I’d like to think we live in a world where either person can stay at home while the other provide the necessary cash.

That people may still raise eyebrows is less important.

Congratulations Eve, on that degree you probably have earned by now. When I was in college, I was a little jealous of women who only wanted to meet the right person and drop out of school–not because I had any desire to do the same thing, but because it seemed so unfair that they could so easily get into Heaven. It seemed to me that an ambitious woman had a much more difficult road, since everyone told me that God thought more of stay-at-home types than advanced degree types. I now believe that people don’t know as much about what God likes as they think they do.

I was most surprised at the reaction I received from my peers in married student wards. I have found that many older women and men have been plesently surprised at my plans and incredibly supportive. But I get a lot of flak from other college age women, particularly those who are married and following the prescribed “plan”.

I have also been surprised at the reactions my husband has gotten. He is not considering furthering his education at this point (he’s quite dyslexic, so research is his least favorite thing, and he prefers to learn by experience) and he has gotten some blunt comments on how he is not fulfilling his duty to provide because his wife is seeking higher education and he is not. Or somehow he is a failure as a man because he is not keeping ahead of his wife.

I think this is an excellent example of how our sexist culture does not only create frustration and misrepresentation among women, but also forces men into a proscribed box as well.

I particularly liked this quote:

But I often felt frustrated with that sacrifice and resentful of my husband’s intellectual adventures, partly because few besides my long-suffering husband seemed to see it as a sacrifice. In the LDS community, moving for a husband’s schooling or job is what women do, what many of the other women in my ward had also done, and it seemed routine, scarcely worth comment.

That is where I am now. LDS social scripts say that women should move onto motherhood and be completely happy with it, but there are many women who long for something more in silence.