h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I am chastened.

Just F*** the families. If they are not interested in your well being, then take time off from them. There is nothing as bad for grandparents as not seeing their grandchildren. You might just say: OK, folks, 2001 is for me and not for you. Keep stuck to yourself, and let them rage on. It will do them good!

Taking a stand in your position is no "Zuckerschlecken" (TC, have you got a good translation for this one??) You have to calculate the cost: No contact to your family, few friends who might help, trusting in professionals who might say something totaly away from your idea of life, OR sticking to the things you know (e.g: being bullied, controled, abused, etc.

This problem has been going on for some while and I think it is time you took some action. First of all, of course, find out if the children understand the problem. Never underestimate their powers for comprehending something like this.

In your position (which I could easily be) you have a home, four kids and a husband. You want the kids. You do not want the husband. Now comes the hard bit. You do not need the home. That's what ties you to him. So you have to exercise some lateral thinking, base your plans on a different basis and plan a life somewhere else. So step 1: find a flat. A friend of mine did that. She took the kids and upped and went. Leaving 'home' behind. The three of them are now happy, within a year she has a job, car, divorce, etc., All the circle of friends rallied round at short notice and decorated the flat within a few days and moved her in.

Sorry if I am saying things which are not correct - I don't have the background knowledge, as Percy says. But it can still serve as an example. There is some tie somewhere which you are going to have to break, but which you think, at the moment, that you can't break. Does that make sense?

Well, E we sort of simulposted there. Zuckerschlecken - no fun. Not easy. Not a bowl of cherries.

I read a good quote just recently: "Not all men are annoying. Some are dead"

Along the same lines.... "What do you call a woman who knows where her husband is every night? - A widow"

I wish mine would go out occasionally.

Well, I hope he will be doing so on the 9th of December. I am looking forward to getting to know you.

"You" also im Sinne von "Euch" Sprache ist ja manchmal soooo schwierig!

O God, why don't I get round to asking him? BTW has ringo ... no.. I'll ask that in the right forum.. See you there...

I heard a phrase about the men in our society (post-soviet) - they want to be in command of their wives, they like the islamic or catholic model of the family. But they don't want the resposibility which the Arabic men have and they don't adore and honour a mother like catholics do.
It's a little hard for me to express myself in English but in my language it sounded just like all our family-problems taken properly in 2 sentences.
I hope the things are changing now in the society but for me and my generation it's too late. I guess one reason of this might be absence of any religion for a long time. People just don't care.

I am not sure religion has a great effect on "Western" society nowadays, Hatifnat. Men are basically the same the world over, and I would like to bet that even the Dalai Lama would develop a macho streak if he spent a few weeks in the company of a group of women.

The basic problem seems to be to find a decent man. I have been very lucky and went on the criteria of a similar upbringing and education and culture. I got to know his parents and have never been deceived. But I did meet a girl once who was practically stood up in her wedding dress, just discovering in time that the man she was going to marry was a criminal and seriously in debt and that all the lovely presents he had given her had been acquired dishonestly.

So your phrase "don't want the responsibility" and mother-adulation apply to "Westerners", too. It may be more a decline in morals and values generally than a specific dissolving of religious beliefs.

Maybe that lightens it up a bit: http://www.h2g2.com/A473762

Or, to put it in one sentence: Men are good and women are bad. Ain't it so?

No.

I checked the link - the reasons you point there lead me to think that some problems are caused by the men still needing to hunt The Primeval Ox. After 8-hour working day they just don't feel the proudness of killing an ox.

Could it be that you are a real macho? Are you doin' fine with that? I'm a macho when it comes to defining aimes and enshuring human rights, and a softie when it comes to helping my wifes (that is: I do help them a lot). And I'm proud of it.

No I'm not a macho. My husband is. Actually he is not, he just wants to be a superman but as this is not possible, he tries to keep the macho image. Helping me makes him somehow feeling himself weak. And he thinks there are men's duties and women's duties and one must never mix them, ie he can never wash dishes. Sometimes (and quite often) it seems very medieval to me.

Religion itself may not govern how people behave, but when it is convenient, people use it as a 'stick to beat you with'. My husband is from a very strict Catholic family, therefore there is no question of divorce. It doesn't matter how badly he behaves or how unhappy he makes the whole family, as far as the Church is concerned, there is no opt-out clause, you are there for life.

And you? Are you Catholic too? Or do you feel yourself free enough to go away without divorce and have a new start with your children?
As about society without any religion - there is no respect to anything or anybody. I think that only bad things fill the empty spaces themselves. People turn to be very nihilistic.

You should be a macho! Yes, I mean it. Gather all of you strength and do the right things. (wich is my definition of macho)

I have to think about it.
BTW my previous husband declared himself to be a feminist.

We all are doing the right things I think. I'm doing the best things always. Everybody does. The problem is that other people have different idea about the right things.