My favorite shot from our wedding.

So, back right before Gary and I got married, I asked several couples who had really good marriages or couples who had over come alot, what their advice would be to a couple getting married.  I got alot of good advice, I got some that doesn't seem to really apply to me and Gary, and I had a few people recommend a book by Debbie Pearl Created to Be His Help Meet.  I never got around to reading it.  Then sometime after we got married, someone gave me a copy of it.  I don't really remember how I got it, but a couple of weeks ago I thought, hmm, I'll pull it down and read it.

My first piece of advice is don't waste your time or money on this book.  I was most interested because someone had mentioned to me, that in the book it talks about how men generally fall into one of three categories, and that it gives some insight into each one.  This is so that you can tell which kind of man your husband is, and how to be better supportive of him.  I thought that was going to be the gist of the book, unfortunately it's only one chapter.  It describes the Command Man and the Visionary Man, both of who in my opinion sound like failures as men.  The Command Man seems to be given a pass at manipulation, micromanaging, and serves as dictator of his home.  The Visionary Man seems to be one who is very detached from most of what's going on around him, almost negligent, impulsive, and is not able to really handle day to day life.  The third kind of man is the Steady Man.  Maybe I only think he's the best, because it was a close description to Gary, BUT to me he's the only one that makes sense of what a husband should act like.  It gave a few useful insights into understand how his mind works.

 "He avoids controversy... He will quietly ignore hypocrisy in others.  He will selfishly fight the wars that Mr. Visionary starts and Mr. Command leads.  ...His steadiness makes him the last to change... His lack of spontaneity and open boldness may look like indifference... However, he is like deep, deep water.  The very depth makes the movement almost imperceptible, but it is nevertheless, very strong."

She later describes Mr Steady as "a wonderful, kind, loving, serving man."   She talks about how when the wife is unhappy or discontent, his response is to serve more.  That is definitely true with Gary he doesn't talk things out, he does things.  I've often described him as a rock.  I can be high strung and all over the place, but it takes alot to get him riled up and moving.  That section of 3 pages in the 289 I read is the only decent material.

Most of her stuff I found to be absolutely appalling.  She goes on at length that women are to have no other drive, goal, or consideration in life but to meet each and every need of her husband, anticipating them before they happen, and ensuring his happiness.  To me what she describes is something sick, a woman who places her husband in a god-like position, and a husband who has acquired a slave.  She twist verses out of context to back up her views, and very often she shades a verse here or there just enough to make you wonder, and then builds her house of cards on top of all these shaded verses.

She goes so far as to recommend that you stay with your husband even if he is abusing you or if he chronically cheats on you.  Ever time she talks about a divorced woman she paints the most dark and depressing pictures she can come up with.  I'm not saying that they have a rosy life, but to teach that all divorcees experience these things to this degree is ridiculous.  For example she writes,

"Look around you.  There is a new breed of women today.  They serve your table at the local restaurant; they mow grass, work in the hospitals, and direct traffic.  There are thousands of these ladies;  they are everywhere doing anything they can find to do.  They are mostly single moms.  They dress cheaply; their hair has a ragged cut, and the dark circles under their young eyes testify to their faded hope.  They are a new army of workers.  Employers can underpay them because they are desperate for work.  You can depend on them because they would not dare take the chance of losing their job.  They are always distracted because they are thinking of their unhappy children or the baby sitter's new, weird boyfriend who comes over when she is at work. ...But all this was not your fault.  No, it was your husband who committed adultery, your husband who was angry or got into porn., but he seems to have a life of ease now with pleany of money compared to your miserable condition.  He takes the kids every other weekend and spoils them, making them hate you all the more.  He seems to be so vital, so alive and full of smiles.  He has money to entertain them, and they know you as a grumpy penny-pitcher.  They think his young girlfriend is really cool.  When you discover a lump in your breast, your teens don't care or understand the gravity of the situation.  You struggle alone with your fear and take yourself to the doctor, knowing that even though this might not end in death, it is the end of hope."

There are excerpts and asides all throughout the book like this. And anyone who knows someone who is divorced and has small children know this is far from the whole story.  She continually underlies everything with an attitude that you are nothing without your man.  One of the further insults that she continually throws at you is that to be a keeper at home, you must be home all the time with your children.  She is against babysitters in every situation whether to go grocery shopping or to work or for a day out, always insinuating that your child will be neglected or assaulted if you leave them alone.  She writes that she received an email from a young man that she knew saying that his wife was helping him with mission work and while with a babysitter, "their little girl, not yet one year old, had been molested, most likely by someone with a terrible disease."

 The most frighten part to me of what she has written indicates that women are to have no mind of their own.  She continually says that women aren't to be partners in marriage but help meets.  She writes about Adam and Eve, "God gave her to Adam to be HIS helper, not his partner.  She was designed to serve, not to be served, to assist, not to veto his decisions." (bolding in the original).  She continually says that the woman has no place, no right, to offer an opinion or to disagree on anything.  Her husband clearly lives this way, as she writes toward the end,

"When our first daughter was just two months away from getting married, she asked her daddy a theological question.  Remember now, she was a graduate of Bible college and had spent three years on the foreign field as a missionary.  But rather than answer her, as he had been doing for the previous 26 years, he told her, 'I cannot answer your Bible questions, for you now believe what your husband believes.  He will be your head, and you will follow him.  It is time to get adjusted to your new role.  Ask him what he believes about it.'"

There is nothing healthy or godly about such a relationship.  I think that a marriage is a wonderful thing.  I have a wonderful man.  God uses marriage to describe the relationship of Jesus to the Church.  The Church wants to follow Christ, he is a good leader.  It's not always easy to follow Him, but He never leaves us or forsakes us.  In a good marriage a wife is a help meet in any way that she can, but the husband is also to protect and care for the wife.  When it says two become one flesh, it doesn't mean that the wife disappears into the man that her husband already is, and that he never changes in any way.  It means that they grow and merge together, becoming entwined.  I've changed for the better for having Gary in my life, and he claims that he has as well.  We are growing together.  If all he needed was the woman that this book describes he could hire a cook and a housekeeper, and have a clean house, with far better meals and a much better price.  Gary values me for my ability to argue with him.  No, really.  We debate out the possibilities, we examine every angle together, we make all of our decisions together, because this isn't the Gary B and company show, it's our family.  I don't always agree with him, and sometimes he takes the gamble anyway, sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't,
but he always knows where I stand.  A marriage is team work, we are yoked together.  I'm not the mule and him the driver with the whip.  We are together pulling.

I want to be a help meet for him, and I want him to be better for having me in his life, rather than me being a hindrance and a burden.  I'm sure there are other women that feel the same way, but if you are looking for advice as to how to get there, save yourself the time and effort, and stay away from this book.