Are Those Who Provide Ever Actually at Home? (How Would You Deal with Loneliness WITHIN Marriage?)

Hey Everyone,

One of the biggest reasons people seem to say they want to get married is because they don't want to be lonely anymore.

As I get older, I find this to be ironic because when I talk to people I know who are part of a couple, it seems as if they very rarely get to see one another. Most work shifts that are either directly opposite of their partner/spouse, or allow for very little time together.

For example, most couples I know have children, and so both parents' working schedules must be worked around the kids. Many seem to have a situation in which one parent works in the morning, and the other works at night so that one parent is always with the kids. But this also means that one parent is always leaving as the other one is coming home, and very few of these couples seem to have days off or vacations together.

When thinking about the thread in which women discussed what it means for a man to be a provider, I have to wonder if it's realistic to expect that a provider would actually be able to spend any time with his family. (I was also thinking about people who say their father provided for them when they were growing up, but was never actually there for them, whether physically or emotionally.)

I've only known a few families in which the man was the sole provider (but the women worked before kids and then again when the kids were older), and they all seemed to have one thing in common -- the man did indeed provide, but he worked hours that to some, might not be humanly possible.

When I was a kid, I remember my Mom asking my Dad what time he needed to get up in the morning, and it was often at 3 AM, because he had to be to work by 4 AM, and wouldn't get home until 6 in the evening -- 6 days a week. On Sundays, my Dad was fortunate to have the flexibility to go to church with us, but then it was back to work for the rest of the afternoon.

The men I know who are providers for their households work around 60 to 100+ hours a week, especially during holidays. As one stated, rather wistfully, "40 hours a week is just a part-time job."

And I'm sure that the wives (or whoever is taking care of the kids) very often feels as if they are a single parent who is doing everything alone.

I'm not sure that I know any couples who are in a position where they work similar hours (so they can spend the rest of the day or night together), get the same days off, and have vacations off together so that "they will never be lonely." Most couples I know work in fields with ever-changing demands, and if you want to keep your job, you have to take what's offered, even if it means barely seeing your spouse.

But, that's just my own perspective.

* What have you observed? Did your own parents get to spend much time together?

* Do you think you'll get to spend a lot of time with your future spouse? Why or why not?

* How would you feel about always taking care of the kids and never seeing your spouse, or working all the time and never seeing your spouse?

* How do you think you'd cope if you felt lonely within your own marriage? For instance, would you take a job so that your spouse didn't have to work as much?

I would really like to know what everyone else has seen among their own families/social circles and what they would do in that situation.

And of course, the experts in the crowd (our married regulars) are invited to be the thread's special guests of honor, because who would know better how to navigate these kinds of challenges than whose who may have faced it?

I have of course never been there, but I have thought of it sometimes. Thus I have no answers, but I do have some questions.

What if one of us worked mornings and the other worked evenings? Would we be willing to stay up through the night to be with each other, and each of us sleep during the other's work shift? It seems the only way to do it, but sleeping in non-nighttime is sometimes hard to do.

Also no restaurants would be open at 3am so we would never get to spend our together-time going out to eat... 24-hour fast food factories don't count!

It has been said that those who work full-time jobs spend more time with them then their own family. While this is sad, having worked for most of my entire adult life I believe this to be true. You can have quantity time with your family, or quality time with your family but those are rare or infrequent times that you can have both, especially where children are involved. If there are no children in the home or they are now adults, it becomes easier to work out a more equitable balance of both quantity and quality with those that you love, especially with your spouse.

As for my marriage, it is very much an equitable arrangement and I am fortunate in that regard. I miss my wife when I am at work but I know that I have a loving and faithful wife to return to at the end of my shift. I have also found that absence makes the heart grow fonder and short periods of time away from your spouse helps you to maintain a positive perspective and gives you something to look forward to when the work is done for the day or possibly days depending on your occupation. I will also say to not remain a stranger to your spouse during the times that you are together.

Speaking as a man and a provider I would conclude with that a man does what a man has to do to provide for his family. It may come at a cost, and at times this cost may be great but the cost of doing nothing to provide for your family is even higher, and that would be an even more sad state of affairs.

I was going to say that in Florida it's a 24/7/365 for a lot of restaurants but of course, as you have stated, these are mostly your fast food factories. Your idea of sleeping doing each others shift is a practicable example of conserving what time that you do have we each other in a meaningful way. Of course, it is also possible to change to more comparable work shifts in most situations but this may take some time and cooperation with the employer. You ask good questions that raise valid points worth consideration.

Working 60 to 100 hours a week would make it almost impossible to maintain a healthy living arrangement, Now 40 to 60, my current range, it seems to be working. I do believe in providing for ones family but don't feel that it is productive to work excessive hours to provide for a more luxurious lifestyle than is really necessary. In the end, it hurts the family more than it helps. It is all a mater of one's priorities and that is where spiritual guidance and discernment plays in important role in marriage. I also highly recommend, that despite any time crunch that you spend a certain amount of time together as husband and wife in daily prayer, devotion and study of God's word. This is time that is well spent and is highly beneficial in maintaining and growing your spiritual relationship together.

the first memories i have is my parents dropping me off at a woman's house to take care of me as they both went off to work. it was always like this until i went to school. idk how they managed to spend time together, but they must have lol. fortunately for us, they only worked monday through friday, and i want to say their work hours had a 30 min difference. my mom stopped working when i was in the 4th grade, so their schedule opened up a little bit more. now they are retired and loving it.

as for my and hubby, we have different schedules. i work 8 to 5. he works 10:15 am to 7:30 pm. it is currently 7:46 pm, and he isn't home yet from work, but he'll be here soon. we eat dinner when he gets home. by the time we finish and i get my things together for the next day, we don't get a lot of time together, but we make the most of it. we are able to talk during my lunch hour, and we text frequently during the work day, so that helps A LOT. BUT! Lord willing, very soon, our work schedules will match! we don't have children, so we don't have the joy/stress that comes with parenthood.

we also have weekends together!

but there are times we have to be intentional in spending time together. life gets in the way, whether it's work, illness, weariness from work, etc. one night, after dinner, we set aside all our electronic devices to talk because we both had hectic things at work going on. it was nice.

It seems that your work schedules are more or less comparable and not extreme. Also, it is great that you have your weekends together, that's a definite plus. What's for supper tonight? Hopefully its pizza. It is always an exciting adventure in starting out married life. I believe that you will be celebrating your 2nd wedding anniversary on April 22. Time flies when you're having fun! We will be celebrating our 5th on November 27. It doesn't seem like that it's been almost 5 years since we first met on CC. It has been quite an adventure so far and we are both happily married. I believe that this is true for you and your hubby as well. Congrats on your upcoming wedding anniversary.

Lynx, Tourist, Melita, these are great contributions and, I hope, the start of a very interesting discussion.

I think it's a huge struggle these days for Christians to both believe that God wants the best for us, but also maintain realistic expectations. The people I've worked with who rarely got to see their spouses did not have luxury lifestyles--they were just doing what it took to support their families.

You can also see how these types of situations are a wide open door for the devil's attacks on Christian marriages. For example, maybe a couple rarely sees each other and when they do "talk", they're always arguing about the kids, the mortgage, and the fact that they never see each other to begin with. All of a sudden... A lonely wife starts to think that maybe someone she's met online could fill that void, because it sure would be nice to have someone to talk to. Or a frustrated husband starts to realize that he talks a lot more to his female co-worker than his own wife, and hey, this female co-worker ain't all that bad-looking, either.

And then people in the churches wonder why there are so many divorces.

I truly believe that loneliness is a huge challenge for everyone, and our ways of coping with it are unhealthy as a single, it will only get worse in a marriage, because I would guess that most every married person has bouts of feeling alone.

There's no doubt that being single can get pretty lonely. But I told myself a long time ago that I'd rather be a lonely single than a lonely married person who's even lonelier than when she was single, knowing that the marriage, and possible that situation, are permanent.

(However, this is just my own perspective... which is why I'm hoping everyone else will share their own as well.)

It is imperative to separate outside stress from normal marriage stress. Like work, and/or that redbull that
was drank on the way home etc etc. We as people tend to lose track, and lash out at those closest to us.

There will always be someone to take advantage of a lonely confused individual, with nothing but their
own selfish interests in mind.

sad but true.

I've thought about this some. At my current income, at least while still paying bills, I'm not sure if I could support a family right now. I could probably make due, but it would be tight. A second income would be good. I'm almost done with school, and then there will be more opportunities for more money. Though, that usually means more hours, especially if taking a salary position. Where I work, there are a lot of people who have been doing 60 hour work weeks for years. I did them for about 4 or 5 years straight but since I am a contractor they eventually stopped so they didn't have to pay me overtime. My pay has increased enough since then so I make about the same working 40 hours as I used to working 60, or more.

There are a lot of higher profile companies that do a better of work life balance in the tech industry now. I think the crunch stories in the gaming industry changed some of the attitudes. There was an article awhile back about the programmer's experience at Blizzard working tons 18 hour days. I can't remember the exact number of hours, but basically once they worked past like 12 or so everything they did had to be redone the next day after getting some sleep. The extra hours were detrimental to coding. I found that to be the case anytime I went over 10 or so hours. I only did a couple of 18+ hour days, though. Lots of 15-16 hour days. I will never work in the gaming industry due to the ridiculous hours.

That is a source of conflict, though with family. I have been single the whole time, but have known co-workers who had to make it up to their wives. During one of our big transitions, a co-worker and i were basically living onsite at work. His wife visited a couple of times and "jokingly" asked me to confirm that he was working with me and not stepping out on her.

For Women Only discussed this a little bit. Trying to understand what the guy is doing to provide. I would more motivated to work more hours if I had a family, even if that meant not seeing them as much. It would be nice to have a job where I could have plenty of time, but that also might mean a job with no real future, depending on the company. I have also found, like in my current job, that there is more of an expectation that men are going to stay late than women. My work area is like 40% women, maybe. But I have never seen a woman stay after 5 except for the managers or the one lady who works from 12-8pm. Managers will call me late at night (including a couple of times after midnight), but won't call my female co-worker, even though it's her job. I guess I don't really mind, but I am aware there is more of expectation for how hard you are willing to work as a guy.

I have known some couples that only saw each other a few hours a week due to conflicting shifts. That would really suck. One worked days M-F, and the other swing M-TH. They only had time to see each other on the weekend when they weren't sleeping or running errands.

This is like the basis for MGTOW.

Are you MGTOW?

No. Maybe if women were chasing after me I would be lol.

A lot of how much you work depends on the job you're in and what your position in that industry is. It seems that at both income extremes extra hours are more the rule than the exception. So I think of my brother's girlfriend who is working some sort of factory / assembly work and is currently working lots of overtime and on the overnight shift. My cousin and uncle are in similar boats of working factory work and often having little choice of schedule and lots of mandatory overtime or holiday hours (and sometimes quite short scheduling notice so that it's hard to plan family gatherings at holidays). I imagine that retail and restaurant / hospitality work also tend to have schedules of you work the most when "everyone else" is off to play.

On the other extreme you have the project and deadline type of jobs where you are expected to put in whatever hours are necessary to get things done on time, and while you may get paid better for these jobs, often the pressure to get as many projects as possible to prove your worth or something as a company means that the employees end up with too much work or not enough people to do all the work while working reasonable schedules.

As far as providing and family marriage dynamics (which I'm very glad I don't have to deal with personally right now), there will always be more things to spend money on than there is money to spend. Advertisers pay millions of dollars to maintain that situation. The best any family can do is set priorities and decide what they are willing to live without, what they can live with a cheaper option on, and what is really necessary. There may well be some economic compromise to have more time with family, but that doesn't mean that choosing the more time and less money option (or temporarily deciding to choose the less time less money option to get training to go into a new field that will result in work opportunities with more money and fewer hours) is necessarily a bad or foolish decision. Money isn't everything and you don't have to try or be involved in everything to have a good life.

You always think of cool stuff how?? Anyway you have a good point. I personally would want my wife to homeschool the kids that's what i see in the Bible so that's wwhat i want. Assuming you don't have kids or something like they grow older it's fine to get a job but when would you ever be together? What's the point in being partners if you just kinda work by yourself in turns? I like Paul washer for many reasons but one of the main reasons is cuz he stressed the importance of family it means something and you shouldn't neglect it even when you're there. He also didn't think of women as children watchers as soon as he got of work he handled the kids for the rest of the night. The whole duty of a man from what I've seen in scripture is that he is supposed to just give his life away and it's gonna suck Jesus wasn't singing songs and jumping for joy when he thought of the cross. The man is supposed to work hard and take care of his family and other people to the best of his ability without neglecting them. You shouldn't be working 30 hours a day like whos gonna see you bro? You're not a father you're a dad, that guy who pays bills(hoepfully) and is pretty much just kinda there. Even when you are there you don't do anything really you just wanna rest well guess what you're an idiot fight me! Like I've seen my mom work and we never saw her like ever we basically had to watch ourselves. 4 kids and a house with no help and a mediocre job. If her life would've been even halfway as decent as most people in America she could've raised us easy so i don't wanna hear that crap about it's impossible to raise a family with only one person working. And even worse you have the people, usually men, who just wanna sit down and watch tv until they pass out after work that's not ok. You're neglecting the weightier matters my friend, you are to provide not pay bills. There is more then just money in providers. Marriage is a good thing but it's not just supposed to be a fun game we play it's supposed to be a challenge because ultimately it's for our sanctification. I'm expecting to have to get up early, to work some good hours, to get home and take care of the kids so my wife doesn't kill herself, to help with cleaning cuz my wife's not a maid, and i dont plan on constantly complaining to her about how hard it is. Jesus did not complain, was his life hard? Yes. Did he suffer a lot? Mmm yes. Just cuz things are hard doesn't mean we can just act like babies, as a man when things get hard you should be stronger then ever id anything cuz that's what your family needs. I don't think men should never get breaks, i didnt say we shouldn't get to talk about out feelings either but there's a difference between complaining and just expressing how you feel cuz sometimes it's too much. News flash women don't have it easy either watching kids and teaching kids is not easy. Have you ever tried to teach a kid anything? It's extremely hard and can be infuriating! Tjat doesn't mean she just takes a nap and hopes the children don't kill themselves. I thought growing up was about taking more responsibility, about being able to lead others and help people who need it, but most of the time all i see are a bunch of people who want the easiest way to happiness and want loads of money for retirement so they can stop working asap. Wtheck dude? When i was snatched from my mom and me and my sisters were put into a car and taken away to God knows where i couldn't shrink back and cry and tell them how scared i was, i couldn't tell them how much i missed my mom, i was younger and as a man i had to step up and let them know we were gonna be alright and i was a complete idiot then wasn't even saved yet. Like maybe I'm being hard idk but the way men act including myself at times is just pathetic and i don't plan on living like an idiot for my whole life and if i can't manage to be enough like Christ so that i can sacrifice my own happiness for my family at times then I don't deserve to get married period. We all want the benefits of marriage but no one wants to face the hardships, that's why we have a bunch of fatherless children cuz a bunch of men were too selfish to.do what they knew they were supposed to. Might be why they leave instead of staying and just being bad dads cuz they can't live with the guilt. *inhales....exhales* ok so i think both parties should try to do their part to the best of their ability and make sure they spend quality time in the process, most men can come home and spend time with their family i think it would just wear them out which is a bad excuse. If you can't afford to take care of a family and spend a decent amount of time with them on a consistent basis then why did you get married? Idk it just sounds like 1. Excuses, maybe get a cheaper house or something idk there has to be a way to spend less money if you can spend more time with you're family otherwise you aren't a father you're a dad cuz you aren't there your kids won't know you if you're never home and your wife will probably resent you. Or 2. You just weren't prepared at all for marriage which is possible and understandable ig so i won't talk about whoever you are. I will say that we shouldn't walk into marriage until we are ready especially not into parenting. Just don't have kids if you aren't ready to raise them simple. I'm not saying this stuff is easy i know it's not but that doesn't mean we don't have to do it ok I'm done I'm gonna have a stroke if i keep thinking about stupid dudes including myself