Holy crxp! I could have written this, although I can't write as well.
Married at 20--just barely. She left me for the hereafter 50 years later. I miss her every day and will so long as I am alive. We got through my PhD as starving students. Then, she got her PhD while raising the children.
There is nothing so beautiful as growing old with someone who was by your side when you were young and foolish. You know each other at a level that cannot be described. You shared the fire of youth, then you share the infirmities of old age.
I tell my grandchildren to find a good one while they are still around, get them locked down and work on keeping it that way. Have your children early and often.
The amazing thing is that they openly wrote about this and no one paid attention. And their funding was not grass roots. Guess where it came from? Foundations like Rockefeller etc. This private funding gave them the start and then they got the govt to pay them billions. What a scam.
Which "feminist" movement?" The one in the late 19th c in which women could keep custody of their children & keep their own wages? In the 20th c they were able to vote? The feminists who began exposing the extent of domestic abuse--that battering wasn't a both-sides ha ha thing but a cycle of personal terrorism that today persists w/ around 3k women killed a year by their male partners in the US alone? Rape crisis centers? The concept of date & marital rape? Those women who fought for all women to open their own checking accounts and get loans? To obtain birth control w/o marriage? To be able to name the ongoing abuse they endured (and endure) my health "care" practitioners with symptoms dismissed as originating from ob/gyn or mental hysteria? Those feminists who raised awareness about child sexual abuse . . . were they using that to plan to "destroy the nuclear family" via depopulation?
"Feminism" is no more homogeneous than "monotheism" or "humanism." At this point we've got to develop another term because this is being used to slur people, dead & alive, who've struggled and sometimes given their lives to improve the lives of hundreds of millions of humans. They deserve better.
That seems like a simplistic assessment without including the other reasons for women to need a voice, Mona. The movement may have ended up this way, but did it start out to destroy the nuclear family?
Actually yes, the Marxists' were originally seeking to destroy the American culture because its strong Judeo-Christian two-parent (male & female) family values provided an independent strength that would always preclude its citizens feeling they could not provide their basic needs without a strong authoritative central government. THAT is anathema to communists.
A significant percentage of females have always needed a mate (family), or charity, or a strong government to protect them and provide basic necessities for them (food, shelter, etc.) and their children. Even Jesus commanded His followers to always take care of "widows and orphans."
Yes, it did start out that way. Read the text from the Seneca Falls event and watch the Fiamengo File of Prof. Janice Fiamengo and get an idea of the original man hatred that started things rolling. It has never been about equality. That is a myth they have successfully propagated and people bought it hook, line, and sinker. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyRUHSsZZa4&list=PLGFFi6pRCnCdQTe1iG3Tw4Td9jvhY2w74
The Marxist based form of so-called feminism started in the 1970s - close to a half century ago - NOT to 'free' women, but to destroy the nuclear family...which is still in high gear NOW in 2024.
MUCH of this Marxist/feminist 'agenda' has been promoted ( and funded) by the U.S. federal government as well as leftist "foundations."
The dismal results speak for themselves as the eye opening information attests in this latest issue of the truth and facts of the matter provided by Robert & Jill Malone.
This is all true. Government documents as well as those from the Population Council and Planned Parenthood show this to be fact. It started in the 1950s with how to continue with eugenics within an expanded framework that was not so obviously racial/poor driven. It was also advanced in the UK. Peas in a pod.
Beautiful essay. I didn’t come to these thoughts until recently. Fully onboard with you now. Thank you for expressing the importance of two parent families and home schooling so well.
One key to successfully homeschooling is the ability to do so outside the rigid government school curriculum and other system requirements.
Congress had a part in it from the beginning and it was specifically noticeable starting in the 70s under Carter. Crank back the economy, inflate the dollar and force the perferred outcome.
Hi Robert, I am an avid follower of you - l love and appreciate your stand for freedom, justice, truth and also how you intermix lovely stories from your farm to help us keep our sanity. That said, I am puzzled by the ideas you are trying to refute in your article. I am surrounded by many of the people you are talking about - staunch democrats. And I would say most, whether they have a low-key job or high powered job want/have always wanted a long-lasting relationship, someone to grow old with, raise a family, have the kids get along really well. But we all have to support ourselves while we are looking for our spouses. I know very few people who give up on their marriages easily, even when one person is shouldering the vast majority of the burden of children and finances. I think you are very fortunate to not only be married but seemingly to have find a true life partner that you enjoy. Perhaps some empathy for those of use who for some reason have not been as fortunate to be matched so well, despite our best efforts :). In my experience, people who are that fortunate look at others who are not and think there is something wrong with them. But that is like people who have 1 easy child and think they are the greatest parents in the world and then they have the next child, use the same parenting techniques, and it's a struggle. A little humility goes a long way....
There is no perfect marriage, but what makes marriage long lasting is a full commitment that divorce is not an option and that each person must truly Love their spouse (husband and wife as designed by God) so much that they are willing to change the flaws in their own life.
That is not easy! It wasn’t easy for me, but I prayed and asked God to help me with my weaknesses and He did—but it took time. COMMITMENT to the end and honoring the vows of marriage taken before God and witnesses, is key to having a healthy marriage and family. I’m still working on this, but every day I see my wife, I see her as my bride on that beautiful day we became husband and wife—God bless her. ❤️
Divorce is a necessary option. It is too easy to obtain, and children pay the price, but we need that option nonetheless, it can be lifesaving for the exploited partner.
Yeah, one cannot "work" enough to get a spouse sober. And one isn't abused & controlled & terrorized along with one's kids because one hasn't "worked" enough. I've worked w/ plenty of battered women who were desperate to keep their marriage together and paid with their lives. The insensitivity here is astonishing.
Lowen, I keep finding such blatant inconsistent thoughts thrown around here, even from Dr. Malone, who left Cal. and his children and grandchildren if I'm not mistaken. (granted, they were probably adults, but the grandkids?) Conservatives are made by early marriages? Somehow I doubt his children have become conservative because of his and Jill's early marriage.That they went against his mothers wishes, is another sore spot. I know that this isn't the insensitivity you are referring to, but yes, what a sad view so many have.
I don’t think Robert was taking the position you suggest. I think he is critical of those who condemned, ridiculed, laughed at those who believed in life long marriages that included raising children, and dividing the task of earning money and raising children in the home, rather than both parents leaving their young children in the hands of day care or nannies.
Agreed. The only thing worse that 'single parenting' is serial marriage. A parent (either one) married 3 or more times leaves children incredibly insecure, confused, rudderless and convinced that they will be left or that marriage is a temporary convenience. Faith can overcome this, but it will take a patient spouse and good counseling to walk through the wreckage. Stable families with emotionally present and mature fathers and mothers, who teach and model good boundaries, give their children the best starts. (Btw, you have to get married younger most people do these days if you want more than two children.)
The odds of alcoholism in one or the other spouse divorcing is 40%. The odds of alcoholism in a person who's been married and divorced four times is at least 85%.
Alcoholic and other-drug addicts are not stable, they are not emotionally present and they are immature. Their emotional growth stops the day they trigger alcoholism: average age 13. They are emotional adolescents or, even, children. The cure is to inspire in addicts a need to "try sobriety," as they put it. And to inspire in them that need, we must learn how to identify them, early and often. Because drinking and using is so often hidden, this is best done by observing behaviors. And because of the stigma of alcoholism, hardly anyone is teaching that or looking for it.
Good parenting requires clean and sober parents and, because alcoholics can be so destructive emotionally, arguably even if it's only one parent.
Good living of life requires that one be clean and sober. We don't want pilots, drivers, machine workers, crane operators or anyone around us to be drunken or strung out messes.
The challenge is how to deal with these people. I know of technologies (therapies) that can handle this problem. Yet outside of my church I never hear about them. If we really want to solve this problem - no excuses - then we need to realize what already exists right under our noses that we are ignoring.
We must eliminate the stigma of addiction so we more readily diagnose it when you and I see it under our noses. It's not that others don't see it; they don't know what to look for or what they are looking at when it smacks us in the face.
But there are no "therapies" that handle the problem. It's genetic. If you are not an addict, try drinking addictively. You won't be able to. It requires that others stop the enabling, the "helping," when the only true "help" you can ever give an addict is uncompromising tough love. That means consequences for misbehaviors, and someone (a spouse, an employer, a judge, law enforcers) forging the link between the heavy use and misbehaviors.
Agreed. The genetic predisposition to substance addiction cannot be cured; it can only be controlled in the sense of abstaining from use. And if they use and think they can control their use, they are mistaken. They may well control use in the short run, only because they are not drinking or using enough to trigger the craving. But in the long run, they WILL lose control over use and, hence, their behaviors (which is the part I write about).
Addictive personalities (read weak self control) wreaks havoc in any family where one or both marriage partners indulge in one or many forms of substances - even food - that become uncontrollable.
It is not weak self control, Tom. Show me an addict who wants his substance and I'll show you someone with far greater will power than I could ever muster: they will get their drug, regardless of the price they or others must pay.
And food is not a psychotropic. While it may wreak havoc in their own lives, it does not wreak havoc in the lives of others in the same way and to the degree of a substance addiction, which causes distortions of perceptions and memory in susceptible individuals. Non-addicts do not experience euphoric recall; addicts do. If a non-addict ever experiences a blackout, where events do not enter the memory banks, they'll never again drink to that excess because it's too scary an experience. Addicts will drink to such excess over and over again.
I know you sincerely believe this, but I don't think it's true. Spirit can rise above addictions (even possibly genetics), and as far as I know, this has been accomplished in many cases. It's not a 100% success rate, but it can be done. See the work of Narconon.
Sometimes it needs help. My dads dad was a drunk who left his polio cripples wife with his family to raise his 4 kids. Dad was raised to be a concert violinist. Actually gave a recital in Dallas. On visit to his dad during prohibition making bathtub gin a bottle broke cutting a tendon in THAT little finger. No more fiddling. Somehow that morphed into his becoming a cop, raising to acting Capt. of detectives when the job took him down. Was treated for nervous breakdown including electroshock and when nothing worked a psychiatrist recommended that teatotaler taking a drink to ease the pain. There must have been a lot of pain.
That’s a rough story. Sorry he went through all of this...and you, so much growing up. Electroshock ‘therapy’ works for some, but at what price? My understanding it can wipe out your memory, long or short term, not sure which.
Everyone has a childhood, adolescent years, young adult experiences, many good, many not. Not everyone thrives, and some are their own worst enemy. Many have no idea what drives them to either good or bad things.
Death needs to be included in the unfortunate mix. It isn't in this article and is one of the reasons why this article feels short-sighted. Women are often left by men, for generations as far back as immigrants coming here. It is common.
Death is not usually something we can control (although I know a person left a single parent due to suicide). Selfishness, abuse and immaturity in both parents is.
Which is, partly, the 'single parenting’ spoken of here. It is a complicated topic, no two situations exactly alike, but often selfishness is the main contributor.
Such an important post! Thank you Dr Malone for speaking the truth about our crisis of fatherlessness. Here's a short video that looks at the manmade plague of fatherlessness. It lists the huge number of problems that have been shown to be related to not having a dad in the home.
Thank you Dr. Malone for this wonderful article, essay on how it used to be. I married at 31. First child at 32. Second at 34. Back when 2 was the number especially if we were older when we married. Yes I would have married younger but it didn’t happen. You spell the success of a happy marriage with one spouse. It’s a job to work at. When #2 came along, I told my husband I can’t keep working full time and taking care of children. We made it with me part time and he full time. Homeschooling has become a must if there is not a good Christian Day School to instill Godly principles (no apology for that statement). Ours was not the perfect home but I sure worked at making it the best I could. I gave up a degree in nursing to have children. I don’t regret it at all.
I agree with the principles you outlined. I know there are failed marriages and many regrets among our readers/commenters. Move on. Do your best to be the best parent to children who need
you. You can do it. My marriage had its ups and downs but I believed “don’t quit”! Focus on the once love of your life. Make her/him that again. A missing ingredient that is the most important is a God centered home. God bless those of you who struggle to take the advice Dr Malone has given. You can make it! I know!
The reason for single parent households is often alcohol/other psychoactive drug addiction in one or both parents.
The odds of substance addiction across the U.S. population is 10%. Yet, 40% of divorces include at least one substance addict.
The solution, then, is get addicts clean and sober. This requires early identification of the disease (you can't force sobriety without knowing there's a problem) and an offer of uncompromising tough love. Addicts must be given a choice of sobriety or consequences. "You're out of here, I keep the kids."
While we'd end up with more temporarily single parent households, in the long run there would be more sober parents.
When I wrote my first book on alcoholism, in which I prescribed "uncompromising tough love," my mother bemoaned, "You're saying I should have left your father. You'd have been children with a single mother. That would have been terrible for you." I told her, no, we might have been children in a family with a recovering addict., which would have been a hell of a lot better than living with an alcoholic. (I told my mother it wasn't her fault--she had no understanding of the disease; they don't teach it in school and drinking heavily is too often glorified.) An even greater benefit is my father almost assuredly would not have died from his disease at 60.
So yes, we do better with two parents--if they are both sober, which does not necessarily mean non-drinkers; it means without the misbehaviors concomitant with alcoholism.
I was blessed to grow up with two parents. Dad worked hard to provide and our Mom did the rest. She took care of the trees while he kept his eye on the Forrest. We all have turned out to be good people. I do miss them though.
Amen! I agree. Children need both parents in the home . Children in single parent homes suffer.
I went back to school to get my music degree after my oldest 4 children were in school. I went part time so I could be home when the children got home from school. It took me 8 years to get my degree. It is so important to be home . Someone needs to be home when the kids get home.
There is also another problem. Having kids to involved in everything that there can be no family time. I have a friend who has her kids involved in so many after school activities that the children have no time to play.
Having a stable loving marriage is important for the children. I grew up in a very loving home. My mom stayed at home and my dad worked hard as a farmer. Because my dad was working long hours in the Spring , Summer and Fall my mom would send me out with my dad to “help” him. That way I could spend one on one with my dad. Back in the day when I was little dad used siphon tubes to irrigated. I would walk down the end of the field while he would get the siphon tubes flowing water down the furrows. Of course later on they used sprinkler pipe then wheel lines and the pivots to water the crops. I will never forget the time I got to spend with my dad on the farm.
My mother taught me to cook. I have made cookbooks for my children and older grandchildren so that they could have the family recipes.
I could have never have put my children in daycare. It would have broken my heart. I realize sometimes circumstances are such that mother’s have to work.
I figured that since I have mentioned it before I didn’t need to bring it up again. I don’t want pity My first marriage last for 22 very long years to an abusive man. I made a bad choice. Abusers know how to pick nice people. But my dear husband now is a wonderful man. He loves me and my 4 older children as his own. They call him dad. He has been a wonderful example of service and hard work and kindness to me we have been married 25 years in Nov. We adopted a biracial little boy and I had a baby at 46 years old. Have children people, they are our future.
What mistakes would that be DD? It is highly improbable that one can learn anything from another's mistake(s) - live and learn is singular. We must make our own, and many decisions don't start out as mistakes.
I will say what I did learn during those long 22 years was I learned to depend totally on the Lord to get me through the day. He would lift my burdens even when the only thing I could get out during my prayer was Help. He was there .
There's a lot missing in this article, if you ask me. The dynamics of a healthy marriage and family are passed down from generation to generation; unless they're not. The foundation for all you speak of can be achieved by "knowing yourself." How that happens and why is a life-process that is different for everyone for good reason. There is no magic method, especially in today's economy. To judge someone for having more than one marriage is a short-sighted stance. To include other statistics in this complicated look would be helpful. There are too many to list here, but to include the success of second marriages would be a start, as well as "why do men abandon their families?" The stories of this happening go way back... Producing guilt (perhaps I should have said "promoting guilt") for not having the perfect two parent family is useless.
Yes, I agree Leonora, and many will add guilt to their already shamed self. Not enough people have developed the skills to know the difference. That's why a different tone for this article would have included more understanding of the circumstances beyond our control. ( I changed the language to "promoting guilt")
The most important part of life is family. A man’s main job is to provide for his family, and be there when they need him.
Having worked in the same company for 40 years (longer than I’ve been married), I can assure everyone, no one from work will ever visit my grave. My life’s legacy will be born from my children, not my work life.
Work is a means to provide for those you love, nothing else.
And yes I’m a highly paid executive, they care about what you bring to the bottom line that’s it.
That's not true for all of us. My work is my passion: my main income-producing gig is helping people keep what they earned, because they spend and invest their earnings more wisely than any government ever has, can, or will. And I teach some others much of what I know.
Work can be a legacy, too. A means for providing for those we love, but also a legacy.
And my other passions help others, too, including my work and writings on behavioral indications of alcohol and other-drug addiction, where I know I've saved lives.
The woman’s Hero’s Journey goes from Maiden, to Mother, to Matriarch. Emulating an unenlightened male one - college/career, etc. - is not being of maximal utility to the women or society. The self-betrayal is horrible to watch.
Holy crxp! I could have written this, although I can't write as well.
Married at 20--just barely. She left me for the hereafter 50 years later. I miss her every day and will so long as I am alive. We got through my PhD as starving students. Then, she got her PhD while raising the children.
There is nothing so beautiful as growing old with someone who was by your side when you were young and foolish. You know each other at a level that cannot be described. You shared the fire of youth, then you share the infirmities of old age.
I tell my grandchildren to find a good one while they are still around, get them locked down and work on keeping it that way. Have your children early and often.
They pay no attention to me.
The feminist movement was designed to destroy the nuclear family--depopulation was the cry.
if these rabid vermin cannot lynch babies in the womb, they will mutilate and sterilize the ones that escape Klanned Parenthood.
Indeed.
The amazing thing is that they openly wrote about this and no one paid attention. And their funding was not grass roots. Guess where it came from? Foundations like Rockefeller etc. This private funding gave them the start and then they got the govt to pay them billions. What a scam.
FEW pay attention to the plight and fragmentation of the American dream.
Along with Roe.
Which "feminist" movement?" The one in the late 19th c in which women could keep custody of their children & keep their own wages? In the 20th c they were able to vote? The feminists who began exposing the extent of domestic abuse--that battering wasn't a both-sides ha ha thing but a cycle of personal terrorism that today persists w/ around 3k women killed a year by their male partners in the US alone? Rape crisis centers? The concept of date & marital rape? Those women who fought for all women to open their own checking accounts and get loans? To obtain birth control w/o marriage? To be able to name the ongoing abuse they endured (and endure) my health "care" practitioners with symptoms dismissed as originating from ob/gyn or mental hysteria? Those feminists who raised awareness about child sexual abuse . . . were they using that to plan to "destroy the nuclear family" via depopulation?
"Feminism" is no more homogeneous than "monotheism" or "humanism." At this point we've got to develop another term because this is being used to slur people, dead & alive, who've struggled and sometimes given their lives to improve the lives of hundreds of millions of humans. They deserve better.
That seems like a simplistic assessment without including the other reasons for women to need a voice, Mona. The movement may have ended up this way, but did it start out to destroy the nuclear family?
Perhaps it is a difference between "designed" as opposed to "intended".
One of the most powerful effects is the "law of unintended consequences".
Yep! There's that pesky law!!
Actually yes, the Marxists' were originally seeking to destroy the American culture because its strong Judeo-Christian two-parent (male & female) family values provided an independent strength that would always preclude its citizens feeling they could not provide their basic needs without a strong authoritative central government. THAT is anathema to communists.
A significant percentage of females have always needed a mate (family), or charity, or a strong government to protect them and provide basic necessities for them (food, shelter, etc.) and their children. Even Jesus commanded His followers to always take care of "widows and orphans."
Yes, it did start out that way. Read the text from the Seneca Falls event and watch the Fiamengo File of Prof. Janice Fiamengo and get an idea of the original man hatred that started things rolling. It has never been about equality. That is a myth they have successfully propagated and people bought it hook, line, and sinker. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyRUHSsZZa4&list=PLGFFi6pRCnCdQTe1iG3Tw4Td9jvhY2w74
The Marxist based form of so-called feminism started in the 1970s - close to a half century ago - NOT to 'free' women, but to destroy the nuclear family...which is still in high gear NOW in 2024.
MUCH of this Marxist/feminist 'agenda' has been promoted ( and funded) by the U.S. federal government as well as leftist "foundations."
The dismal results speak for themselves as the eye opening information attests in this latest issue of the truth and facts of the matter provided by Robert & Jill Malone.
This is all true. Government documents as well as those from the Population Council and Planned Parenthood show this to be fact. It started in the 1950s with how to continue with eugenics within an expanded framework that was not so obviously racial/poor driven. It was also advanced in the UK. Peas in a pod.
And just look where WE are NOW!
I agree.
Beautiful essay. I didn’t come to these thoughts until recently. Fully onboard with you now. Thank you for expressing the importance of two parent families and home schooling so well.
One key to successfully homeschooling is the ability to do so outside the rigid government school curriculum and other system requirements.
Make that rigid MARXIST "government" school curriculum - enforced by the NEA and AFT union commissars.
Thank the Rockefellers for pushing women in the workplace to increase the tax base & get kids into government schools for brainwashing.
Congress had a part in it from the beginning and it was specifically noticeable starting in the 70s under Carter. Crank back the economy, inflate the dollar and force the perferred outcome.
Spot-on!
Hi Robert, I am an avid follower of you - l love and appreciate your stand for freedom, justice, truth and also how you intermix lovely stories from your farm to help us keep our sanity. That said, I am puzzled by the ideas you are trying to refute in your article. I am surrounded by many of the people you are talking about - staunch democrats. And I would say most, whether they have a low-key job or high powered job want/have always wanted a long-lasting relationship, someone to grow old with, raise a family, have the kids get along really well. But we all have to support ourselves while we are looking for our spouses. I know very few people who give up on their marriages easily, even when one person is shouldering the vast majority of the burden of children and finances. I think you are very fortunate to not only be married but seemingly to have find a true life partner that you enjoy. Perhaps some empathy for those of use who for some reason have not been as fortunate to be matched so well, despite our best efforts :). In my experience, people who are that fortunate look at others who are not and think there is something wrong with them. But that is like people who have 1 easy child and think they are the greatest parents in the world and then they have the next child, use the same parenting techniques, and it's a struggle. A little humility goes a long way....
There is no perfect marriage, but what makes marriage long lasting is a full commitment that divorce is not an option and that each person must truly Love their spouse (husband and wife as designed by God) so much that they are willing to change the flaws in their own life.
That is not easy! It wasn’t easy for me, but I prayed and asked God to help me with my weaknesses and He did—but it took time. COMMITMENT to the end and honoring the vows of marriage taken before God and witnesses, is key to having a healthy marriage and family. I’m still working on this, but every day I see my wife, I see her as my bride on that beautiful day we became husband and wife—God bless her. ❤️
Divorce is a necessary option. It is too easy to obtain, and children pay the price, but we need that option nonetheless, it can be lifesaving for the exploited partner.
Good for You! Commitment is in many ways a hard thing to do.
the doctor is not fortunate, he works hard for his marriage.
That is called work, not being fortunate.
Tragically, so many of your rabid democrat friends don't like to work.
And hate others that do.
Yeah, one cannot "work" enough to get a spouse sober. And one isn't abused & controlled & terrorized along with one's kids because one hasn't "worked" enough. I've worked w/ plenty of battered women who were desperate to keep their marriage together and paid with their lives. The insensitivity here is astonishing.
hahaha, leave it to a democrat to hallucinate comments never made, and then get all pissy about it.
Feel free to list anywhere I said that "work" will get a spouse sober. Or that "work" will stop abuse.
Or just keep hallucinating things other say, and get all pissy about it.
The stupidity here is just astonishing.
Speaking of bettered women, many will stay with their partner, that beats the shit out of them, once a month, but says pretty things the next 29 days.
Because women place more value on pretty words, than they do actions.
Just like democrats.
If you could teach those battered women to place more value on the abusive actions, rather than the pretty words, that might help.
Help them take responsibility for their own actions, and they might not keep repeating the same mistakes.
Like so many democrats do.
individual irresponsibility is endemic in America.
Lowen, I keep finding such blatant inconsistent thoughts thrown around here, even from Dr. Malone, who left Cal. and his children and grandchildren if I'm not mistaken. (granted, they were probably adults, but the grandkids?) Conservatives are made by early marriages? Somehow I doubt his children have become conservative because of his and Jill's early marriage.That they went against his mothers wishes, is another sore spot. I know that this isn't the insensitivity you are referring to, but yes, what a sad view so many have.
Pat, my mom 👩 used to say in Spanish: No hacen, ni dejan hacer.
Translation is what you said: They don't do anything and they don't let anyone else do anything! Sad 😔 ‼️
Its true, incompetent people get mad at the competent.
True, they're threatened!
Threatened people lash out!!!!
I don’t think Robert was taking the position you suggest. I think he is critical of those who condemned, ridiculed, laughed at those who believed in life long marriages that included raising children, and dividing the task of earning money and raising children in the home, rather than both parents leaving their young children in the hands of day care or nannies.
In light of your last sentence, I am reminded of the saying: "physician heal thyself."
Agreed. The only thing worse that 'single parenting' is serial marriage. A parent (either one) married 3 or more times leaves children incredibly insecure, confused, rudderless and convinced that they will be left or that marriage is a temporary convenience. Faith can overcome this, but it will take a patient spouse and good counseling to walk through the wreckage. Stable families with emotionally present and mature fathers and mothers, who teach and model good boundaries, give their children the best starts. (Btw, you have to get married younger most people do these days if you want more than two children.)
The odds of alcoholism in one or the other spouse divorcing is 40%. The odds of alcoholism in a person who's been married and divorced four times is at least 85%.
Alcoholic and other-drug addicts are not stable, they are not emotionally present and they are immature. Their emotional growth stops the day they trigger alcoholism: average age 13. They are emotional adolescents or, even, children. The cure is to inspire in addicts a need to "try sobriety," as they put it. And to inspire in them that need, we must learn how to identify them, early and often. Because drinking and using is so often hidden, this is best done by observing behaviors. And because of the stigma of alcoholism, hardly anyone is teaching that or looking for it.
Good parenting requires clean and sober parents and, because alcoholics can be so destructive emotionally, arguably even if it's only one parent.
Good living of life requires that one be clean and sober. We don't want pilots, drivers, machine workers, crane operators or anyone around us to be drunken or strung out messes.
The challenge is how to deal with these people. I know of technologies (therapies) that can handle this problem. Yet outside of my church I never hear about them. If we really want to solve this problem - no excuses - then we need to realize what already exists right under our noses that we are ignoring.
We must eliminate the stigma of addiction so we more readily diagnose it when you and I see it under our noses. It's not that others don't see it; they don't know what to look for or what they are looking at when it smacks us in the face.
But there are no "therapies" that handle the problem. It's genetic. If you are not an addict, try drinking addictively. You won't be able to. It requires that others stop the enabling, the "helping," when the only true "help" you can ever give an addict is uncompromising tough love. That means consequences for misbehaviors, and someone (a spouse, an employer, a judge, law enforcers) forging the link between the heavy use and misbehaviors.
I favor Larry's point. Even if genetic, those that abstain do so on a daily basis. They call themselves recovering not cured.
Agreed. The genetic predisposition to substance addiction cannot be cured; it can only be controlled in the sense of abstaining from use. And if they use and think they can control their use, they are mistaken. They may well control use in the short run, only because they are not drinking or using enough to trigger the craving. But in the long run, they WILL lose control over use and, hence, their behaviors (which is the part I write about).
Addictive personalities (read weak self control) wreaks havoc in any family where one or both marriage partners indulge in one or many forms of substances - even food - that become uncontrollable.
It is not weak self control, Tom. Show me an addict who wants his substance and I'll show you someone with far greater will power than I could ever muster: they will get their drug, regardless of the price they or others must pay.
And food is not a psychotropic. While it may wreak havoc in their own lives, it does not wreak havoc in the lives of others in the same way and to the degree of a substance addiction, which causes distortions of perceptions and memory in susceptible individuals. Non-addicts do not experience euphoric recall; addicts do. If a non-addict ever experiences a blackout, where events do not enter the memory banks, they'll never again drink to that excess because it's too scary an experience. Addicts will drink to such excess over and over again.
I know you sincerely believe this, but I don't think it's true. Spirit can rise above addictions (even possibly genetics), and as far as I know, this has been accomplished in many cases. It's not a 100% success rate, but it can be done. See the work of Narconon.
Sometimes it needs help. My dads dad was a drunk who left his polio cripples wife with his family to raise his 4 kids. Dad was raised to be a concert violinist. Actually gave a recital in Dallas. On visit to his dad during prohibition making bathtub gin a bottle broke cutting a tendon in THAT little finger. No more fiddling. Somehow that morphed into his becoming a cop, raising to acting Capt. of detectives when the job took him down. Was treated for nervous breakdown including electroshock and when nothing worked a psychiatrist recommended that teatotaler taking a drink to ease the pain. There must have been a lot of pain.
That’s a rough story. Sorry he went through all of this...and you, so much growing up. Electroshock ‘therapy’ works for some, but at what price? My understanding it can wipe out your memory, long or short term, not sure which.
Sometimes, it is just selfishness.
Everyone has a childhood, adolescent years, young adult experiences, many good, many not. Not everyone thrives, and some are their own worst enemy. Many have no idea what drives them to either good or bad things.
Childhood trauma, if not dealt with early, can be indicative of a trail of regrets and abuse.
...or serial cohabitating
I know people whose father died and the mother married again, or did not and raised the children, got a degree and worked while raising six children.
The death of a parent is tragic. I was referring to divorce and remarriage multiple times.
Death needs to be included in the unfortunate mix. It isn't in this article and is one of the reasons why this article feels short-sighted. Women are often left by men, for generations as far back as immigrants coming here. It is common.
Death is not usually something we can control (although I know a person left a single parent due to suicide). Selfishness, abuse and immaturity in both parents is.
The women I refer here to, are left, but not by death.
Which is, partly, the 'single parenting’ spoken of here. It is a complicated topic, no two situations exactly alike, but often selfishness is the main contributor.
Also, men are left by women too.
Yes. It takes two to build a stable home.
Often for good reason.
Such an important post! Thank you Dr Malone for speaking the truth about our crisis of fatherlessness. Here's a short video that looks at the manmade plague of fatherlessness. It lists the huge number of problems that have been shown to be related to not having a dad in the home.
https://menaregood.substack.com/p/the-manmade-plague-of-fatherlessness
Thank you Dr. Malone for this wonderful article, essay on how it used to be. I married at 31. First child at 32. Second at 34. Back when 2 was the number especially if we were older when we married. Yes I would have married younger but it didn’t happen. You spell the success of a happy marriage with one spouse. It’s a job to work at. When #2 came along, I told my husband I can’t keep working full time and taking care of children. We made it with me part time and he full time. Homeschooling has become a must if there is not a good Christian Day School to instill Godly principles (no apology for that statement). Ours was not the perfect home but I sure worked at making it the best I could. I gave up a degree in nursing to have children. I don’t regret it at all.
I agree with the principles you outlined. I know there are failed marriages and many regrets among our readers/commenters. Move on. Do your best to be the best parent to children who need
you. You can do it. My marriage had its ups and downs but I believed “don’t quit”! Focus on the once love of your life. Make her/him that again. A missing ingredient that is the most important is a God centered home. God bless those of you who struggle to take the advice Dr Malone has given. You can make it! I know!
The reason for single parent households is often alcohol/other psychoactive drug addiction in one or both parents.
The odds of substance addiction across the U.S. population is 10%. Yet, 40% of divorces include at least one substance addict.
The solution, then, is get addicts clean and sober. This requires early identification of the disease (you can't force sobriety without knowing there's a problem) and an offer of uncompromising tough love. Addicts must be given a choice of sobriety or consequences. "You're out of here, I keep the kids."
While we'd end up with more temporarily single parent households, in the long run there would be more sober parents.
When I wrote my first book on alcoholism, in which I prescribed "uncompromising tough love," my mother bemoaned, "You're saying I should have left your father. You'd have been children with a single mother. That would have been terrible for you." I told her, no, we might have been children in a family with a recovering addict., which would have been a hell of a lot better than living with an alcoholic. (I told my mother it wasn't her fault--she had no understanding of the disease; they don't teach it in school and drinking heavily is too often glorified.) An even greater benefit is my father almost assuredly would not have died from his disease at 60.
So yes, we do better with two parents--if they are both sober, which does not necessarily mean non-drinkers; it means without the misbehaviors concomitant with alcoholism.
Or SSRI’s going south. If they destroy your connection to your soul the drive to maintain contacts can be destroyed…..
Doctor Malone.
You made some great 👍 points.
Where can we start fixing 🤔 all of the different social, emotional and spiritual dynamics that are in play now days?
That is our biggest challenge.
I was blessed to grow up with two parents. Dad worked hard to provide and our Mom did the rest. She took care of the trees while he kept his eye on the Forrest. We all have turned out to be good people. I do miss them though.
Amen! I agree. Children need both parents in the home . Children in single parent homes suffer.
I went back to school to get my music degree after my oldest 4 children were in school. I went part time so I could be home when the children got home from school. It took me 8 years to get my degree. It is so important to be home . Someone needs to be home when the kids get home.
There is also another problem. Having kids to involved in everything that there can be no family time. I have a friend who has her kids involved in so many after school activities that the children have no time to play.
Having a stable loving marriage is important for the children. I grew up in a very loving home. My mom stayed at home and my dad worked hard as a farmer. Because my dad was working long hours in the Spring , Summer and Fall my mom would send me out with my dad to “help” him. That way I could spend one on one with my dad. Back in the day when I was little dad used siphon tubes to irrigated. I would walk down the end of the field while he would get the siphon tubes flowing water down the furrows. Of course later on they used sprinkler pipe then wheel lines and the pivots to water the crops. I will never forget the time I got to spend with my dad on the farm.
My mother taught me to cook. I have made cookbooks for my children and older grandchildren so that they could have the family recipes.
I could have never have put my children in daycare. It would have broken my heart. I realize sometimes circumstances are such that mother’s have to work.
Families are our future. Have a great day!
Dr Malone isn’t true that the UN Proposal passed?
It might have been helpful to include why your first marriage didn't work, Melanie.
I figured that since I have mentioned it before I didn’t need to bring it up again. I don’t want pity My first marriage last for 22 very long years to an abusive man. I made a bad choice. Abusers know how to pick nice people. But my dear husband now is a wonderful man. He loves me and my 4 older children as his own. They call him dad. He has been a wonderful example of service and hard work and kindness to me we have been married 25 years in Nov. We adopted a biracial little boy and I had a baby at 46 years old. Have children people, they are our future.
You did not have to abide by DD's requests. How doing so was it to be helpful to her is beyond me?
Not helpful to me so much as other readers who can benefit from real life experiences, and see that we can learn from "mistakes'.
What mistakes would that be DD? It is highly improbable that one can learn anything from another's mistake(s) - live and learn is singular. We must make our own, and many decisions don't start out as mistakes.
I will say what I did learn during those long 22 years was I learned to depend totally on the Lord to get me through the day. He would lift my burdens even when the only thing I could get out during my prayer was Help. He was there .
There's a lot missing in this article, if you ask me. The dynamics of a healthy marriage and family are passed down from generation to generation; unless they're not. The foundation for all you speak of can be achieved by "knowing yourself." How that happens and why is a life-process that is different for everyone for good reason. There is no magic method, especially in today's economy. To judge someone for having more than one marriage is a short-sighted stance. To include other statistics in this complicated look would be helpful. There are too many to list here, but to include the success of second marriages would be a start, as well as "why do men abandon their families?" The stories of this happening go way back... Producing guilt (perhaps I should have said "promoting guilt") for not having the perfect two parent family is useless.
Married Life is about accepting those challenges. (You made a Vow...A contract)
Am I doing things right, or are behaviors making them worse?
Am I serving the families best interests, or only myself?
Is my pursuits of pleasures doing an illustrated harm on the well being of my family?
You will be faced to make decisions you never dreamed possible.
Making them utterly ones out of anger and stress only complicate it.
Doing it for years in front of your family insures your failures.
The time for you to seek professional help was yesterday.
The lawyers refer to divorce as the DIS-ILLUSION of marriage.
Man they got a funny way to describe it don't they?
Been there....If you have been blessed to find a soul mate in your life....Treasure it!
DD - you know this I'm sure: If I feel guilty, for any reason, that's my doing, my responsibility. No one can "produce guilt" in me.
Yes, I agree Leonora, and many will add guilt to their already shamed self. Not enough people have developed the skills to know the difference. That's why a different tone for this article would have included more understanding of the circumstances beyond our control. ( I changed the language to "promoting guilt")
Couldn't agree more.
The most important part of life is family. A man’s main job is to provide for his family, and be there when they need him.
Having worked in the same company for 40 years (longer than I’ve been married), I can assure everyone, no one from work will ever visit my grave. My life’s legacy will be born from my children, not my work life.
Work is a means to provide for those you love, nothing else.
And yes I’m a highly paid executive, they care about what you bring to the bottom line that’s it.
That's not true for all of us. My work is my passion: my main income-producing gig is helping people keep what they earned, because they spend and invest their earnings more wisely than any government ever has, can, or will. And I teach some others much of what I know.
Work can be a legacy, too. A means for providing for those we love, but also a legacy.
And my other passions help others, too, including my work and writings on behavioral indications of alcohol and other-drug addiction, where I know I've saved lives.
YES! YES! YES! Thank you for this article.
Necessary stuff, Docs!
The woman’s Hero’s Journey goes from Maiden, to Mother, to Matriarch. Emulating an unenlightened male one - college/career, etc. - is not being of maximal utility to the women or society. The self-betrayal is horrible to watch.