Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Refreshing Romance

I enjoyed reading the few posts about "what bugs you", but come on ladies! I know we have a few more pet peeves than that! I hope you will continue to add what bugs you to the blog. It's nice to know we all have our little issues with our traveling men.

My husband and I just got back from a weekend away. It was so nice to get out of town and away from any responsibilities. Even though we try to save our weekends for fun, it makes a different when you couldn't do anything productive, even if you wanted to. (out of sight, out of mind)

How often do you and your husband take time for a little vacation? I think it's hard some times to take time away, when they're away so much during the week. When my husband is home on the weekends, I hunger for normalcy and often the last thing on my mind is a weekend out of town. I like seeing him AT HOME, sitting on th couch, doing mundane things like channel surfing together. But I realized again this weekend how important it is to travel together.

Thursday, January 25, 2007

What Bugs You?

Here's a wild card post .... write about anything that drives you crazy about your traveling husband. Does he leave his towels on the floor like he's at the Hilton? Does he never want to go out and eat on the weekends because he's having all of these fabulous meals on the company dime during the week? No complaint is too big or small.

I'm going on a ski weekend with my husband today so I'll be away for a few days from the internet, but I'm looking forward to checking in when I get back!

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Time for My Stuff


I don't know about you guys, but when my husband is home, I have a horrible time getting things done I need to get done. Between trying to spend time with him, and help him with a few things, there's little time left for things I need to do. I guess just need to make time, but in my mind, I think - "well, I can do that after he leaves."


The end result is that on the nights he's gone, I'm squeezing in a lot of little things in I need to do. My personality is I have to get the "need to" things done before I do the "want to" things. By the time I'm done all of my obligations, I rarely have time left. I know I need to work on this. My husband is incredibly good at goofing off even when there's stuff left to do. And to his credit, things are always done eventually, when they absolutely have to be. Not sure if this is a gender things, or personality trait.


Anyway - does anyone have the same problem?


*the picture is one we took a couple years ago in Warsaw, Poland.

Monday, January 22, 2007

Back to Reality

My husband is back in town for this week after being gone all last week. It's always hard for us to balance the things I've been waiting on him to do, with what he needs to do to catch up from being gone. Sometimes it feels like a tug of war. I know he's got to get caught up, but I've been waiting to do things (like tonight it's sealing off some windows in our drafty old house (just bought an 1830's row house)). Right now, he's bogged down at work so I've been running around taking care of it which is what I said I wouldn't do. He'd promised to help, BUT, I can tell he's stressed and I just keep telling myself it's not as if he's going to see a movie. He said he'll help when he gets home, but I don't want to do it at 10 at night.

Aside from the "honey-do" list - I just want to spend time with him, catching up on our favorite shows, and relaxing. Thankfully, this weekend we have a long ski weekend planned in Colorado so we'll have some QT there.

How do you guys balance what your needs are when your husband gets home with what he needs to take care of?

Friday, January 19, 2007

Have a great weekend!

I hope you're getting to enjoy some time with your husbands. Mine is still out of town - so it's a girls weekend for me! Talk to you guys on Monday!

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Unexpected Irritation

I don't know what got into me this morning, but for some reason I got irritated at my husband. He wasn't even here and last night when we talked all was fine. But something switched when I went to work, and his crazy schedule the last week got under my skin. We've hardly talked because he's been so busy and I've tried so hard to be cool about it and understand that this really is a crucial time. But this morning, I left my "coolness" at home and sent him a "nasty-gram' email about something he hadn't done that I'd asked him to do. He immediately took care of it, and then I felt a little silly. But should I have felt silly? Fourteen days (I counted) isn't unreasonable to expect something to be done.

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Share your thoughts - The Honey Do List

Here's a topic ... how do you gals handle the "honey do" list? In a traditional marriage, men are home all week, they can help out around the house, they can change a light bulb or call a repairman. For us weekend wives, things are a little different. If our husbands try to squeeze all of these responsibilities into 72 hours on the weekend, we all miss out on quality time.

I try to do everything I possibly can during the week so the weekends can be mostly fun. Of course, I do this with my own selfish motivations, but in the beginning I REALLY resented my husband. Here I was getting home from work at 5:30 and cleaning, fixing, whatever - and he was off in some Hilton eating at Mortons.

Then one night during a fight about this very topic, my husband said, "I feel like you're complaining about mowing the yard when I'm out digging a ditch." Things changed a lot after that night for us.Their life might seem glamorous on the road, but bottom line (at least for my husband who is a consultant) they're working 16 hour days. And the Hilton is nice, unless you've been there for 8 months and at that point the novelty has worn off. I work 8 hours a day. If I have to put in 2 or even 3 hours a night around the house, I still have the better end of the deal. At least I'm at home. I guess, for me, it came down to finally accepting his job as my own as well.

What do you think? How do you deal with household chores? Do you have a hard time accepting the responsibility? Even though I'm more at peace with things, I still have a hard time occasionally.

Have a good night ladies!

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Girl Time!

Tonight I stepped out of my normal weekday routine and hosted a girls night at my house. I've known all of these girls for a while, either through my husband or work and we maintain a phone and email friendship, but rarely do we make time to just hang out during the week. You know how it is, we get bogged down by responsibility and trying to hold the household together while our husbands are away.
It was awesome. We laughed and giggled like it was a slumber party for a bunch of 30 somethings. It was a great release, but also great to share stories of what life is like when our husbands are away. Two of the other women are also weekend wives, and it was great to share with them. I know them through firm events and this is the first time we've done things without our husbands.
Isn't it funny how we meet other weekend wives often through our husband's work events, but rarely do we reach out to eachother. This blog is a great start, but I encourage everyone to step out of their comfort zone and reach out to other weekend wives they know nearby.
Many of you have been so good to write in and share that you feel lonely because you're in a new city with no family and few of your close friends. It's hard. I remember when I first moved to Philly I basically volunteered to work any hours during the week because it made them time go faster and before I knew it Thursday night was here and USAir was finally bringing my husband home for the weekend. It's taken me about two years to establish a social group. So many of my friends have husbands who are home during the week, and many of them wouldn't dare make regular plans that didn't include their men. It's almost like I was driven to make friends with other single women, which is fun, but they don't have exactly the same interests all the time as I do.
So I hope tonight was the start of a regular tradition. It was a boost for my week and my husband was blown away tonight when he called at 10pm and I couldn't talk because I still had company. :)

Monday, January 15, 2007

How Do We Handle Children?

The subject of adding children to our demands as weekend wives is a tough one. Both Yelnad and Amyd wrote in to ask if anyone else has children. Kim shared her experience about spending a large part of her last trimester alone. I think it would be helpful if those of you with children could offer advice to the rest of us.

My husband and I don't have children yet, but we plan to start trying soon. I am nervous about it. When we've discussed it, the plan now is to hire a nanny so I can continue working. I love my job (most days) and worked hard to get where I am. A regular day care or baby sitter won't work because there are nights I have to stay late. I told my husband early on in our relationship that if he continued to keep his crazy travel schedule after we had kids, then part of his salary would have to cover child care.

Who knows how my perspective will change once we have a child. I'll be honest, a majority of the women I've interviewed for my book either adapted or quit their careers when they had children. They tell me it's just impossible to do it any other way. That scares me a little. I don't feel ready to give up my job.

Anyway - those are my feelings about it. How do you guys feel? Do you weekend wife mommies have any advice?

Wow! Weekend Wives Unite!


Ladies - I am overwhelmed and so grateful for all of you taking the time to write in. I've been seeing the comments flood my "inbox" all day, but my "day job" was keeping me from responding.

I been longing for other women to talk to about this for a long time, so I'm thrilled that this is taking off.

First of all - thank you for all your well wishes about my infection. I'm doing so much better today. After thinking about why I got so upset yesterday about my husband being gone, I think it boils down to feeling abandoned. I can't realy fault him because I sent him away, but I was still angry with him until I had a chance to work things out in my head.

We all come from different perspectives - some of us became weekend wives AFTER we married, but others, like me, knew what we were signing up for. My husband was straight up with me when we were dating about his job. I had love goggles on and thought, hey, I'm up for it, this is the man of my dreams.

I have no regrets about marrying him, but I am only now realizing the commitment I have made.

Several of you opened up about similar experiences with health problems and home nightmares. I don't know about you guys, but I can deal (most of the time) with my husband's absense during these times. BUT what makes me upset is when it seems he doesn't realize how hard it can be. When he does recognize that his being gone puts added stress on me, I have an easier time. I guess it all comes down to acknowledgement and appreciation. We all love our men, but WE KNOW sometimes a "thank you" or "wow, you're really working hard" is few and far between.

Many of you have written in about other challenges and topics, such as children. I'm going to reorganize things on the site and create specific posts that address these topics that folks can respond to. I'll still generate daily posts (as long as I'm near a computer), but at least this will give you guys a place to gab about specific things. AND please let me know if there's something I'm not addressing.


**The cheesy picture in this post is my husband and I on a trip to Australia. That's where we got engaged a few years ago.

Sunday, January 14, 2007

Rough Day

What a crazy 24 hours! Friday I went to the doctor and found out I had a staph infection on my leg because of my razor! (change your razors ladies!)
This morning I woke up and the infection was worse. My doctor told me to go to the hospital and that I may be admitted. In the middle of all of this, my husband was about to leave for a long business trip. Missing the trip would have many ramifications. He wanted to stay home, but I told him to go. I knew that most likely I would be sent home after they checked me out, and I didn't want to have him miss his trip just for that. He almost refused to leave, but I finally got him to go.
After he left for the airport, as I was sitting at the hospital - I had major second thoughts. Why was I facing this alone? Why did he listen to me? Why didn't he turn around and come back? It didn't help that this nosey lady asked why I was there alone!
I'm sure all of us have had an experience where we wish our husbands were there. We have to do things on our own sometimes, where other women might have their husbands there.
You know what was one of the things bothering me most? -- what others might say about my husband not staying. I understood why he got on the plane, but I wasn't sure my parents would, or some of my friends. It's hard for others not in our situation to understand what we have to do to keep going and make things work.
Anyway - I'm feeling better now and my husband has called to check on me several times today. It's all worked out, but today was a true test of my weekend wife strength! How have some of you been tested?

Saturday, January 13, 2007

Bracing for Time Apart

A response from SMP made me think about how we all have to prepare for extended periods of time apart. Most of the time my husband is gone for 3-4 days at a time. But there have been times that he's been gone for a week, two, even three weeks.
I always initially dread it, but I've learned to look at it as a little vacation for myself. I make sure I have plans, especially with people I'm not able to see that often because of our hectic schedule. While he's gone for those long periods, we talk every day, unless he's out of the country, and we are always bouncing emails back and forth during the day.
I find that I do okay with about a week and a half apart, but after that I start to get emotional and I really miss him.
Of course, as we all know, sometimes the "reunions" can be kind of fun so I guess that's a positive.
My husband is about to leave for nine days tomorrow. At this point, I'm kind of looking forward to it. I'm planning on writing a proposal to submit The Weekend Wives Club to women's magazines. I'm hoping that if I can get an article published, that will force book publishers to take notice.
Have a great Saturday night ladies!

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Let me hear from you!

Today I got my first comment on my blog. It was such a great feeling to receive feedback from another weekend wife. I suppose it all has to do with affirmation. We all have established a comfort level in our weekend wife arrangement, but to hear that this is "normal" for someone else helps so much.


I hope more of you will write in - and keep logging on to read the discussion. This is only the beginning of what I hope is a national (maybe international) awakening that people are living these marriages and they can work.


Sometimes, I feel lucky with such an arrangement. I talk to some of my married friends and associates and it doesn't seem like they're able to truly value their time together. Because my husband and I's time is so limited, we make sure it's quality time.
**This is a picture of us in Cape Town, South Africa in December of 2007.
We do a lot of traveling - thanks to his hotel and airline points (you know what I'm talking about ladies!) - so occassionally I'll post pictures of some of our adventures. When I get overwhelmed with the demands of being part of "the club" - I think of all the opportunities we've been granted by his job. Do you take the same approach?

Monday, January 8, 2007

A Night Out


I try to schedule MY time around my husband's schedule. Today when I left for work he reminded me he had plans with a friend. So I quickly set up a happy hour with a friend. Mid-afternoon his friend cancelled and my immediate inclination was to cancel plans to spend time with him. I forced myself not to. I went out with my friend while he waited on my at home. I am so glad I did. It's so important to make time for ourselves and it feels good once in a while to let our husband's day revolve around us for a change.

Sunday, January 7, 2007

I need my time

Isn't it funny that when our husbands travel, we wish they were home? But then, when they're home for longer than a weekend, we realize there are some benefits to being a weekend wife.
I love my husband dearly, but when he's away, I have my routine. The messes I clean up are my own, I set the agenda for the television, I can monopolize the computer. I get everything done I need to for me, and when he's home on the weekend I'm ready to play. He's been working from home for a few months and it's becoming hard to get things done for myself. For instance, a trip to the mall today was abbreviated today because the Eagles were playing at 4:30. When I know I have the week to run the errands I missed out on, I don't care. But today I did because I haven't had a chance to do things I need to during the week. I know having him home is a gift and it's only a matter of time before he's back on the road. Because of that, during the week I try to enjoy every dinner together I can, every night in front of the TV watching our favorite shows.
Occasionally he'll have a night where he goes rockclimbing or out with a friend, and I look forward to these nights so much. The time to myself is back - except I am realizing I use those nights to go grocery shopping or do something for the household. I need to do a much better job of reserving those nights for myself, in the same way he's making time for himself.

Wednesday, January 3, 2007

About Me


I met my husband in 2001 while working in Tennessee as a TV reporter. I was at the beginning of a two-year job contract and he was just starting his career as a consultant in Philadelphia.


Our long distance relationship began and lasted for three years before I was
able to move up to Philadelphia. Although we solved our geography issue, we were still left with the reality of his job which requires him to travel. Typically, he leaves on Sunday night and returns Thursday night or Friday morning. It's a crazy arrangement, but we figured things out as we went along and have a pretty good system.


Early on in our relationship I went to the book store to find a self help book for women whose husbands travel. I could not believe that nothing exists. After we finally married in April 2006 and I became an offical Weekend Wife, I decided that it was time to do something. I've spent the last year trying to get The Weekend Wives Club published. So far, publishers love the idea, but don't think the market is big enough.


Together, we're going to prove them wrong. It's time Weekend Wives are recognized as key parts of many American marriages.

Just the beginning

After months of talking about it, it's time to get The Weekend Wives Club up and running. It's a place for weekend wives around the world to log on and find a community of women in the same situation. It's something I was looking for when I decided to pursue a commitment with my husband and it didn't exist. Now it does, and I invite you to share your thoughts and stories with this blog and the other 3.7 million women in the United States who are in the same boat.