Stress and no sex: Sandwich generation bites back in Tricia Stringer’s novel The Model Wife
Are too many women still clinging to old-fashioned ideas of what it takes to be a mum, daughter, wife? Author Tricia Stringer explores what happens when a “good woman” is pushed too far.
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A recent catch-up with a friend was interrupted by texts and phone calls until finally she admitted she had to go. We were supposed to be relaxing over coffee on one of her few days off from her busy job. But she’d barely taken a sip when the phone started ringing.
Her daughter asked her to look after her toddler, her mother-in-law wanted help to organise a plumber and she had to rearrange work so she could drive her dad to a specialist appointment. The last call was from her husband who needed her to pick up some items before she went home. “I’ve still got to do the shopping,” she groaned. “Cooking dinner is the last thing I feel like doing. I’ve become the filling in the sandwich and I’m being pressed on all sides.”
She waved and was gone, leaving me to reflect on a similar conversation I’d had with another friend the week before.
That friend had cried into her wine. She’d recently returned home after supporting her dad who was going through cancer treatment. She’d gone straight back to work because they’d given her so much time off. During the week her teenage kids were away and her husband had suggested they have a date night. He cooked a romantic dinner, they shared a bath and by the time he’d put out the cat and come to bed ... she’d fallen asleep. She’d slept all night, something she couldn’t remember doing for a long time — but felt so guilty because she hadn’t had sex with her husband, something else she couldn’t remember doing in a long time.
And that reminded me of another friend who kept sending me photos from a book of advice on how to manage her home. It had been a gift from her aunt, who after a visit to her chaotic household had remarked on how tired she was looking — but instead of bringing her flowers and a meal, the aunt brought a book that had the power to inflict feelings of guilt and failure. And it was this that gave me the idea to create a similar gift for my new novel, The Model Wife. My own version of a little book full of proscriptive and ridiculously old-fashioned advice became the conduit to show how cultural norms and advice from friends and family, often based on outdated ideas of what women “should” be, can undermine and cast shade on those very women, rather than support and nurture them.
The person juggling the diverse needs of the multigenerational family load often lacks time to invest in their own health and well-being. Somewhere beyond turning forty not only do women have menopause to look forward to and the disorientation that can come with midlife but they’re often also entrenched in the sandwich generation — those caught between the demands of career, kids and ageing parents.
When that happened to me, I crashed and burned. It was tough having to hit rock bottom before I realised I had to make changes.
Counselling, acupuncture, exercise and medication helped me back to functioning. I learnt that self-care is not selfish but a necessity. Guilt about failing to be the perfect wife, daughter, mother had to go. My children were all capable and I let them use their skills. My husband and I shared household chores. He was my rock and when I recovered my good health, I was able to be his. Getting help to support our parents meant asking for help from others. I’d been juggling two jobs. I resigned from nearly forty years of teaching to become a full-time writer. Saying no was the hardest — but beyond the family I’ve learnt to politely decline when I can’t fit something in. I never want to hit that rock bottom again.
For a writer this is all good fodder and when Natalie King, the central character of The Model Wife began to develop, I drew on everything my friends and I had been and were going through. I delved into what might happen when a contemporary working woman like Natalie, has internalised the kind of advice from a time when women did not work full time, had little economic power and as a consequence were expected to carry the “caring” load as well as a full-time job. Are too many women still clinging to old-fashioned ideas of what it takes to be a mother, daughter, wife? Can a good woman be pushed too far? Does having it all mean doing it all? So many women of my generation try to do the impossible, take everything on board and I wondered what would happen if one day that woman simply took off her heels and walked away.
Ah, yes ... perhaps I’m channelling the inner me still.
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Find out what happens to Natalie and those around her in The Model Wife, published by HarperCollins Australia. It’s our new Book of the Month which means you get it for 30 per cent discount at Booktopia by using the code BCBT19.
Meanwhile you can share your own experiences — and book tips of course — at the Sunday Book Club group on Facebook.
Originally published as Stress and no sex: Sandwich generation bites back in Tricia Stringer’s novel The Model Wife