Discussion: "Wife Privileges"

ArkNemesis00 · 2023-07-26T14:48:24+00:00

I posted a comment with my thoughts on this the other day!

To get a man to commit to marriage, he either has to 1) want marriage for his own benefit or 2) want marriage for his partner's benefit. A woman can make a strategy that appeals to either motivation. The first is primarily positive motivation - marry me, and you will get ____, the second is primarily negative motivation - marry me, or I will leave/nag you/become unhappy.

Doing "wifely actions" detracts from the first option, him wanting marriage for himself, because he has what he wants now. Stating that you are withholding: sex, living together, combining finances, domestic chores, having children, etc gives them a clear motivation to tie the knot. Of course, if they decide the present relationship is not enough to make them happy, or they don't believe their situation will improve upon getting married, you run the risk of them dumping you.

However, "wifely actions" can benefit a woman pursuing a second strategy to motivate a man to keep what he already has. Men do want to see their partners happy, and have the ability to know a good thing when they see it. In this second strategy, it can be more important to have conversations about how much you value marriage and what your timeline looks like.

I believe there is plenty of room to display your skills and entice your man without stepping into domestic care. Cooking the occasional fancy meal or batch of cookies is quite different than meal planning for the week, grocery shopping, cooking multiple meals a day, etc. I wouldn't recommend taking over a man's laundry or meal prep, for instance - it's enough to have a conversation about what you both want to contribute to the household after marriage.

I think there's space to motivate your partner with a combination of these two strategies.

throwaway253025 · 2023-07-26T13:39:09+00:00

My husband and I waited to live together until a month before our wedding (because of the timing of when our leases ended). We combined finances after we got married, as well as bought a starter house, and had kids. But before marriage, I cooked for him, helped clean his apartment sometimes, paid all my own bills and helped pay for dates (even though he insisted I not). After we got married, and before we had kids, I helped pay the bills, paid off his debt, paid the downpayment on our house, and also paid for a few big vacations (I made more than him). But once we had our first, I stopped working and now his income has gone up a lot. He earns three times when he made when we first got married and is on track to make partner next year. We’ve been married seven years and have three kids.

I was 22 when we started dating (now I’m 30) and we dated for ten months before getting engaged. I really didn’t pay too much attention to his income because I was so infatuated with him lol. I did love that he was very ambitious though and had career goals, exercised, came from a good family and shared my traditional values.

anothergoodbook · 2023-07-26T13:49:16+00:00

I got married young (22). We spent the first few months just doing dating things - dinner, bowling, talking until 3 am, going for walks. We couldn’t not be around each other. A lot of making out lol. We waited up we were married to have sex (we pushed the boundaries as much as we could lol, but we didn’t have sex until marriage).

I went home for a few months so we talked on the phone all the time, wrote letters… that sort of thing.

We were engaged fairly quickly when I moved back near him. And got married later that year. We were dating/engaged for about 18 months. I really didn’t do anything for him. We just spent all of our time together. I worked so we basically just paid for ourselves most of the time while out or took turns.

We both lived on our own and were basically independent prior to marriage. I didn’t know anything about “wife vs girlfriend privileges”.

I guess I didn’t do anything to get him to commit except be myself. I was dating him over the summer and a conversation early on was - is this a summer thing and I need to not get serious or is this something you’d like to see grow? We both agreed we would like to see where it went and fostered that attitude about it. We were both of the same mind that we wanted marriage and kids. And we both agreed we didn’t want long, drawn out dating/engagement periods.

Environmental_Ad5867 · 2023-07-26T14:07:46+00:00

People have asked me how things have changed since we got married. I tell them nothing.

My husband and I have lived together for a year until he proposed. We got married a week before our 3rd year anniversary. I didn’t magically become something/someone else when we signed the documents to be legally husband and wife. Our lives are largely the same since we already had shared finances, responsibilities which we did after a year of being together.

RPW talks about incremental commitment which I think is the best way to describe our relationship from the beginning. The trust, ‘wife/husband privileges’ were earned with consistent reciprocal good behaviour.

I never withheld anything. I behaved in a way that was true to myself and was consistently reflecting and checking myself so I would be a good person, partner. I behaved in accordance to my own values and beliefs. He respects me for that and that’s why he married me. I married him because he was already the man respect and admire.

Imaskinnybitchyall · 2023-07-26T13:10:47+00:00

I am interested to see what people say about this! I don't have much experience in dating and I feel like the barrier for wife privileges is common advice.

fossacecak · 2023-07-26T16:22:07+00:00

I don’t have much to contribute as I am not married yet (which will hopefully be changing soon!), but I just wanted to say thank you for posting this and prompting this advice from married RP women. I feel a lot of confusion around what I’m supposed / not supposed to do, to inspire marriage but also not become a doormat. There is some great advice here already but I will be saving it to come back and read more. ❤️

Rasphodi · 2023-07-26T15:32:42+00:00

I can help answer that! My husband and I were a long distance couple through COVID lock downs. When he could come to my city to visit (he did most of the visiting), I spent most of the time with him (did not sleep over at where he was staying though). I also planned the activities/ dates since it's my city and cooked meals at home that I took over if we were staying in. Since he was working from home, he'd come visit and stay a few days at a time, and he'd visit every couple of weeks. That's how we did it. For example, the first time he visited, to meet face to face, I made him a small sandwich to take on the train ride back home. To me, that was just being nice and caring to a person who travelled to come see me. While I didn't do any laundry for him while he was here (unless he spilled/ ruined a shirt and had nothing to wear), I basically tried to make his time nice, enjoyable, and as easy as possible. I think there are little things you can do, like take a home cooked meal every once in a while (especially if it's something he likes) or make snacks if you are watching a movie at home together, but for me I drew the line with sleeping over/ spending the night and cleaning up after him (laundry, cleaning his living quarters, etc.). I didn't mind cleaning the dishes that resulted from BOTH of us eating together, but again, that's where it stopped. Once married of course, I just did more things for him, such as dishes, laundry etc. so he got a taste of what I can do while being engaged/ courting (trial version if you will) and once married he unlocked the premium.

alien_eater289 · 2023-07-26T16:43:55+00:00

My husband and I lived together for years before we got married. To be honest, a big turning point in our relationship happened when I learned to cook his favorite meals (dishes from his culture that take hours to make) - as soon as I did that he became much more serious about me and proposed that same year. I was definitely doing a lot of cleaning, hosting his family, etc as well.

So yeah, I would agree that there’s nothing wrong with showing what you can do before getting a ring. However my husband was already very serious about me and pursued me aggressively throughout our whole relationship and he also did his fair share of housework. If he had been more casual then I probably wouldn’t have been inspired to give him all those things. You have to also be receiving hubby privileges to an extent lol

_Pumpkin_Muffin · 2023-07-26T13:30:31+00:00

I don't think I ever purposefully withheld anything because it was a "wife privilige". Why buy the cow? Because I haven't mooed in a while. I'm not a cow, I'm a woman. He's not buying a cow, he's choosing a partner for life.

I gave him everything that I was comfortable giving and that made me happy. I cooked. Cleaned. Had sex. Mended his shirts. Moved across a continent. Changed jobs. Met his whole family. Spent tons of money on plane tickets and gifts. Listened to him and supported him. And he was doing just the same for me - maybe not the same exact actions, but with the same sentiment.

"I love you, I love spending time with you and making you happy, and I want this to be forever."

We were clearly serious from the beginning. We knew each other beforehand, so we skipped the "getting to know eachother" phase and jumped right into boyfriend/girlfriend mode. The key is that we were both very invested, and I wasn't just pouring and pouring into an endless pit. It was an exchange; not a transactional one, but a virtuous cycle that kept reinforcing itself.

Was it a good strategy? Maybe it wouldn't have worked with a man who didn't really want marriage and children, but then, the relationship itself would not have worked. He knew he wanted children but he didn't place much value in marriage before getting together... when we got together, he started seriously considering it, because he suddenly saw the value of that "forever". Our relationship showed him that he wanted it with me, and it showed me that I wanted it with him. I'm confident it would NOT have worked if we had purposefully held back.

Things did change when we got married. Merging finances, buying a house and having children was the stuff I was NOT comfortable doing before marriage. Not because they're "wife privileges", rather because they imply longterm plans and a lifelong commitment. I was not tying myself to someone for life before deciding that I wanted to be with them for life. I also naturally became much more trusting and submissive, because that "for life" promise allowed me to completely let go.

Deliaallmylife · 2023-07-26T13:23:10+00:00

I’m not married but I have always seen it as moving in with a man, cooking him dinner, doing his laundry etc. because then you’re acting like you’re married, but without that commitment of marriage. And if you break up it would probably hurt much worse if you’ve built a whole life with them like that already!

Fae_Leaf · 2023-07-26T16:27:31+00:00

Our relationship didn't change at all between dating and when he proposed. I guess there was the most subtle subconscious change just because we knew we were at the next serious step, but as far as what we did for each other, how we spoke to each other, etc., it was all exactly the same.

I don't get into a committed relationship with someone unless I hope for it to result in marriage. I've always felt that dating is a trial for marriage, so I'm not going to hold anything back. And neither did my husband.

cbunni666 · 2023-07-26T20:24:28+00:00

I didn't really live with my husband before we got married. My husband lived with a roommate. When his roommate went on vacation for a week, I brought up the idea of "playing house" for that week. At the time I didn't have a job so I took advantage of the spare time I had. He gave me a key to his place and while he was at work I prepared a dinner. He came home and we had our first homemade dinner together. He said that my cooking was good and he could get used to this. I was sad to have the week end but it was a good practice for me. Not long later I got a job so a nightly meal wasn't in the cards but we took turns with that.

So yeah, you can do wifely things without being a wife. I mean how do you know what you are good or bad at if you don't practice?

wifelifebelike · 2023-07-30T19:44:24+00:00

It's hard for me to answer this question because I was the one who avoided and put off marriage for a long time. I have a dysfunctional attachment style that makes it really stressful for me to "commit" in the normal terms. I was always committed in my heart and lifestyle, but it took him 8 years to drag me to the altar and another 5 to get me to change my name. It gives me a severe panic because in my mind its like a jinx. I wanted to do those things but in my backwards mind, it felt like I'd lose him if I did. Has nothing to do with him and everything to do with things that happened to me as a child that I'm still sorting through.

On that note, though, I dont think you should marry a man if he's not adamant about it. Psychologists say relationships have more longevity when the man is more interested in the woman. Men can intuit a lot about compatibility just by looking at a woman. Then they pursue. And women pick from the pursuers typically the one whos the most crazy about them, because that indicates he will stick around longest, provide for his offspring, etc. If the woman is the one trying to get the man to marry her, I dont think it will work long term.

Other than protecting yourself reproductively or financially, I dont think there's anything you need to withhold from a serious relationship VS a marriage. But I think if youre trying to convince him to marry you, you should just leave. My husband stated aloud he was going to marry me week one. He was dogged in pursuing that. He's a great husband who seems to think I'm the prize, for some reason. Don't coerce a man to marry you. They should be chasing you, never the other way around.

Deliaallmylife · 2023-07-26T13:02:05+00:00

I've told some of my story before but:

I knew my husband as a friend for about a year before we got together. He dated other women, I was still assuming I'd go back to my ex. We flirted and he decided to actively pursue me.

I slept with him on our first date and quite frequently afterwards. We moved in together around the 6 month mark. He was at my place all the time and it felt right. At this point, I had decided that this was the man I was going to be with forever. I cooked for him and kept the apartment cleanish (a really easy task when you are young with no kids in a small apartment with big closets). He drove places and introduced me to new things. I enjoyed being with him. We moved together for him to finish school. We did family holidays together with each other's family. We did "family" holidays that were just us. He covered my health insurance with his first job. We split bills (because young and broke!). We bought furniture together and had cats. I did cooking, he emptied trash cans.

We actually did our own laundry until we were married. We kept our own bank accounts (and didn't combine anything) until we were married. We didn't buy a house or have kids til we were married.

It took us about 5 years to get married and we eloped when we did. We had family drama on both sides. We both needed to finish school (though I was enrolled when we got married, he was done and settled into work).

In the sense of cows and milk, he absolutely had no reason to marry me. He has repeated often that he's glad he did. I'm glad he did too. I'll always think the key to RPW is knowing how to make a man happy rather than providing instructions on how to get from point A (dating) to point L (marriage).

Cosima_Fan_Tutte · 2023-07-26T14:29:31+00:00

We slept together (starting from the third date), lived together, split expenses and chores 50/50, though I never did chores at his place prior to moving in together.

To me, wife stuff is combining finances, buying a house, having children, becoming a sahm/housewife, moving, dealing with his family (the day we got engaged his mom starting including me on the rambling emails she sent to her siblings, lol), and maybe dealing with long-term illness, though plenty of people would harshly judge a gf who didn't want to care for a sick bf.

In mainstream western dating, everything else is fair game prior to marriage. I think the more you withhold, the less likely you are to get married. The whole "why buy the cow" thing is 50 years out of date unless dating in a very traditional smp.

flower_power_g1rl · 2023-07-26T15:40:30+00:00

I don't know. I don't live together and I don't share finances or pets with my bf. He plans to propose soon, then we plan to move in temporarily just to see what it's like ( we both actually like to live alone! ). We have some travels together coming up and he suggested to combine finances, but I said no. I said I would only combine finances towards marriage such as saving up and spending together for our wedding.

StunningSort3082 · 2023-07-26T18:57:46+00:00

What did your relationship look like before you got the ring?

We dated for less than a year before getting engaged, so our relationship definitely continued to evolve after he proposed. At the time he proposed, we were living together but there was obviously still a lot of newness left in the relationship.

What did you do for him and what didn't you do for him?

We started living together after 3-4 months of dating. At 6 months I sold off my house, so I didn’t have a separate place anymore.

We didn’t combine our finances until we started making bigger purchases together, so it was during the time we were engaged. We bought a car together where both our names were on the title (paid cash for the new car, so no loan). We were in similar financial situations though, so neither person was really giving anything up or gaining anything when we switched to joint finances.

I love to cook, so I started cooking on like our 3rd date. When I would stay at his house for a weekend, I would pick up groceries and cook. He always, always insisted on cleaning up the kitchen afterwards though, which was nice.

We started sharing cleaning responsibilities when we moved in together, but it’s always been a very equitable split.

I can’t really think of anything I held back? I guess I didn’t change my name before we got married, but that’s a huge undertaking outside of marriage/divorce, so that would have been wild if he had that expectation.

How long were you together?

6 months before I sold my place, 1 year before getting engaged, and 2.5 years before getting married. We would have gotten married sooner, but needed a really large wedding venue that was hard to get booked.

What did the living situation look like.

We started living together after 3-4 months, and while I rarely spent the night at my house I did still have my own place. After I sold, we started living together full time. I think it’s important to note that I could have easily moved out at any time from a financial perspective, which I know isn’t the case for everyone, so that made my decision a little easier.

Were there outside influences on your path?

My family was not on board with us living together before marriage, but I was able to sell at a great price and didn’t want to keep maintaining a home I was never at. Generally I think folks thought we were moving quickly but we were already in our 20s, so it just seemed right to us.

I’m not really sure how having a list of things I was saving for marriage would have benefited our relationship.

Scabondari · 2023-07-26T22:14:08+00:00

What are some examples of wife privileges?

ItWasBrokenAlready · 2023-07-27T21:36:59+00:00

I would not buy property or have children with man I'm not married to.

artic_fox-wolf1984 · 2024-10-01T09:29:42+00:00

Counter question! At what point is it no longer “showing him what you can do” and does become “he’s taking advantage of you”? Because, frankly, if I’m the only one putting in the “spousal” duties and the other one is putting in “boy/girlfriend” duties, that’s not equal and is, in fact, not healthy.

TheBunk_TB · 2023-07-26T13:13:47+00:00

My ex gfs were temp agency relationships. All they had to do was value my beliefs and add to my life. Want to be a LTR or a wife? Value the fact that a man has good beliefs and do something to add to his life.

(I was active duty and a relationship with them was a net detractor)

AutoModerator · 2023-07-26T12:39:22+00:00

Title: Discussion: "Wife Privileges"

Full text: I regularly see women here suggesting that you cannot give "wife privileges" before you are a wife or you will never get the ring. I am a firm believer that you need to show him what you can do in order to get to the ring but I'm curious how other women went about dating their husbands.

So question for the married ladies :

What did your relationship look like before you got the ring? What did you do for him and what didn't you do for him? What wife privileges did you either gift or withhold? How long were you together? What did the living situation look like. Were there outside influences on your path? Etc etc etc

The general theme is "What did you do to get the man to commit?

(I'll remember to answer this time)

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Title	Discussion: "Wife Privileges"
Author	Deliaallmylife
Upvotes	56
Comments	48
Date	July 26, 2023 12:39 PM UTC (2 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/RedPillWomen
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/RedPillWomen/comments/15a4qzq/discussion_wife_privileges/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/RedPillWomen/discussion-wife-privileges.1226546 https://theredarchive.com/post/1226546

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