Helpmate

 

Two social media posts recently caught my eye. The responses to these posts caused me to pause and reflect on my own thoughts on the topic of today's blog.

The first was from a well-known social media influencer named Tabitha Brown who said she was retiring her husband from his job as a police officer. She explained that due to her success she was now in a position to have her husband leave his job and pursue his dreams and interests.

The second comprised of screen shots of a conversation between a couple. The woman had apparently landed a 70K a year job and after congratulating her, her boyfriend went on to state that now that she could afford to pull the weight for both of them for a while, he wanted to quit the job he hated and focus on his mental health.

Apparently, he had been the main provider for the family for the past 3 years while she was working towards achieving her educational and career goals. He acknowledged that he was not in a good place, and thought that not only did he need professional help, but also some time off work to focus solely on improving his mental health.

The woman became very concerned and proceeded to let him know there was no way she was going to support a man for any period for any reason.

Wow!!!!  Was my immediate reaction to both posts. What are your thoughts?

I thought about being a helpmate as discussed in the Bible and began to reflect on my own journey with my husband. I had not only been a helpmate for him, it was also evident that he had been one for me throughout our relationship. Our agreement from very early was that as we are made in God’s own image, male and female, we are both equal.

With this equality, are we then not expected to be helpmates to each other?

We serve different purposes within our relationship, and we certainly have different talents. My strengths are not his, and his are not mine, yet out of this, balance and unity evolve.

Compromise and sacrifice are two significant words in our relationship as we seek to be helpmates to each other. We both carry the burden, sometimes together, in other instances, alone. I remember quite vividly times when I carried all the responsibilities for our children and home, while he focused on achieving his goals, and when it was time for me to move, he took the load.

Having common goals has been another part of our relationship. The ideas about how to get to those common goals are not always in alignment, but inevitably we figure out what works for the both of us, as compromise is always an offer on the table. 

Sacrifice. How easy is that for any of us? Who wants the prize but won’t make the effort? Giving up the things we desire or need are hard choices, yet at times we must for the greater good of our relationships, if even for a time.

Those two social media posts brought on an onslaught of opinions and commentary, some cringe worthy and others filled with great insight and perspectives. We very often sit in judgement of others and their situations not knowing what their goals, discussions or agreements are with each other in their relationship.

I am no relationship expert, and by no means is my marriage perfect. I have just found that once we were both in agreement with our goals and how we were going to achieve them, we did not care two hoots about what anyone else had to say about the decisions we made. After all, at the end of the day it was simply just the two of us.

The idea of being a helpmate to some may illicit different meanings or conjure up different thoughts than what I have expressed here for myself. Whatever it means for you, my encouragement is that you make that covenant with each other, find the variables in the equation that work for you and keep working at it.

~Tam~