T"H is a beautiful thing
I was moved by a comment made by "visiting" over here.
I'm repeating her comment here so I can expand on it:
When I got married I was on birth control. When I got off, for the next year, I had a 24 day cycle. I feel this has deep ramifications for the turbulence that I am feeling in my marriage, even now, five years later. I got used to sleeping alone, I got used to not having DH to hold on to or support me physically. I also have a hard time transitioning from famine to flood (as another poster has mentioned.) I harbor resentment toward T"H in general. I harbor resentment toward my DH, when of course it is not his fault.
I ovulated regularly and of course could not get to the mikvah in time. So when I wanted to have sex I was not permitted. With me working and DH working, there were months when we were together once or twice. And of course there is the embarrassment of the mikvah lady looking at you like "weren't you just here?"
For some people, T"H seems to be a beautiful thing. But I wonder if they are just telling themselves that? To me it is not.
Ouch. This woman is obviously still hurting, 5 years later! and I feel for her. I don't think I would have put up with a 24 day cycle for a whole year! But maybe she didn't know there were other (chemical) options to delay ovulation? Maybe she wasn't working with a Rav who knew that and could have directed her to ask her doctor some very important questions? Or maybe she was, and it still took a year to get everything "under control."
But what I really wanted to address was that she grew to resent the halacha, to resent T"H. This pains me the most. Maybe I'm just blessed with a "pollyanna" personality, but I try to see the benefit in even the hard times. Maybe getting used to sleeping alone could be a good thing? Maybe being able to survive without constant physical support from your husband could be a good thing? Maybe you were supposed to take the time to work on the other aspects of your relationship? Maybe you were supposed to... oh, who knows.
As for people finding deep meaning and beauty in their observance of T"H, psychologically, "just telling themselves that" can and often does lead to actually believing it. And if finding that meaning and beauty makes it easier, than that too is only for the good.
No one ever said it was easy to be an Observant Jew. It's much easier today than it ever was... beautiful assortments of head coverings, a plethora of assorted prepackaged Kosher food available, jobs that don't require violating the Shabbos, shuls and mikvahs in practically every sizeable community... but easier isn't easy. We all agree that T"H is hard. And that we don't do it for the benefits, but that they do exist. But if you grow to resent the halacha, well, then you make it that much harder on yourself! I don't resent having to eat Kosher food, although sometimes it would be much easier to not bother. And I don't resent T"H, even when it means I sometimes can't have the physical contact I crave... because it's the way things are, and resenting it would only make me feel worse. Instead I seek to beautify the mitzvos, which in a way makes them easier to do.
I feel like I'm rambling here... did any of this make any sense?
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Yes, resenting halacha is an awful outcome of hardship. But resenting a spouse isn't any better.
"Getting used to sleeping alone" can easily lead to an "I don't need you" mentality, which would be severely detrimental.
Compound that with the possibility of "needing to work on other aspects of the relationship" - hmm, maybe clear verbal communication? maybe with a spouse who isn't good at it, and doesn't quite understand why it matters?
It takes two to tango; if a husband thinks "out of sight (nidah); out of mind", what's a wife to do?
None of my supposing may have any relationship to "visiting"'s life, but I shudder to think about the possibilities.
You're right... I didn't touch on any of the implications of resenting her husband, which is of course not a positive thing!
I often sleep "alone" (B'li neder, a full post on that eventually) even when tahor, (husband's choice) and I've learned that it doesn't reflect on me... it's nothing personal. But it took some time to realize that and accept that, and I'm classifying myself as a pollyanna here... what's a normal person to make of it?
I think one of the aspects of T"H that people do need to work on is developing their relationship as friends, not just lovers. If you aren't intimate beofre marriage, that may help, since friends is all that's open to you then... but too often the focus once married is on being lovers.
T"H is supposed to help balance that. Of course, if you're both too tired by the end of a very full work day to even work on the lover aspect (as "visiting" described, only being together twice before she became niddah again) then I'm sure you're too tired to pour energy into the friends aspect as well... which is not only a real shame, but can lead to the very resentment she describes.
When your husband isn't supporting you physically, he's still supposed to be supporting you emotionally. And you him. Hopefully you're on the same page with regards to T"H, (same level of commitment to it) so that it doesn't become an issue between you, but something you deal with together, if sometimes apart.
Thanks for your comments, and I certainly didn't mean to hijack the other thread. I think it is important to keep in mind that T"H is a mitzvah like any other, but that it does not automatically strengthen a marriage. When I first got married, we decided to have a queen sized bed and a twin sized bed for when I was niddah. We would trade off month to month on who would sleep on the twin. Well, having a 24 day cycle means you are trading a lot. And I got comfy on my own bed. It was how I slept before I was married. The matress was mine from before I was married. It was firmer than the queen we shared and I liked it.
Also, I did see an RE and my cycles eventually worked out to be 27 days. My infertility battles are too long to discuss in this situation, but even 27 days isn't very long, as the OP pointed out, she feels 30 days isn't very long.
My point in posting originally was that if you don't have enough time to get into a groove of physical intimacy then it is harder as time goes on, as issues build up, especially with infertility always on the brain. If we had been able to establish physical intimacy from the beginning, maybe all those months of perform on demand, going to doctors, timed relations, all that stuff that infertility brings would have been easier, because we would have been more comfortable with each other. But being in a nearly constant niddah state puts stress, infertility puts stress and if I did not practice T"H I most certainly would have had less stress.
So again, my point in posting (sorry so stream of consciousness) is that T"H is a mitzvah, just like shabbos is a mitzvah, and sometimes it is great to have a break from the real world and not watch TV and not talk on the phone and sometimes, like when shabbos comes in at 4:15 and you were supposed to stay at work till 6 because of an important client conference call, it is not so great. For some, T"H strengthens and for some it simply does not. I'm just saying that the polyanna view of T"H doesn't work for me.
Desde wrote: If you aren't intimate before marriage, that may help, since friends is all that's open to you then... but too often the focus once married is on being lovers.
Except that in the "right wing" Orthodox world, dating doesn't leave time for friends. The emphasis when ging on shidduchim is simply to determine that there is enough in common to start with, then BOOM, get engaged, plan a quick weeding, instead of taking 6-12 months just enjoying each other's company and getting used to talking about personal and somewhat private things with someone you haven't known that long.
Maybe longer engagements so people don't feel the need to discuss private things with every person they date? Although supposedly longer engagements lead to other problems. . . (sigh)
Long engagements are hard! Long shomer negiah relationships pre-engagement are hard too, so I understand where the "rush" comes from... but I'm still not sure how I feel about the whole shidduch scene, not having gone through it. We're just "right wing" enough to consider it for our children... who are still young enough to make that decision years off.
Ah, life is hard. You have to pick your battles, kwim? I'm not sure there is a perfect answer.
Starting out as friends when you've only known your spouse for between 6 weeks and 6 months is a joke. Not that it won't be in-process, but true, significant friendships take time to grow. So it's one more thing to work on once you're married.
And I almost feel that it's easier to ignore the physical thing while you don't "know what you're missing". DH insists he can't carry out a meaningful conversation with me while nidah without getting aroused. And it doesn't matter if the conversation is job interviews or the kids' education, either! Sheesh. Sensitivity can be overdone as well.
Ksis, I tend to disagree with you on both points. I knew my husband for three months before we got engaged, and we were engaged for six months. While there was a lot of "getting to know you" after we got married, I don't think it is so different for couples who have known each other longer but have never lived together. Our courtship/engagement was not a natural progression like most friendships are, it was a heightened, fast-forward type of thing. Either way, I don't think the friends before lovers angle really works.
About the second point- my husband and I were shomer negiah the entire time before we were married, and not having a phyical relationship, even though I had never experienced one, was absolute hell for me. Halakha tends to agree that it is easier for married couples to keep their hand off each other than it is for unmarried men and women. This is the reason why there is no yichud between married couples when the wife is a niddah as there is between unmarried couples.
Avigayil, I think you meant "no prohibition of yichud," not "no yichud." At least my understanding of the word is that it means to be alone together, although it is often used to refer to the prohibition as well. I once told an acquaintance that he couldn't be "Kol Ishah." [voice of a woman] I was "Kol Isha," he was "Shomer Kol Ishah" [guarding against/about the voice of a woman: being careful not to listen to her singing.] but his usage wasn't unusual, it was just "wrong."
So my friends before lovers comment was way off... both aspects are something you want to cultivate in a marriage, and actually, in retrospect, all the sexual tension of not being intimate probably makes cultivating friendship before marriage harder, not easier. T"H is supposed to help you set aside the time for each aspect, so neither one gets overlooked... but, well, life happens, and it doesn't always work out that way.
I meant "yichud" as a halakhic concept, not as in the literal meaning of the word. Thanks for the clarification.
desde, i dont think your "friends before lovers" comment is necessarily way off, but maybe a difficult ideal situation. Having been through the shidduch scene, a short courtship and a longer than desired engagment (due to our families and obligations etc), there was definitely tension at times, but in a way, i found it difficult to want something that i had never experienced and didnt really know what it was, and its being so out of bounds made it simpler - in a way - as i said, the tension was there. right before i got engaged somebody made the point to me that your spouse really does have to be your best friend, becuase she had an experience that made her a niddah for 11 months (i guess during pregnancy?) and her point was that sometimes, friendship is all you can have together, so it is necessary to make sure it is there to begin with, or at least the potential is there to work with, and i think that may be the basis to go further, becuase yes, all relationships need to develop over time and not all dating allows for it. thats my theory anyway, for whatever its worth.
Do couples who were not shomer negiah during courtship have more difficulty keeping T"H restrictions during marriage? We found it to be quite difficult
Desde - obviously it's been pointed out that "friends before lovers" doesn't work in a lot of communities. but it certainly is possible in others. My husband and I dated for 3 years before getting married (we met in college).
Right... so did we, that's whay I'm not so familiar with the shidduch scene.
I clarified my original comment by adding that the tension of being shomer negiah may make it harder in some instances to cultivate a friendship... I didn't mean to say it was impossible! It was certainly my experience... but it was far easier for us (and profitable for Ma Bell) to work on said friendship through long phone calls... because after a while, being in the same room and trying not to touch was too distracting.
I find keeping T"H much easier than being shomer negiah, (as Avigayil mentioned, Halakha tends to agree that it is easier for married couples to keep their hand off each other than it is for unmarried men and women.) because we know the time apart will end, and even have a good idea of when!
And yes, anon, I would think that if you don't have the experience of being shomer negiah at all before marriage, that would be a huge culture shock type experience (even knowing what's coming isn't the same as experiencing it) and make keeping T"H very very hard.
We actually went thru several phases that added to the difficulties. We were completely S"N for several months during our courtship. Then shortly before engagement we "gave in" and enjoyed a non-intercourse physical relationship. About a six weeks before the wedding we realised it had gotten way out of hand and went back to being S"N for the duration. While we are now happily married and managing with T"H I do find that the experience have having "given in" wore down our resolve to be extra careful in our marriage. Additionally I had had several other relationships before my husband where we also cheated on S"N. Just saying that one avairah leads to another and makes resisting all the more difficult sometimes for years to come
'one avairah leads to another and makes resisting all the more difficult sometimes for years to come'
I can see how that's true if you consider not being shomer negiah to be an avairah. but if you were never intending to be shomer negiah, then the dating time actually gives you practice setting limits, which is helpful for T'H.
Good luck anon. I hope things are easier for you now.
Lots of sense to me, but then again that's sort of what I was trying to say in my post. Sometimes "beautifying mitzvos" is not at all easy, and in some situations may seem nearly impossible, but it might be that at least for those who will anyway be following them, it may actually be worth it in the end.