For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage

For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage by Tara Parker-Pope is the book I just raced through.  I'm not very good at reading non-fiction since I don't retain the information as well as I do with something fluffy that I read in just one go.


I would recommend this book for newlyweds, pregnant couples and people who have a rocky marriage.  I think it caters to people who would question aspects of their marriage, rather than those who have settled into one and seem fine.  Then again, I know a couple that seems to just co-exist, and that's how they work things out between themselves.  


I was first attracted to this book because when I can, I like reading the New York Times, and Tara Parker-Pope is a regular columnist.  She had written something in an article that struck a chord, and so I hunted down her book.


So here are some of the interesting things I learnt and want to share with you before I race it back to the library (see earlier post).  Note that I'm just sharing my notes with you, but I've read the book.  If you read these notes and then quote them to someone else, you're probably taking things out of context.

• Divorce rates aren't going up, they're actually going down, for a variety of reasons.
• One doctor is quoted as saying: "What I find so disturbing about this 50% divorce rate idea is that people aren't forming the right expectations about marriage.  The 50% number makes people think, 'Will my kids be raised in a divorced household?  Will I end up a single mom?' I think in terms of planning for the future, it's useful to understand what really happens in your peer group."
• Phoebe's lobster story in Friends isn't true.  Lobsters don't mate for life, it's more like two weeks.  The writers should have used the prairie vole as the example.
• Birth control pills might actually lead a woman to choose a mate that's genetically unsuitable for her.  The idea is that you're a better match with someone who has different major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes from you.  Birth control pills trick your body into thinking you're pregnant, so your instinct for different MHC genes goes dormant. [It's an interesting chapter on tests that required smelling sweaty t-shirts.]
• A man's olfactory senses appear to guide him toward a woman who is primed to conceive.  [Interesting section on how strippers make more money when ovulating.]
• There's no excuse for not having time for sex because if you were having an affair, you'd make time for that.
• Women don't need sex when breastfeeding because they're tired and getting all the cuddly hormones from the contact with the baby.
• Holding hands with your wife can relieve tension and stress, particularly through traumatic experiences.
• How you tell your "how we met" story says a lot about your marriage.
• Jazz lovers are 30% more sexually active than other people.
• Obesity in a marriage can be contagious.
• Wives are like "gatekeepers" of family health.
• There's a good chapter about how sleep and snoring and separate bedrooms have an effect on marriage.
• You need friends.  Heterosexual men tend to say that their wife is their best friend or their only friend.
• Husbands should take a long parenting class with their wives.

My husband is way better than a roommate

So I was all ready to go downstairs and heat up some lunch, when lo and behold, I open up the fridge.  Gasp.  My one soup mug of homemade butternut squash soup (that I was saving for today) is gone.

There is only one other person in this house that could have eaten it.

I’m more miffed because I had about a cup of it when there were 5L that I made.  Butternut squash soup is becoming one of my signature dishes, which is nice, because it’s so time-consuming that not everyone will jump in and make it themselves.  On Friday, I was slaving away on this thing.  I microwaved the squashes, peeled them, chopped them, scooped out the gooey bits, drenched them in oil, roasted them, poked them, then boiled them until they were squishy, added the other ingredients, simmered it for an hour, ladled it in several batches into the blender, blended, poured carefully into jugs to be left in the fridge until the next day’s party.

I don’t blame him.  If it was sitting there, I probably would have done the same thing.

I’ll make it again.

I’m really quite flattered that that the soup goes down so well and everyone seems to love it.  One of my best friends, Syd, was here on Saturday.  I announced that anyone was welcome to take leftovers home, and she jumped at the chance to get some butternut squash soup.  It made me all googly warm inside.  Which is also why I’m not mad about not having soup for lunch today.

But the point I’ll make today is that it’s one of those instances in which I really appreciate living with my husband.  Strange, I know, coming from missing soup “miffage.”

I’ve lived with shitty roommates who eat your expensive ice cream bars, keep you up at all hours of the night, invite unstable male friends to hang out in your space when neither of you are there.  And when you literally have to clean up somebody’s shit when you are neither in love with or related to them, you just want to throw them out.

So .... hubby taking the last of the soup is really not a big deal.

Hubby promises that he’ll help me make it next time to make up for eating my last portion.  I like that he’ll come with me to grocery shop and stand patiently with the cart as I choose the nicest looking squashes.   

I like that there is no strict division of yours or mine in the fridge.  I like that he appreciates what I cook for him, and there’s no question of who owes who what for groceries.  I like that he listens to me when I show him why we do things a certain way (like overwrapping cheese in plastic wrap to keep it fresher and soft).  I like that we buy toilet paper but there’s no squabble over who bought it last.  I like that he now sees my logic in not putting clean laundry on surfaces that are dusty or where we’ve put our feet.

Perhaps it is love, perhaps security, perhaps the expectation that you’re going to try and make this living arrangement work, you know, forever, that make you more open to compromise and problem solving.  I suppose it is also a combination of hubby being relatively easygoing and me being a pretty good person to live with. (I cook good food, keep the house clean and don’t spend too much money. I think that’s a good deal.)