Mother or wife: whose side should a man take?
By Shadrack Kirunga
This article discusses the impact this struggle has on the men who find themselves caught between the women they love. On a light note, I will leave it to you to decide who the rock is and who the hard place is.
The relationship men have with women is culturally defined by two primary components: protection and provision. This is what love means to the male species.
In return, and in the various seasons of life, he will receive from the women nurturing, tenderness, pride, and pleasure. From the man's point of view, he owes both his mother and wife protection and provision and trying to alienate one is like tearing away a part of him.
The result of the conflict is a thoroughly stressed man. The two women represent his fallback position in times of hardship and when they fight, none is available to him.
The poor guy is left in the middle, unable to fulfil his roles to the most important women in his life, and deprived of their cherished support.
There can be several responses from a man who finds himself in such a position. First, he can confront his mother and tell her off, sometimes even withdrawing support.
I am sure there are many mothers out there who have been abandoned for what is seen to be gross interference with their son's marriage.
Second, he could ignore his wife's concerns or tell her off as well. If you want proof of this, listen to women talk; their conversation is often replete with disdainful narrations of lectures they got from their husbands about respecting their mother-in-law because "she is my mother!"
Third, the man can stand aside and let them fight it out until the victor emerges. Fourth, the man can attempt to be a go-between to create a working relationship between the two, which can hopefully grow into a meaningful relationship.
Let us briefly look at these responses. The first two are essentially the same. Taking sides. The result, however, is that nobody is really happy because the man will find it difficult to live with the result of this response.
The results are more devastating in the third, especially to the man. Since he is the object of the conflict, at the end of it all, he will be left looking like a rag doll that was the subject of a cat-dog fight.
The last is probably the best option, hard as it may be. The man should facilitate dialogue between his wife and members of his immediate family, especially mothers and sisters, so that a bond is created between them.
It involves the man invoking his right to love them all and to play his divinely instituted role in their lives.
By not taking sides overtly and explaining his position to both parties on various issues, the man creates the need and opportunity for the two women to build a relationship, even if it would merely be a working relationship.
Obviously, for this to happen, the parties involved must be willing participants and consider each other "family".
What you have to bear in mind is that when your mother and your wife fight, it is you who suffers the real pain. The two may fight and forget (as they say), but it takes a long time for a man to forget a bad word said about his mother or his wife, regardless of who said it.
Women would do well to consider this fact and find a more congenial approach to staking their claim on the "man in the middle".
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