My Marriage, My Flourishing

I'm thirty-six this year, and I am happily married to my husband, Kimroy Bailey. He is very handsome, smart, loving towards me, and he loves our children very much. We have been married for over thirteen years now, and we still love each other, even more than we did when we started out at 23 and 24 years old.

We have always been a standing-back-to-back type of couple. We talk things through. We are full-of-faith type of people. As a couple, we are not afraid to talk, and we are always chatting. Even through some of the hardest seasons of our lives, we still chat and laugh.

I can say that within my marriage I have truly flourished, and so has my husband. It is not the act of marriage itself that causes us to flourish. It is because our hearts are truly committed to each other. Neither of us is looking left or right or over our shoulders looking at other people or better opportunities. We are genuinely committed to each other and faithful to each other.

What I Might Have Faced Instead

I shudder to think of what my life might have looked like if I had not met and married my husband when I did. Children outside of marriage. Jaded relationships. Possible exposure to sexually transmitted infections. Possible abortions. Heartbreak after heartbreak. All the pitfalls waiting for a young woman who is left bobbing through the world trying to figure relationships out while being influenced by social media messages, dating pressures, hookup culture and whatever society is telling her at the time.

I am not saying every unmarried woman will experience these things. I am saying those risks were there for me too. I was a young woman living in the same world.

Meeting a good man, committing to each other and building a faithful marriage gave my life a completely different foundation. So when I write about this topic, I am talking from experience.

Growing Up in Jamaica: What Changed

Fifteen years ago, as a young girl living in Jamaica, I wondered many times to myself, "How do people even get into a relationship these days?"

When I was a kid growing up in rural Jamaica, everyone knew which two young people were talking and courting, and people respected that. People would know that Andrew liked Cara. Even then, nobody necessarily expected marriage because Jamaican culture is largely a shack-up-together culture. But there was still that principle that those two were together, and people generally did not try to disrespect their courtship.

Fast-forward to my teenage years and suddenly nobody even seemed to get into relationships properly. One guy could be talking to five different girls at the same time. None of the girls really knew where she stood. Even if they knew about each other, nobody knew which girl he was serious about, or whether he was serious about any of them at all.

What changed? A lot of the messages coming through media changed. Hookup culture grew rapidly in Jamaica. But this article is not really about Jamaica, because it was not only a Jamaican problem. It was happening to girls growing up under American culture and American television across much of the Western world.

Leaving Her to Figure It Out Alone

We created a civilization that leaves its young women exposed while its young men are not seriously trained to become husbands. Too many are instead trained to become playboys.

Then we tell the young woman to know her worth. How? Many young women do not even have a strong father figure helping them understand what a good man looks like, what treatment they should reject, what character looks like, or simply reminding them that they are worth being taken seriously.

Then we leave her to figure out one of the biggest decisions of her life by herself.

I am not saying marriage alone makes a woman flourish. I am saying that without a good man and a good marriage, she is missing what I believe is one of the most important starting points for flourishing. From a good foundation she can flourish in motherhood, work, creativity, learning, travel, friendship, leadership, invention and whatever else her life becomes.

But if the most intimate relationship in her life is unstable, unfaithful, lonely, disrespectful or filled with a man who was never prepared to become a husband, everything else becomes harder.

Widening the Circle: Courtship Gatherings

This is why, inside the Trott Bailey Family Civilization, I do not want young women and men to be left completely on their own to figure this out.

If a young woman is not meeting anyone suitable around her, why should the answer simply be, "Well, good luck"? We can widen the circle. We can create serious Courtship Gatherings where people who actually want marriage can meet each other, with their families close enough to observe, ask questions and notice things.

The parents do not choose the husband or wife. The young man and young woman choose each other. And the woman does not have to sit around waiting to be picked either. She can see a man she respects and make her interest clear.

But even that only works if there are good men there to meet.

Building a Worthwhile Pool of Husbands

We need to create a worthwhile pool of husbands. There is no point telling women to choose better men if civilization is not preparing boys to become good husbands. We cannot train boys to be playboys and then blame women for the shortage of good husbands.

And even then, the work cannot stop at the wedding.

The Work Doesn't Stop at the Wedding

Finding a good husband is not enough if marriage drops the woman into a life where she carries the cooking, washing, cleaning, childcare, remembering, planning and household coordination mostly by herself.

I author the Trott Bailey Family Civilization, and a large part of that work is about creating concrete conditions in which women can actually flourish inside marriage, family and their own lives. That means free access to orchards and food, family housing, travel, baby care, healthcare, Sabennerie when nobody wants to cook, Fabric Nodes to take clothing care out of the private household battle, professional cleaning support, childcare and Baby Worlds, water and energy systems, places for families to rest and play, and what I call family delight: travel, adventure, beauty, celebrations and experiences that make family life enjoyable instead of one long list of chores.

I do not want a woman to finally find a good husband and then spend the rest of her life buried under repetitive work. The civilization around the marriage should help the husband, wife and children flourish together.

What "Women Flourish" Really Means to Me

So when I look at the words Women Flourish, I take them seriously.

Women are not flourishing simply because we tell them to be confident, ambitious, independent, productive or better at self-care. We have to look at the foundation underneath her life.

• Does she have access to good men?
• Are young men being prepared to become husbands?
• Does courtship give her clarity instead of leaving her guessing?
• Does she have people around her who genuinely care whether she makes a good choice?
• And if she does marry, is the life around that marriage designed to help the husband, wife and children flourish together?