It’s been an extraordinarily busy weekend – the good kind of busy, filled with family and friends and good times – but I haven’t had much time for reading. However, I didn’t want the weekend to pass by without sharing this great piece from my talented friend Christine Koh: Hello, Plague. Goodbye, Martyr.
Since becoming a parent, I have heard — probably a million and one times — about a dynamic in which when the mom gets sick, she puts her head down and powers through, and when the dad gets sick, he crawls into his cave and rests. And admittedly, this has been my reality. When I get sick, I don’t see rest as an option. How else will the children get fed, the house tidied, my clients satisfied? I never take naps unless my body shuts down and I collapse. Jon, on the other hand, will retreat to his man cave to rest when ill….
And then I had a realization. I was a key player in this annoying dynamic –- unfortunately, in the role of enabler and martyr. I wondered whether men are more realistic about self-preservation and simply take care of themselves when needed because that seems the quickest route to repair. I wondered whether women –- in their wiring as caregivers –- are primed to be martyrs, to put themselves second (or third, or fourth…) and not ask for or state what they need.
Can you relate to Christine’s revelation? As we move into cold and flu season around here, I’m definitely reminded that it doesn’t serve anyone when I go, go, go until I collapse. I deserve – and need – to care for myself as well as I care for everyone else around me.
And maybe the “mom cold” should start looking a little more like a “man cold.”
I do my best to slow down and rest as soon as I start to feel sick. But my husband comes home from work and goes to bed and stays there until he feels better. When I am sick he will come home long enough for me to go to the doctor, most of the time. Rarely do I get a whole day to stay in bed. So, I don’t think I’m playing the martyr. I do what I can to slow down and rest in the circumstances I am given.
Meagan, thanks so much for sharing this here! I’m interested to read how others handle this scenario.
Nope. I’ve never had the martyr gene. Even when my kids were bitty if I felt bad I napped during their naptimes and all unnecessary cleaning and cooking were tossed out the window until I felt better. While the kids were awake I’d lay on the couch wrapped in a blanket to keep one ear/eye on them. But they also were trained from very young that when someone (anyone, Mom included is sick) we are quiet and behave nicely. Seriously, I get that mom’s feel pressure to DO everything but I find that I’m a horrible mom when I’m sick and try to push through. Everyone is better off if I hunker down and expedite trying to get better.
As a man, I guess it is a matter of communication. Guys can help out their wives when they are down with sickness, but some women tend to be too picky on the daily tasks that men would rather back off.
Nice sharing of article..Thanks for sharing this to us..
I don’t know…I think the martyr/wimp dichotomy is definitely overblown in some families. And I think many women need to be willing to let themselves chill when they’re sick. Personally, I don’t have a huge problem with this! When I’m feeling bad, I try to rest. The problem, though, is that sometimes I’m barreling through not to be a martyr but because I really, truly do NOT have a choice. Sure, heavy cleaning and even cooking can be put off. The kids won’t die if they have toast and an apple for dinner. But they still need to be taken to and from school and after-school activities. They still need to have homework supervised. Dishes still need to be stacked in the dishwasher. Clean clothes still need to be brought up from the laundry room. If I’m sick on a weekend and my husband is away, the kids still need to be offered SOMETHING to eat, entertained, and have some basic needs taken care of. If I’m really feeling lousy, even the modest effort required to help them get cereal in the morning, find their clean gym clothes, or make arrangements with a friend to take them for a few hours, can be a lot of effort. And in our house, it doesn’t matter if I lock myself in the bedroom; my kids WILL find me. Whereas my husband, if he’s sick, can cozy himself into bed with a book and no one will even realize he’s there. You could argue this is my own fault for making myself indispensable to the kids, I suppose. But I’m the primary caregiver when my husband is at work 50 miles away. They are used to my being THE ONE because most of the time, I am. While he is very hands-on and involved on weekends, they will never look to him for the constant parenting help for which they look to me. And when I’m really sick, I do resent even the effort I have to put into telling the kids to PLEASE go ask Dad about it. They will wake me up from much-needed sleep to ask some question that he could have easily answered for them. So the martyr dynamic is not necessarily mom or dad’s fault. Sometimes it just is.
And my favorite thing about finally having all my kids in school all day? I can finally get a sick day for myself. Or at least until 3:00. I think there are few parenting burdens I despised more than having to care for a needy toddler or preschooler when I felt really, really sick.
Not a martyr here. Oh, I’ll power thru a more mild illness that might have had me in bed before I had a child, but if I’m truly feeling awful I tell my husband and I go to bed. I also take plenty of naps (on the weekend when I’m not working) now that I’m pregnant and I go to bed early. Granted, these naps and early bedtimes are with my daughter, but still, I don’t stay up to get that last bit of cleaning done. I get the sleep I need while my husband washes the dishes.
Ha! My husband was sick over the weekend, and spent about 60% of his waking time just lying in bed. I was kind of annoyed with him, since he didn’t seem THAT sick, and I was dealing with all the house/baby stuff alone. But maybe he was on the right track, he seemed a lot better this morning!
Mmmm I dunno about all that. I think what annoys most women about man colds is the whining. My husband isn’t a whiner at any time other than when sick. That’s what a man cold is. Not that they rest or take care of themselves it’s the ridiculous moaning and groaning as if they have the bubonic plague.
Also I can’t rest. Ever. So while writhing around on the couch whining sounds fantastic it’s just not a possibility. I don’t see it as martyrdom I just think some otherwise fabulous men turn into babies when they catch a cold ?
ITA! My DH was “sick” last week, no visible symptoms to me other than he just “felt unwell.” He has allergies, and when they flare up all I hear is “I feel like I’m getting sick, I’d better go lie down. *sniff, sniff*” For me to lie down I have to literally feel like I cannot get up. And I don’t fuss about it when I get a bit of a cold — I had recurrent sinus infections and just took an Advil and went on with my day. But the “woe is me — I am so sick!” just grates on me because I still feel able to do things when I am a little sick, I just take some cold medicine and soldier on, but he refuses to take anything, and then complains that he isn’t feeling well. ?
The worst part for me is that I want to rest-but I also want to eat real healthy food and stuff, but then I’ll have to do all the chopping etc and wash dishes (we don’t have a dishwasher) and so then I end up going to fast food or junk like oven pizzas that really isn’t going to be the fuel my body needs to get healthy fast. I need to start doing the freezer meal thing so I have healthy meals I can plop out when I’m sick, lol, but it only happens like once a year, so I probably won’t actually make any changes…
In my husband’s defense though, he works a full workday even when sick, which is surely more physically demanding than sitting around on the couch/floor playing Little People and Chutes N Ladders. With no kids in school yet and no job myself, I really do pretty much relax all day when I’m sick. When I was sick this January I think I didn’t go outside for over a week. lol.
Some strong opinions on this one! I do think it’s sometimes easier said than done than to totally give in to a cold, and I also don’t like the idea of indulging the particularly wimpy “man colds” to the point where a guy with a mild headache gets to lay around in bed for three days while I soldier through the flu. That said, I think the difference between being a martyr and being a mom who simply has to get stuff done is often in our attitude (are we soldiering on because we have to or because we have a point to prove?) Hmm, I think this one is going to require a follow-up post. Thanks for all the food for thought everyone!
We’ve been dealing with this very issue this week. I’m going on week 2 of the cold that just won’t end. It doesn’t help that I’m pregnant so I can’t take much for the symptoms to start with and I’m allergic to the only medication I’m allowed to take.
I’ve had several times in the past week where I just had to let things go and take a sick day. The guilt always kicked in but I had to remind myself that it was okay to slow down.
This is great, and something I have learned to deal with bit by bit in our marriage. I’m not convinced a male/female thing as much as how you were raised to cope through illness or the examples you had growing up. I was always told that unless I couldn’t move I would make it to church and school. Husband was absent from most of high school for any given excuse. Two extremes! So I’m sure you can imagine how this panned out in adulthood.
But, I’m proud to say that this weekend we were all hit with a 24 hour flu, and I laid next Husband in bed for almost 24 hours straight!