Do You Understand Your Date's Career?

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If you want a bit of wholesome, quality television...

I highly recommend the British series All Creatures Great and Small, which ran between 1978 and 1989, with a few gaps in between. The series is based on the semi-fictionalized memoirs of ‘James Herriot’ (real name Alf Wight), a rural veterinarian in Yorkshire during the 1930s and 40s.

One of the recurring themes throughout the series is that a rural vet has to be essentially on call twenty-four hours a day. James and his colleagues are frequently gotten out of bed at two or three in the morning or forced to cancel plans to rush off and tend to an ailing cow or horse in labor.

You see, for the Yorkshire farmers, their animals are their livelihoods, and losing one because the vet couldn’t be found could mean financial ruin. Therefore, the vets have a responsibility to always take calls, no matter what else is going on.

Now, towards the end of the first season, James marries Helen, a farmer’s daughter, and she comes to live with the vets and share in their experiences. Though not a vet herself, James’s occupation frequently intrudes upon their marriage, as he often has to cancel dates or miss dinner when duty calls (he was even obliged to spend part of their honeymoon vaccinating cattle).

Being a farmer’s daughter herself (as well as generally a pleasant person), Helen takes it all in stride, but this does raise an important point: before you get married, you ought to make sure that you understand what your spouse’s career will mean for you.

The simple fact is that some careers are harder on relationship than others; some jobs simply require long hours, an unpredictable schedule, high stress, and a deep commitment.

There’s really nothing anyone can do about that; the nature of the job is what it is. If you fall in love with a man with this kind of career, you will have challenges that not everyone has to face.

(Obviously, the same thing applies for men falling for women with this kind of career).

For instance, police officers often say their job is a ‘marriage killer’ due to the combination of stress, long hours, irregular shift, and frequent overtime. Doctors too often find their shifts run long or they’re required to come in for extra work.

Similar issues emerge, to a greater or lesser degree, with military personnel, truckers, and emergency workers, among others. A person in these professions is going to be cancelling a lot of dates, missing a lot of holidays, and singing ‘Happy Birthday’ through a phone more often than not.

As I say, this is just the nature of the job, but it’s important to be aware of this before you get married.

Many, many relationships have been wrecked because of this sort of thing. You go in accustomed to a certain kind of lifestyle, only to find that your spouse’s career renders that impossible.

You find that he isn’t home very much, and he’s exhausted when he is. He keeps having to miss family events or date nights because of a call at work. He’s never around to help with the children, and you find you have fewer and fewer things to say to each other because your day-to-day experiences are so different. Resentments form, affection cools, and love dies.

It can be even worse if you both work, where, depending on your schedules, you may end up not seeing each other at all for long stretches. In such cases, it’s probably best for one or the other to drop their job if at all possible.

I am not in the least trying to dissuade anyone from marrying someone they really love because his career is difficult to live with.

I am only recommending that you be aware of the potential danger in this area. No doubt you will talk to your potential spouse about his career plans, but don’t just stop there; ask about what the hours are like, what the work environment is like, be aware of whether he’ll have to be ‘on call’, and so on. Then honestly assess whether you could handle a life like that. If you can’t, then this might not be the person for you. In any case, it’s much better to know ahead of time.

When you are thinking about marriage, make sure you discuss this with your future spouse. Let him know how you feel about his career, any concerns you might have about it, and come to some kind of agreement on the issue.

If you marry a country vet expecting to be able to make your own schedule, to have regular time for home life, and frequent uninterrupted nights, you are going to be disappointed and probably unhappy. But if you marry knowing full well what his job entails and are prepared to bear the same sacrifices and hardships as he is and, well, to do the best you can with what life gives you, then you will more likely be able to deal with it fairly well.

 

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