The Mom Weekly Volume 81: February 25, 2025
You can read this, or any other previous Mom Weeklies, by going to the home page here.
Marriage Article of the Week
For obvious reasons (!!!), occasionally in this space, I’ve decided to share a “marriage article of the week.” In my opinion, it is more than helpful to have a wide variety of reading material and information before marriage, and certainly during marriage.
When I share articles or ideas, I won’t agree entirely with everything each person says, but it is helpful to consider a lot of different approaches! And article-sized portions are better than trying to read and talk about an entire book. Maybe I can even get Dad to read these articles with me and have a chat?
Also, if you have a suggestion for a marriage article of the week, I would love to hear. from you! You can just reply to the weekly email and I will get it.
I will probably put these, with less commentary, in the “Interesting/Notable” section of future weekly newsletters. But for this week, it’s the main event! And that is why, this week there is no “Interesting/Notable” section.
Not Once, in 25 Years
This is a thoughtful, excellent read. This writer (who I discovered on Substack) is not Catholic, but she offers a solid description of the mutuality in marriage, and the give and take of decision-making, big and small.
I remember reading articles from Catholic or other Christian bloggers decades ago, and some (yes, even the Catholic ones) talking about how the husband “gets the deciding vote.” I always thought this was utterly ridiculous, and so does Dad, and we always grieved for those who were harmed by this concept.
This article really encapsulates how much mutual submission goes on in a healthy marriage. Her description of using “giving a fig” (this is what that means, in case you haven’t heard that old-fashioned expression. But you probably have!)
She talks about the person who “gives more figs” than the other usually gets his or her way (as in the description of wedding china); and when both have strong feelings, they hash it out.
This longer quote is an excellent description of how this works:
Years later, there was a big thing I didn’t think I wanted. My husband really wanted it. I had fear. He had figs. He gave lots of figs, but he never would have tried to exercise a vote against me, when I had serious concerns, and the decision would matter so much to both our lives. Whatever we decided, we were both going to keep giving lots and lots of figs. In a moment of trust, both in him and in the Spirit, I said, “let’s do it.” I submitted. The results weren’t what either of us expected, and neither of us would ever take back that decision.
We roll with things. We go back and forth. We make some decisions knowing we’ll need to stay flexible, ready to change if that’s what’s needed to be faithful in our marriage, to our family, in our callings.
We mess up. Sometimes one of us calls an audible without consulting the other. Sometimes we have to apologize for those calls, but we also trust each other to make them when the game demands it. We’ve gotten things right, and we’ve gotten things wrong. We’ve needed patience, wisdom, and discernment. We’ve needed lots of repentance and forgiveness. We’ve needed mutual sacrifice. But never, not once, in 25 years have we needed a deciding vote.
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I would agree with so much of that, only adding: never once, in more than 30 years!
Also, it’s important to note that sometimes you will come to a decision together, or go with one person’s “figs,” and later realize that wasn’t the best decision.
You might even, like Dad & I, disagree about whether something in the past was a good decision or not. But there’s no recrimination about it. Our relationship takes precedence. We can “agree to disagree” as we imperfectly work through our decision making.
Action Item of the Week: Clean Out Your Freezer
I don’t mean clean out, like defrost and wash your freezer. That can be a goal for some other time!
What I mean is for you to take a few minutes to go through your freezer and see what you have forgotten about, and what you can maybe incorporate into your meals this week.
Toss anything that you don’t like after all or that is expired. No need to keep things—that is the sunk cost fallacy in action. Make more room in your freezer for things you like to eat!