Thoughts after hearing of Terry Martin Hekker

From PopPolitics:

Terry Martin Hekker once wrote an op-ed for The New York Times "on the satisfaction of being a full-time housewife in the new age of the liberated woman." The column became a book, Ever Since Adam and Eve, and she became an overnight authority on homemaking. Then, on her 40th wedding anniversary, her husband asked for a divorce, and Hekker realized her economic disadvantage. "The feminine and sexual revolutions of the last few decades have had their shining victories, but have they, in the end, made things any easier for mothers?" Hekker now asks.

"My anachronistic book was written while I was in a successful marriage that I expected would go on forever," she adds. "Sadly, it now has little relevance for modern women, except perhaps as a cautionary tale: never its intended purpose. So I couldn't imagine writing a sequel. But my friend Elaine did come up with a perfect title: 'Disregard First Book.'"

I do not know, nor do I remember ever having heard of Terry Martin Hekker when she wrote her first book 25 years ago. I was busy at the time with my marriage, my two children, my work with the Girl Scouts in the community and Day Camp, and my job as a nurse at a local hospital. I am unsure of when she wrote it, but if the information at Alibris is correct, it was 1980.

But I have seen many who are now in her situation since then.

One spouse has an affair, CHOOSING to violate the vows spoken on their wedding day. That spouse then chooses to serve the other spouse with divorce papers (no fault, unilateral, and forced divorce with no due process for the recipient of those papers).

So now we have an adulterer who has also CHOSEN to again violate the vows spoken on their wedding day, being granted that divorce, with everything supposedly split down the middle. HOWEVER, since the adulterer knew that the papers would be coming, and the recipient of those papers did not, very often money and assets are hidden well, so that there is no trace of them, AND the petitioner will have access later.... (and I know of a few cases where the Petitioner was aided in this by a lawyer or accountant friend before the papers were served!).

The Respondent in the divorce is left with no medical/dental insurance, devastated by both the knowledge of the unfaithfulness of their spouse, and the fact that there is no protection or defense in the breeching of their 'contract' by the other spouse.

None.

And the attorneys and judge can only go by what shows on paper as far as dividing the assets...so what is hidden is not figured in.

(A recent case in point is one I have mentioned already--wife left hubby with $2.00 in their joint account, maxed out the charge cards, and left saying she was going to mother's for awhile. Later, it is learned that she had NOT gone to mother's, but had moved to another state using the money she took with her to start a new business and life with her 'new love' whom she had 'met' online...and MOM knew it was happening and aided her in this move... )

So, the unfaithful and abandoning spouse gets his/her divorce, and half of the visible assets, and a new lover.
If it is the wife leaving, she may also get the kids and the house, etc, and move her lover in shortly after moving hubby out.
If it is the husband leaving, the new lover is most often much younger, and he no longer WANTS the kids or the house.... though there are some who even want custody of children and house.

Now let's say that they are Catholic, and it is important for the new lover to be married 'in the Church'.... and the abandoner is the one who does the petitioning for what is often incorrectly called an 'annulment'--a Declaration of Nullity.

In the US, chances are that the Tribunals will find a Null Decision, with the Court of Second Instance affirming that decision (since most are strongly discouraged from asking for the Roman Rota to be that Court of Second Instance where the first decision may not be affirmed, but overturned depending on grounds..and often is. ) As a result, even in the Church, there will be NO penalty paid for either the adultery or the breech of the vows.

So what do we now have?

An adulterer who broke their vows twice, one in adultery, and once by divorcing, now being 'rewarded' by being able to marry trophy wife or lover IN THE CHURCH!

But now we add age to this picture, and we have a woman married forty years, being handed those divorce papers by her husband on their 40th wedding anniversary, leaving her for that younger woman. A woman who stayed home and raised her children, fed her husband, cleaned his clothing, cared for their home, with no training for a job, and no job to begin with, who has been left with no insurance, no assets, nothing...after forty years.

Not knowing Terry Martin Hekker, I have no idea if she also had helped to put her husband through school or not, but many women DID, and are left in the same way that she was.

Today, there is no 'alimony'. And if you have no children for the spouse to help support, there is also no family maintainance. Sometimes, a judge will allow for some financial help for a couple of years for the abandoned spouse to get training for a job that will support her/him...but not always. And how do you train for any job after forty years of marriage??? If married at 21, you are now 61 years old. Training takes time, and then... who will hire you anyway? Where will you find any work at all with any kind of training?

Something is wrong with this picture.

If a spouse is an adulterer, they should NOT be rewarded with half the assets and be able to leave their spouse sitting there in poverty. They chose to be unfaithful. To even try to blame the spouse for their decision to cheat is reprehensible. To be rewarded for it as though nothing is wrong with it is even more so.

I don't know Terry Martin Hekker at all. I had never heard of her until recently when two stories appeared, and were sent to me by friends, and again by Diane Sollee of Smart Marriages via her newsletter.

But I have heard her story a myriad of times. And it is getting to be more sickening each time I hear it, especially now, when it is happening to women who have no hope to support themselves due to their ages. It is hard enough when a mate dies after a long marriage, but to be deliberately left behind for another younger lover, and to be left in poverty to boot is tragic.

It is more than tragic. It is despicable. It is reprehensible.

Our vows: The groom says:I (...), take you (...) to be my wife. I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love you and honor you all the days of my life. The bride says:I (...), take you (...) to be my husband. I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love you and honor you all the days of my life. "Right is still right if nobody is right, and wrong is still wrong if everybody is wrong," Archbishop Fulton J Sheen author of The Life of Christ Catholic, Christian, Commentary, conservative, Current events, divorce, Marriage, No fault divorce