Towards improved marital stability for dual earner couples in Nigeria

Marital stability (MS) is the ability and unwavering willingness of spouses to not only remain married but also maintain the freshness of marital bliss without consideration of any form of separation. MS is the sole desire of every person that decides to embrace married life.

However, this desire is ‘mere wishful thinking’ for most married persons who neither work towards it nor are willing to offer requisite sacrifices for its attainment. No doubt, the attainment of marital stability demands enormous self-giving beyond the affordance of many, particularly at times when it is needed the most. Dual earner (DE) couples are self-given couples who, through their respective work, can support their spouses and families economically. Such support, necessitated by a drive for individual and collective advancement, expresses the true essence of partnership in marriage. However, the stress and strain of dual-earnership make it a status that tends to threaten marital stability when badly managed.

Dual-earnership demands a great deal of love and rationality to ensure the needed balance for stability in marriage. The sacrificial demand of a stable marriage, its imperative commitment and mutually required compromise by spouses, in marriage as well as, the need for a more financially fulfilling life, brings about marital instability.

MS optimises couples’ well-being and ability to sustain marital unions, without tilting marriages towards breakdown. Efforts to attain and sustain stability in marriage are increasingly demanding, owing to the rapid prevalence of dual-earnership among couples, due to the rising need to consolidate on “bread-winnership” in families, globally. While dual-earning for couples presents remarkable advantages in an economically fragile country like Nigeria, this could have devastating consequences on marital and family life, if improperly managed. This article, therefore, addresses the intricacies of dual-earnership in marriages, with a bid to promote improved MS for married couples in Nigeria.

Dual-earnership creates a demographic shift, so that wives whose role was traditionally limited to the private or domestic sphere, now support their husband’s breadwinning role – for greater financial stability and balance in the family. Spouses in DE marriages tend to cooperate with each other to provide financial support for their family. Thus, making their work obligation as important as their family obligation. Good as it seems, it exerts certain strain on the family. The same woman found on the streets hawking, in corporate offices, industries, or private business ventures, offering commercial or social service, or in a structured employment is also expected to rush back home to care for the family.

Naturally, the stress of work will have a ripple effect, and spillover from work could bring about emotional imbalance, leading to domestic crises and affecting MS. Similarly, the man returns home from work with positive or negative stressors for which he traditionally expects succour from his equally fatigued wife. DE couples usually find themselves in such fixes most of the time.

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Unfortunately, interactions to resolve potentially emanating crises tend to take the form of blame trade, as to who is expected or supposed to do what and why, so that MS becomes negotiated, but on moral grounds.

MS has not been proven to be a function of family financial or social status. Rather, it is indicative of how couples respond to changing family situations. These situations, in their social, economic, emotional, environmental or ‘spiritual’ character, require that couples create time to define and reflect on what their priorities are, and what they should be. In working to achieve family priorities, couples must be sensitive to the needs of each other.

They must frequently consider the good of the other before taking a job offer or accepting a certain assignment, when it is flexible or possible to do so. When decisions are made collectively, or in conscious consideration of one’s spouse, challenges that come with such decisions are better handled. Thus, couples can transcend the debate on who is expected or supposed to do what and why, to understanding that roles in dual earner families cannot be completely guided by traditional gender division of labour.

As the woman supports the man in breadwinning, men need to realise the need to freely contribute to defraying domestic responsibilities, in furtherance of a total and maritally stable family.

Traditional gender ideologies need to adjust to the realisation that promotion of MS exerts demands on both husband and wife. Therefore, Spouses need to view marriage as complementary. Couples must take it as a lifetime goal, a responsibility and commitment that they owe their spouse and family. Consequently, communication is enhanced; the challenge of cultural background is overcome; individualism in educational or professional attainment is eliminated; and socio-economic or financial competitions among couples would be resolved almost immediately. This will bring about mutual selflessness and unflinching support between couples.

Therefore, the saying “beside every successful man, there is a good woman” would be immensely valid for a maritally stable home – where the woman has made many sacrifices supportive of the man’s success. Similarly, it would also be appropriate to say “beside every successful woman, there is a good man.” For dual earner couples to give marital stability a chance, proper communication for mutual understanding is necessary. The willingness to make sacrifices for each other is the hallmark to the promotion and sustainability of marital stability for dual earner couples in Nigeria. This portends huge implications for building better families, businesses and societies, as well as leading more productive and fulfilled life.