America's model housewife turns feminist as husband abandons her

Guardian Unlimited ^ | January 8, 2006 | Paul Harris

[Lorianne]

It is 25 years since Terry Hekker hailed the housewife, now in a landmark decision the acclaimed author has rejected her past saying she was wrong

Terry Hekker wrote a book in 1980 that made her famous. Ever Since Adam & Eve was a passionate defence of her decision to eschew a career and spend her life as a wife and a mother.

Coming at the end of the Seventies, when feminism was enjoying a renaissance and the career woman was emerging from behind the cooker, Hekker became a celebrated poster child for more old-fashioned values. She wanted her job choice of 'homemaker' to be considered as valid as those of up-and-coming women bankers, bosses and company directors.

Today, Hekker told The Observer, she is planning a follow-up book. Its working, albeit jokey, title is bluntly honest: Disregard First Book. For her life did not turn out as she planned, and she now believes her decision to become a housewife and homemaker should serve as a warning for young American women. 'My anachronistic book was written while I was in a successful marriage that I expected would go on forever. Sadly, it now has little relevance for modern women, except perhaps as a cautionary tale,' Hekker wrote last week as she announced her U-turn.

In a display of spectacular bad taste, Hekker's husband presented her with divorce papers on their 40th wedding anniversary and left her for a younger woman. The divorce left her facing an uncertain financial future, bereft of income and - after spending her adult life bringing up five children - lacking skills to make her attractive in the job market. Despite that, the judge in her divorce case suggested that - at 67 - she go for job training.

[Paul Ross]

Terry WHO?

[MEGoody]

I feel bad that this lady's husband left her. Some guys let that 'mid-life crisis' thing override their common sense.

But she should be very proud that she raised her kids instead of foisting them off on a day care. She should be proud that she put her family first.

And because she did this, hubby should have to pay her alimony for the rest of her life.

[Paul Ross]

The divorce left her facing an uncertain financial future, bereft of income...

Wait a minute. This does not ring true. She would only have been denied spousal maintenance at that age if she HAD some other form of income. Likely social security, etc. Hence, it sounds like a gross exaggeration.

[TradicalRC]

If my father had left my mother the way my husband left me, no one would ever have spoken to him again. Divorce has become a licence for men to behave badly,' she said.

But it it the Feminists who insisted that divorce would liberate women. They were relentless promoters of divorce and attacked any traditional idea of marriage. The chickens have come home to roost.

[MEGoody]

the John Kerry-George Bush battle in 2004 would have been like an atomic bomb to our marriage.

I guess that depends on where your priorities lie. Is it more important to you that George Bush/John Kerry get elected, or that you make your marriage work?

If necessary, I'd choose the latter. You can vote your conscience behind that curtain without having to make your home a battleground because you can't agree on political issues.

[linda_22003]

"One of her last statements should be taken to heart of all women. She says that women need to learn how to take care of themselves and be prepared for the worst."

Exactly. Death or divorce are not the only reasons a woman should have the ability to support herself or her family (I can't believe we're still even debating this in the 21st century!). Thanks to my mother's example and insistence, I didn't even stop at a bachelor's degree (my parents wouldn't have heard of that!), and I've had a lucrative career for the last 25 years. My financial contributions over the years have matched my husband's, most of the time. And when I see people post here that they won't be "able" to retire at 67, 68, or more - well, we're not among them, thanks to my parents' expectations for me.

[TradicalRC]

For the men on here, this woman/wife of 40 years certainly does deserve a great many of the family assets for 40 years of wife and mothering.

I completely agree. I don't know how you leave anyone after that long. I'll be married fifteen years and I can't imagine being with anyone else.

[Alkhin]

amen Nea - have long concluded that if *I* - a housewife and homeschooling mom - lived my life even half the way a lot of the grumpy old bitter farts that post here on FR say a woman like me should live - I would be in the nut house, flipping my lower lip going "brre brre brre brre brre!"

I think some DIVORCED male FReepers use this forum to bash women because they are so ineffectual in having a genuine discussion of their problems in real life.... I suspect a lot of men like playing the femme fatale as much as women do.

[CaptRon]

Her ex-husband is a cretin and a louse. Good riddance to him.

Her ex-husband is dead. I was acquainted with them both years ago. I believe she is also the sister of a former US attorney for the district of New York.

[CaptRon]

Also, there seems to be some time dilation here. She might be 67 NOW, but the breakup was some time ago. She hasn't been the mayor of the village they mention for quite some time.

[music is math]

a. Men wounded by divorce and

b. Women wounded by divorce.

to that, you can add:

c. Younger men who have seen their fair share of crap marriages (liberal and conservative, secular and christian, etc) and won't be going anywhere near that particular trainwreck, thankyouverymuch.

[Galveston Grl]

We would not see women bashing threads on a liberal discussion board because those angry feelings of betrayed and angry men are not allowed. So we get the nasty little wounded puppy crusaders here.

Female hating men support the men's movement and they sound like the femenazis they hope to replace in power with the difference of hating and targeting women. Call them mascunazis. They hate the nature of women as deeply as the femenazis hate the nature of men. They want a system of revenge to replace the male hating system created by the femenazis.

The one group both the female haters and the male haters agree to hate is housewives. Both view housewives as leeches and useless garbage. They mock the ideas of love, selflessness, and marriage loyalist. Both support a divorce structure that ultimately economically and socially punishes the gals with no money and social status.

I am disappointed in the men's movement and will never support it because of it's women hating and bashing. The same with the women's movement. The men's movement has burrowed into the conservative power structure and conservatives often support it as a valid reaction to the man hating and abusing femenazis. But it is the same animal of hatred with the goal of injustice; only difference being the sex of the target. It will not lead to a reform changing the current hate game.

The sad part is what we have learned from liberalism's racial and sexual rights movement. The wealthiest, most hateful and unjust rise to the top of the political and social reform in the name of victimhood and righting wrongs. Hate is a powerful energy. Conservatives need to sideline the men's movement like they have sidelined feminists. And conservative women who kneejerk support the men's movement in reaction to their anger at the feminist movement better remove their heads from their a$$es. If we must have a group of flaming haters shaping family social and legal policy, it will get worse for women and children with the men's movement in charge.

[Galveston Grl]

The men's movement has burrowed into the conservative movement in reaction to the man hating feminists. But they are no more than the male version of the feminists. They hate and disrespect women as much as feminists hate and disrespect men. They should be sidelined by the conservatives because we don't need a new and improved form of hate "reforming" family and marriage policy.

[TradicalRC]

Also, how often have we heard about a conservative man dying with a fortune like the one Theresa Heinz received...and the woman, after her husband's death, turns out to stand for everything that he did not stand for? What was up with that? I met a woman in Los Angeles 2 years ago who bragged about how, after her father died, her mother could finally breathe easy and become a Democrat! What is that all about? Did the men have an idea that would happen?

I used to work in Wheaton, IL which is a Very Conservative town, and one of the bank presidents had passed away (who was also Very Conservative Republican) and sure enough his wife marches in the Fourth of July parade with the democrats. I would not make any assumptions about why they chose to marry each other, though.

[TradicalRC]

I think some DIVORCED male FReepers use this forum to bash women because they are so ineffectual in having a genuine discussion of their problems in real life.... I suspect a lot of men like playing the femme fatale as much as women do.

Please. The bitterness is palpable from both sexes on this forum. Noticably more so from the divorcees. Which goes to show that divorce is not only bad for the children, it's bad for the spouses. We keep God in our house and marriage. I see no mention of Him here.

[Campion]

Female hating men support the men's movement and they sound like the femenazis they hope to replace in power with the difference of hating and targeting women. Call them mascunazis. They hate the nature of women as deeply as the femenazis hate the nature of men.

It's Newton's Third Law; the equal and opposite reaction.

The whole agenda of feminism was to wreck marriage and replace it by sexual license (both the pre-marital and extra-marital kind) and the resulting mistrust and hostility. The mistrust and hostility works both ways, as it was designed to do.

Most of us probably know stories of decent men treated like garbage by women they loved. (My brother went there and did that.)

Likewise, we also know stories of decent women treated like garbage by their husbands or boyfriends.

And in both cases, there's probably more to the story than we know, beginning with the question of why they married those individuals in the first place.

Feminism is accomplishing what it set out to do.

[GermanBusiness]

[the John Kerry-George Bush battle in 2004 would have been like an atomic bomb to our marriage.
I guess that depends on where your priorities lie. Is it more important to you that George Bush/John Kerry get elected, or that you make your marriage work?]

How many FReeper men would have had a fairly easy time staying married to Cindy Sheehan over the past 2 years?

This is FR and not "Waiting to Exhale."

[GermanBusiness]

[sure enough his wife marches in the Fourth of July parade with the democrats. I would not make any assumptions about why they chose to marry each other, though.]

I wish there were more studies done regarding mixed-marriages. Does anyone have any good links on the subject?

I don't have any experience in marriage but I just assume that, after 9-11 showed us that politics can be life-or-death, it could be about the stridency of a woman's leftism and whether she seems old enough to have grown out of it by now.

Especially in the New York area, where the whole place could become a radioactive wasteland if terrorists are allowed to win. This woman is the mayor of Nyack, New York which could, if the wind is right, end up in the fallout path of the Indian Point Nuclear Reactor further up the Hudson on the other side. How happy would I be to find myself married to a leftist politician post 9-11? We just don't know what role her politics played in this story.

Long hair on a twentysomething male looks cute. On a man over 30 it looks ridiculous. Only buzzcuts make older guys look cute. Exhibit A: Donald Trump and the dead animal on his head compared to Bruce Willis and John Travolta.

Similarly, liberalism on a twentysomething female looks cute. On a woman over 30, it makes her look ridiculous. She would be expected to know better by now. It is the same principle as the above buzzcut imperative for older males.

I went out to dinner this past Friday with a German woman who was anti-Bush...but she is young and doesn't know the world much...she wasn't strident or arrogant with me...wasn't telling me "you are wrong" in any off-putting way. It was a great evening. If she had been like an American aunt of mine, however, and gotten strident with me and made remarks like she felt US soldiers deserved to be killed in Iraq...the evening would have gone entirely differently.

Don't worry. I wouldn't want to suggest that any marriages break up because of just political differences.

But isn't it refreshing to be discussing how politics could possibly destroy a marriage (on FR of all places!) rather than continue the "Waiting to Exhale" theme.

[justshutupandtakeit]

Many apparently yearn for the good ole days when women died early and saved their husbands from having to divorce them.

One question though about the "younger" woman how young is younger? 60? 65? 30?

[TAdams8591]

"I happen to dislike either type."

Agreed.