married. I would like to point out to those who say it's too expensive to get married that it is only as expensive as you make it. It cost us the price of the marriage licence and lunch for our witnesses......we virtually eloped as we didn't invite anyone, my husbands Mother didn't get to go but we knew she doesn't like to travel.
well.....
For what it's worth I think it better to part ways rather than being miserable for a lifetime and usually it is better for kids to grow up in a loving environment rather than one in which 1 or 2 individuals are deeply unhappy. I think most people do what they can to stay together and make things work but sometimes it just isnt possible - people change, people become ill, lives change, people grow apart, find new interests, move on, grow up and sometimes their partner can not live with those changes. I dont think most people part lightly - if they do then that is another matter.
As for the kids - who says a loving environment has to be their 'natural' mother and father? Many family units are equally as stable for children. Anyone who has been fostered will agree on this - a loving, supportive enviroment is what is needed rather than only a nuclear family.
Did anyone ask the kids if they were happy?? Surely that is all that matters?
Quote from: Psi on June 22, 2009, 12:46:04
Did anyone ask the kids if they were happy?? Surely that is all that matters?
All seemed perfectly happy to me Psi, never questioned that. ;)
we've been married for 37 years this year, my sister was married for 18 yrs, then had a child, after 2 years, her husband decided he didn't want to share her and walked, he has told her it is too expensive to divorce!!! :o
my eldest son was with his partner for 9 years and he wanted to be married before they had children. my daughter was with her partner and got caught with her first, they'd only been together 2 years, he was 5 when they decided to get married, However, I always felt they were as committed to each other as we are ;D
My kids get to spend their holidays with their Dad.....and they're happy I left.
Interesting thread this, we celebrated our 48th anniversary last week, & our 3 children are all married, happy as far as i can see they always seem happy with there lives so that makes us happy.
I woulden`t be without my husband for any amount of gold , he is truely my hero, which always makes my daughters laugh when i say it.
For those couples who are not married i think if that makes them happy & content so be it, good luck to them they must know what they want. ;D
It's not really a new thing... both my parents were "single parents" before they hitched up. My dad had a daughter by a woman who spent all the money he saved while on active service abroad during WW2, she nearly got away with it he got both his legs broken in March '45. My mum had a child out of wedlock in the '50's. They had three more children together ( five actually one was a twin that died as they were very prem, the other miscarried in the third trimester) I'm the middle one. They split the month after my GCE's, the divorce took longer... but it had been on the cards for a decade... she had left him in the '60's but had to go back lacking support from even her parents... It just gets a higher press profile now we can blame the permissive '60's.... :-X
Good post, saddad!
society changes, people change with it - better or worse, the majority of us try and do the best we can.
Saddad, spot on - what about the number of babies conceived out of wedlock in 1945? Shocking!
From my own family's perspective:
My brother lives with a divorcee who has 3 kids from her 1st marriage. brother & partner had a baby six months ago which is brother's first child
I do not have/have never had a husband/partner/fella etc & don't (so far) feel the need for one
Sister is married to a bloke 39 years older than herself & they have a kid. She also has a kid from a previous relationship & he has kids, g.kids & g-g.kids from his previous two marriages.
Our parents have (somehow) been together for 45 years.
My greatest "concern" (for want of a better word) regarding all these family permutations is that you could end up with half-siblings inadvertently partnering up & therefore, unknowingly breaking the incest laws.
Add in IVF with egg &/or sperm donors & you don't know who you are setting up with.
It all makes the mind boggle.
CC