Hooray for Good Husbands!

I saw an ecard on Facebook today that bothered me. It said: "Marriage is a fancy word for adopting an overgrown man child who can't take care of himself." A lot of my friends found this funny, but it just made me sad. Is this really what young women in our society think about men and about marriage? Then no wonder so many of them are deciding to stay single!
Ladies, if you treat your husband like a child, then you have every right to expect him to behave like one. If you treat your husband  (the man you fell in love with and promised to honor and cherish) like he's an idiot, talk down to him in front of people, and continually criticize him, he's not going to act like your knight in shining armor when you need him. If you tell your daughter that she is smart, capable, and beautiful, that's what she's going to believe about herself.
Personally, I have three small children to take care of; I don't need a fourth. I treat my husband like a man because that's what he is, a MAN. Not a child, not a bank, not a girlfriend or a babysitter, but the MAN I fell in love with and chose to make a lifelong commitment to. I choose to take good care of him because he takes good care of me. He is a fantastic father, something I knew he would be great at, I just didn't know how great until our babies were born.
Words are very powerful. I have heard it said that mothers use their words to paint a picture on the canvas that is their child. My children watch and listen to every single thing I say or do. Yes, sometimes they pretend that they didn't hear me the first 87 times I called them, but I know better. They also listen to everything my husband says, probably because he is a lot sweeter than I am sometimes. And more patient, tolerant, understanding, all that sappy stuff he learned straight from his wonderful mother. She is the kindest person I have ever met. Period. When I am really trying to MAKE myself be the parent I want to be instead of the one I am sometimes, I say that I am channeling my inner Mama Dot!
This morning, one of my girls was comforting her baby sister, who was crying because she had strawberry cereal bar all over her hands. She hugged the baby, smiled, and said, "Don't worry, Little One. It will come right off. Mama's not mad at you. You got a good mama." It sure did my heart good to hear her say that, and I know right where it came from: her daddy. He tells our girls all the time in front of me, "Girls, you got a good mama." And I've heard it so much, I've started to believe it, too.
I have had many friends who wanted a wedding, but as it turned out, they didn't really want a marriage. I think that's why the divorce rate is so high. Marriage is about choosing to love someone, choosing to take care of them, choosing to be happy instead of being right all the time. I choose to be at home, taking care of my husband and my children, each and every day. I married a man, not a child. He loves, supports, and encourages me every single chance he gets. And because he does those things, it makes me want to do the same things for him. He could absolutely take care of himself. He was doing that before we met. He could take care of our children, just not as well as me. (Kidding! Love you, Babe.) I am his wife, his girlfriend, and his biggest supporter. I am a lucky woman, and I know it. Hooray for good husbands! And kudos to the moms who raised them, because let's face it, that's really who made them good husbands.