(A
note from Mark Remond: I join many of my readers in lamenting Ms. Amanda’s recent
departure from guest posting here. I learned a lot about FLRs and female-led
families from her posts, as well as from her clear and concise response to
readers’ comments. I, too, hope that Ms. Amanda will consider posting here in
the future, if circumstances permit.
In
the meantime, I am pleased to offer readers the first of what I hope will be
quite a few guest posts by an online friend and email correspondent of Mrs.
Amanda, “Ms. Jenn.” Ms. Amanda mentioned Ms. Jenn several times in her posts,
as here: “I
have [had] some email correspondence with another dominant lady who lives in
the Netherlands. She also runs a female led household...”
Although
English is not Ms. Jenn’s native tongue (that is Dutch), I have found it
necessary to make only a very few alterations in her writing. Here is her first
post. — M.R.)
*
First, to provide a little bit of
background. I do not come from a
female-led family, but from early on I became aware of what I would call the
higher potential of women. Add to this the fact that I have always been the
dominant type. However, when I met my future husband, Paul, our relationship
started off quite “normal.” Actually I should say “vanilla,” because, as you
will see, I regard a wife-led marriage and female leadership in a family not
only as normal, but quite natural, firmly based on the natural fact of female
superiority.
Paul is a very soft, loving,
caring and loyal guy. He works two days a week as a way to supplement my
full-time income. This allows him time to do all the household chores and to
help with the children. We have three—Sophie, 12, Luuk, just turned 9, and my
youngest girl, Lotte, 6 years old.
In many ways, however, my Paul is
like another child. He is frequently very childish in behavior and thus
irresponsible (a trait which I have come to recognize in many men) and,
frankly, less intelligent than Sophie, for instance. That does not mean that I
love my husband the less; I am merely stating the reality.
When Sophie was 3 years old, I became fed up with Paul’s childishness, and told him we
had to change things for the good of the family. This has been an ongoing process
for the last 9 years. Eventually, I decided I should take more responsibility
over Paul, even though that would mean he would be relieved of
responsibilities and thus rights.
As a result, Paul has grown to
be more and more off a brother to my children rather than a father, even though
he still displays fatherly love and, as I said, does practically all chores.
But he is relieved of any meaningful decision-making. I told him, as his
behavior is childish, his treatment should reflect that. All kind of rules that
the children abide by, my husband has to abide by as well.
Believe me, compared to the way
it was before these stricter rules were applied to Paul, it has worked very
well for all of us. My husband is happy and works hard, even though he
sometimes has trouble coping with having to keep to the same rules as the kids.
So far I am talking only about
our female-led relationship. Now I will speak of our female-led family.
Not long ago my daughter Sophie became
12 years old, and I viewed this milestone as a crucial turning point. She had
been asking for more responsibility within the family, and I decided that she
should get comfortable with increased responsibility.
I had been browsing on the
Internet for information about female led families, or matriarchal families. In
that search I came across Mark Remond’s blog, Worshipping Your Wife, and especially certain guest posts by
dominant women who had taken charge of their families.
I was especially interested in
the posts by Becky Sue on female superiority and matriarchal family guidelines,
and by certain comments by Siobhan to Ms. Nancy’s guest posts. I also received
some valuable information from comments by other dominant wives and mothers
which Mark Remond kindly emailed to me at my request (including from Ms. Amanda).
In my next post, I will share a
little bit about my first family meeting on this important topic, in which I talked
about some of these ideas with my husband and Sophie and the two younger
children. I will also tell you about some of the changes that were decided upon
as a result of that meeting.
But here I would like to add a
note of caution, which I may repeat in later columns. While I do believe
strongly in female-led families and a female-led future, obviously no two
people, and no two families, are quite alike. What works for our family may not
work for another. So when I describe some of the female-empowering guidelines
that we follow, please do not suppose that I am offering these as prescriptions
or as an "exact model" for other families. —Ms.
Jenn
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