Naima B. Robert – Single mothers, Step Fathers and Keeping it 100! Marriage Advice for Muslim Women
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The speakers discuss the importance of understanding the level of commitment and investment needed to support a woman who is financially responsible for supporting her children. They stress the need for a new father to ensure the success of the family and emphasize the importance of avoiding giving children as an excuse to deny intimacy. The speakers also advise parents to find out from their children about their father and stay with them in relationships.
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Smilla Salam aleikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato. Sister
Nyima be Robert here, back again with another quick thought, a
quick reflection. A quick reminder, if you haven't already
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your way, Mashallah.
Today, I want to talk about
a comment that was left on one of the videos, where a sister said
that she wanted to leave her husband, after over a decade of
marriage, she's had enough
from what she said the brother himself is not very practicing.
But he has been providing for her and the three children very well
enough that she was able to not work, she was able to devote
herself to the children and, you know, to homeschool her kids,
which she always wanted to do. Mashallah. However, the Dean
situation, I don't know how severe it is. But she has decided that
she she doesn't want to be in that situation anymore. And she's
hoping that she will find somebody better. Now,
of course, please, bear in mind that this is my subjective
opinion. And it's based on my years of experience, it's based on
what I've lived, and what I know and what I see around me. And the
reason I wanted to make this video is because I know that for most of
us men and women who who want out of a marriage and want to remarry,
everyone is hoping for an upgrade.
Give me a yes, in the comments. If you agree, everybody's hoping for
an upgrade, right? Because if it wasn't an upgrade, you kind of you
wouldn't be thinking of leaving the man that you're with, or the
woman that you're with, right? You were hoping for an upgrade. So I
want to speak to this because
having been young and having a marriage, and, and divorcing and
wanting an upgrade is is it's a tricky one. And it's tricky for a
few reasons. And I want to go into these. But let me start with this
first example that I had, which was this sister who has three
children in her late 30s. She is hoping for a man who has Deen
inside and out and is responsible and kind and basically a good guy.
Now, when it comes to being married, having been married to
somebody who was not practicing, and then wanting a practicing
spouse, I believe that you can find that because Al Hamdulillah,
there are still so many practicing brothers who are not married.
Right? So they're mungkin, it's possible, it's possible to find
that sis, where you lost me
was when you said responsible. Now, I'm guessing that for many
single moms, if they say that they're looking for a man who is
responsible, or looking for somebody who is going to support
her, support her and her children, I'm assuming that what you mean is
that you're hoping that this new man is going to be responsible for
you and your children financially. And otherwise, if I got it wrong,
forgive me. But I'm going to go with that as my assumption. And
I'm going to use that as the basis of this discussion.
So we know from this example, that the father of the children was
responsible, he is responsible, okay. Now, the way things work in
our community, I cannot be sure whether he would continue to be
financially responsible once the divorce goes through. Because I
know many instances of fathers who wants the divorce goes through for
whatever reason, they do not take financial responsibility of their
children, and have it on good authority. How many sisters are
when they're looking for a second, second or third marriage, and they
have children. Very often they will say the Father is not in the
picture, or they need someone to come in as a father figure.
The problem here is this. The reason why that first husband, who
from what we understand was not religious, the reason he worked so
hard, hard enough for you sis to not have to work for him to be
able to support you and three children so that you can
homeschool. The reason he was able to do that. And the reason he did
that was because that is his legacy. Those are his children,
and you are the mother of those children.
And I want sisters to be very, very clear on this. And I'm going
to say this and anyone who disagrees with me. Please hit me
back in the comments. But I believe and from what I've seen,
and from what I've heard them or what men have said
The level of commitment, the level of dedication, and the level of
investment that a man will make in his own children cannot be matched
by the level of dedication, commitment, and an investment that
a man will make in children that are not his.
I'm going to say that, again, that level of commitment that you will
see from the father of your children, right, you're married to
him, he's married to you, the two of you have children together,
that man is going to go to war for you. Okay, he is going to work
three jobs in order to put food on the table in order to be able to
keep the house going, etc, because those are his kids. Now, if you
leave that man, because you're not happy with him, for whatever
reason, my dear sisters, I need you to be realistic. When it comes
to what you expect that next man to do for you and your children,
especially financially, you need to understand, those are not his
kids. Islamically, he is not responsible for them. I'm gonna
say that again. Islamically, your new husband is not responsible
financially for your children. So I hope that when you're saying you
want a responsible man, you're not looking to replace the father of
the children when it comes to like the finances for the children,
even the involvement, the level of involvement emotionally,
physically, etc, sis, sisters,
I'm gonna say this, and you may not like it. But I need you to
know that for a man to step into a house, where there is a woman and
her children.
And for him to step into that house and agree to play the part
of the emir, or the father figure is a huge deal.
It is not baseline, it's not the bare minimum. It's a huge deal.
And a man who agrees to that scenario, is making many
sacrifices and is signing up for a difficult road ahead. Not because
you're bad, not because your kids are bad, not because you have less
value or any of that nonsense. It's just the deal on the table.
Okay, if a man moves into your house, already, he's at a
disadvantage, because it's your house. Now, it's your house and
your children's house, right? This is this space, he is moving into
this space, replacing their father in the room with their mother, and
you want him to play Dad, I'm going to leave it to you and your
imagination to just imagine all the different challenges that that
situation brings about, okay? Because I'm sure that if you use
your imagination, you can see why that situation is not necessarily
going to be an easy situation. The older the kids are, the more
difficult it becomes. So that man who has agreed to come in sisters,
what I need you to do is I need you to recognize the level of
sacrifice that he's making, I need you to understand that it's not
something you should just expect from a new man that he's just
going to be cool with it, or that he's gonna be good at it. Because
it's a big deal. And as I said, the sacrifices that he makes for
himself. They're huge, right? And again, I'm because I'm a novelist,
because I write fiction, it's quite easy for me to step into
somebody else's shoes. So I'm thinking to myself, If I'm a man
of a certain age, and I want to get married, um, I'm looking
forward to, you know, marrying a woman, building a relationship
with her enjoying her company, she's gonna spoil me a little bit,
I'm gonna spoil her. You know, we're gonna have a nice time as a
family, we get lots, you know, as much time as we want together, you
know, and it's just going to be this wonderful experience right?
Now. If I marry a woman who has children, already, I like I said,
you're at a disadvantage if you move in with her. But also, I know
already that the deal on the table is that I am not going to be this
woman's priority. I know this as a man.
Not many men are cool with that. And men in the comments, you can
tell me what you think. But most men would like to be a priority in
their woman's life. They'd like to be at the top of the totem pole.
Ideally, if you marry a woman who has children, you're not at the
top of the totem pole. You can't be right. If he's marrying you
knowing you have kids and you have custody. He's already accepted an
inferior
Your position, he's accepted that he his position is going to be
lower than that of your children, right, because most men do not
expect you to, you know, to have him in the house, and then he's
going to be at the top. Now, that being said, it doesn't feel great.
Nobody willingly puts themselves in a situation where they're going
to be bottom of the heap, right? Because you're busy with the kids,
and you're busy with the house, and you've got to deal with, you
know, their father. And at the end of the day, your kids need you,
you know, you're their main carer, et cetera. My guy, you just wait.
So because that is the situation that he's ostensibly coming into
you, my dear Sis, I need you to recognize that he is making a
sacrifice, a sacrifice he did not need to make, he didn't need to
sign up for you and your three kids, he didn't need to sign up
for you and your five kids or your two kids, or however many it is he
didn't need to do that. And if he hadn't done that, and he had found
somebody who didn't have kids, his life probably will be better. And
let's say this with all women being equal, okay? Because I know
we all believe that we're very, very special. Mashallah. But women
are women and men are men at the end of the day, okay?
Why do I say this? Am I saying this in order to make my single
moms feel bad, or to dissuade men from marrying women with children?
No. What I am saying, though, is sis, if you're being courted by a
man, and you have children already, just please be aware of
the fact that he's already making a sacrifice, and that he is
stepping into a very challenging situation. So if you want that
relationship to last, if you want that marriage to last, I suggest
that you start appreciating him just for the fact that he said yes
to coming into your situation. Because he didn't need to do that.
Let that be a big deal in your eyes, especially if he's actually
bringing something to the table with regards to the kids. Don't
nitpick his parenting style, don't muscle in and take control and try
to manage him and micromanage the relationship with the kids. And
definitely don't start giving him a hard time about things that
other people give their their spouses a hard time about, oh, why
don't we have date night, you never buy me gifts, Oh, I thought
we were going to be doing this, I thought we're going to do that,
you know, I need you to be more this with the kids, I need you to
do more of that any, you know, like all of those other demands,
and all those other pressures that you think are reasonable, because
as far as you're concerned, the baseline is that he steps in as
the man of the house, stop that. It's not a baseline. And many men
can't even do that. Okay, if they themselves, for example, didn't
have a relationship with their father, if they have not seen
fatherhood being modeled. He can't step in as the father of those
children. Not only has he not seen it modeled, but they're not his
kids.
So where is this feeling men to come from? Where is all this
vision and all the things that you expect from the father of your
children? Where is it supposed to come from with this stranger who
just stepped into their lives and maybe has known them for like
three months it that
we need to be humble. When we're going into these situations,
everybody, the man, he's already humbled because he's like, you
know, I know what I'm signing up for. It's not homelessness, boom,
it's not five star. It's not the best that I could get. But
alhamdulillah like, I'm good with this. I think I can make this
work. Right. It's not ideal. And I'd explained already why it's not
ideal, but I'm good with this.
That's where he's at. You're going to meet him with that humility.
And I'm going to use the word guys the G word, gratitude.
Thank you.
I appreciate you.
Thank you.
For whatever he does with those kids is whatever he does with
them, you bet thank him, you're gonna be grateful for it. He's not
their dad. He's not their dad. He doesn't have the natural feeling
that their father may have had for them. He doesn't have that natural
sense of protectiveness of that natural sense of investment in
them. That natural sense of bonding is not there. So anything
he does for those kids, you are thank him for it. You're gonna be
grateful for it. And don't expect more. Be happy with what he can
give you and talk about it beforehand. Have the discussion?
You know, obviously if he's if he's asked you to marry him, he's
clear that you know, okay, children are part of the picture.
You ask him
What do you want the relationship to look like? Don't you come with
your list of demands? And I need you to do this, I need to do that
I need to know, find out from him where his head's at, has he
thought it through as he thought about it? What's his vision of
being a stepdad
and then see if you can work with it, have a conversation about it.
So in addition to, you know, thanking him, whenever he does
something with regards to these kids that are not his, especially
at the beginning,
you need to compensate.
Sorry, you need to compensate. And what do I mean by that? I mean,
like, the ways in which you were like, casual with the children's
father, with maybe your appearance, maybe dinner, maybe
*, whatever it is, you had an excuse when you were with the
children's father, because, hey, you've been looking after his kids
all day, of course, you're not gonna have had a shower, you've
been looking after kids all day, of course, you're gonna want, you
know, a break on the weekend, and he should take the kids etc, you
know, you guys, you know, we do that with the, with the data of
the kids, right? That's, you know, and the father of the children
knows, as well look, this, you know, what, these are my children,
of course, I'm gonna make, you know, I'm gonna give her a play.
When he's not their father, you don't have those excuses. You
can't afford to fall back on those excuses anymore. Because it will
put strain on your relationship.
It will make him feel like, you don't value him, like you take him
for granted. Like, basically, you don't care about the fact that he
has needs to, right. So what I'm saying is,
don't fall back on the fact that you've got the kids, the kids are
always going to be your responsibility, whatever he does,
to help you alleviate that responsibility will allow Hamed
Alhamdulillah, but you can't go in there expecting it to be like it
was with their father, and you need to compensate. Maybe you can
call it overcompensating right. When you have the father of your
children, maybe intimacy suffered a little bit, for example, right,
because you're up late nursing, or because you're just tired. And at
the end of the day, he's just there, and they're his kids and
all the rest of it, it's a great excuse, not with the stepdad guys,
not with your second husband. You can't use the kids as an excuse to
deny intimacy, or to refuse intimacy, you need to have that in
your head. You can't use the children as an excuse for why
dinner isn't done, or why the house is a mess, because it's
going to cause tension between the two of you. And it causes him to
resent the kids, and to resent the fact that you don't seem to value
him enough to sort yourself out and sort your things out to make
sure that he is taken care of. A lot of the time, I think, as I'm
thinking of the single mom videos that I made, you know, years ago,
right a couple of years ago, and I didn't have this awareness at the
time at all, which is why I didn't give any of this advice at the
time. But trust me, these subsequent marriages,
statistically, are shown to last a shorter time and to be more likely
to end in divorce. One of the reasons is because of these, these
expectations that we have, and the natural kind of tension when it's
a blended family, etc. And we want to avoid that. We've already had
one divorce, we don't need a second and a third and a fourth.
So how can you win in your second or subsequent marriage, by not
thinking you can do things the same way you did in the first
marriage, particularly if you do not have children together. And
even if you do, I'd argue that it's probably not a good idea to
kind of fall back on that stuff anyway. But long story short,
you may get the religious guy says, but if you're hoping to
simply get a full upgrade on the father of your children, as in, he
provides as well as the father did. He's as responsible as the
father was. Maybe he's as involved with the kids as the father was as
well as being more religious, having a better connection with
you, you know, being more generous, whatever the case may
be, you are in for a rude awakening, because eligible Muslim
men meaning practicing, you know, fairly attractive, responsible
family, men who have financial means
do not grow on trees. And the ones that you'll find in your age group
are more than likely married. So if you're up for polygamy, you may
get one of those. But if you want monogamy, you'll need to really
look at the list that you have and get realistic with it. Sometimes
the best option is to stay with the father of the children because
He has the commitment, and he has the investment in the children.
And you can maintain your situation for longer. If you can't
hack it at all, if you can't make it work, if you can't see your way
through, just understand that the next relationship is not going to
be as stable as the first one. It doesn't have the roots that the
first one had. There's more challenges, it's more
difficulties. There's a lot more things that impact to the
relationship than in the marriage that you have now, right? So Far
be it for me to tell anyone to say yes or no to stay or to go. But I
do feel that it's important that we have more realistic
conversations about what life looks like on the other side of
divorce. Yes, there are some stories that are wonderful. Yes,
there are some stories where you hear that the new husband loved
the children like his own and was the even better father than the
father. But trust me, even in those situations, the kids don't
like that, because they want their father. So anyway, like I said,
Far be it from me to say, you should say yes, you should say no,
you should stay you should go. But let's at least make decisions
based on reality and not fairy tales.
If you guys got anything out of the content, please do hit the
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thoughts on this reminder that was supposed to be short, but it is
now 20 minutes long. And you know any hair any good that has come
from this is from Allah subhanaw taala and any mistakes from myself
on the shaytaan I ask everyone's forgiveness in advance. If I've
upset anyone if I've offended anyone if I've triggered anyone. I
I think you know by now, I speak from the heart. And I only say
what I believe to be true based on what I know. And you know what
Allah subhanaw taala has allowed me to learn along the way. So I
pray that this helps someone and if you know anybody who needs to
hear this message, then feel free to just forward this in this video
off to them. You know, and inshallah I'll see you on the next
one. Subhana Allah hamara whenever handing eyeshadow inlay, Lila and
Wusthof will go on a taboo like Santa Monica