1O4 ELLE.COM/UK^ April 2020
y father was a doctor, my mother a nurse –
both brilliantly talented: he a medal winner,
she an assistant matron by her mid-twenties.
Then they had me. He went on to be a world leader in his
field: saved lives, published books, won prizes. She
went on to be a mother of five: frustrated, resentful, with a
sphere so small it felt sour to her; always telling me not
to make her mistake. She was less the power behind the
throne than an insurgent forever threatening rebellion.
She would divorce him, she would abort the next baby,
we would wake up one morning to find her gone.
I’m crying as I write this because these are hard truths.
I loved my mother, I felt for her and I feared what she might
do. I identified with her rage, but I decided to be my father, so
work has always been how I defined myself. Unsurprisingly,
I have found myself attracted to men who feel the same:
driven, with interesting jobs, putting their ambition before
all else. At times, this has led to the uncomfortable question:
how much ambition can one relationship take? And, more
specifically, which one of us is going to
yield and handle the domestic stuff, the
emotional stuff, and be what would once
have been called ‘the wife’?
Relationships in which both members
of a couple maintain alpha status are
rare. There are the bankers I talk to who
take it in turns to prioritise their careers,
so one takes a job somewhere in the
world and the other follows for three
years, then it is the first one’s turn to look
after their children. However, the reason
this feels remarkable is because it is
(and being as rich as Croesus is a help).
A friend tells me that she and her husband- both famous in their respective spheres
- are ‘like rivals, rather than partners’. She adds, ‘It feels like
an exercise in world domination, with us on opposing sides.
Our ambition was exhilarating at 28. Now it feels like a war.’
The stereotype used to be that men left an ‘equal’ partner
for an ‘easier’, less career-minded ‘trophy wife’... cue eye-rolling
all around. And one does not have to look far to find examples:
I give you the friend who left a fellow lawyer for a succession
of student girlfriends. However, I also know a good many
women who are sick of high-flying husbands and slinging
their respective hooks. ‘I’d been doing it on my own for years,’
says one thirtysomething divorcee I interview. ‘Why not formalise
the situation? Then, one day, I might meet someone at least
prepared to have dinner with me occasionally.’
The most successful executive of my acquaintances maintains
‘a happy loafer’ of a husband. He walks the dog, picks up the dry
cleaning and has ‘a job so part-time it’s virtually non-existent’. She
refers to him as her ‘sanity saviour’, in the way that former UK and
Australian prime ministers Theresa May and Julia Gillard are said
to think of their ‘civilian’ spouses. Film star Julia
Roberts found happiness when she ditched
fellow celebrities in favour of a camera
operator happy to let her take the limelight.
In my own case, if my parents’ relationship
taught me to be wary of love as a vocation
vanquisher, then so did my romantic forays. Throughout my life,
I have adored men – as friends, as lovers, as what I optimistically
referred to as ‘partners’ – but, in myriad ways, said partners have
stood in the way of my ambition. However alluring my drive,
the moment I became romantically entangled with them, men
have put their objectives first and mine very much second.y Oxford University boyfriend paid lip service to
respecting my goals, yet there was definitely a sense that
his career was the more pressing. I remember explaining
to his mother that academia could take me anywhere: Dundee,
say, or Chicago. ‘But, you’ll have to follow his work,’ she exclaimed,
mystified that I could interpret matters any other way, despite
my better degree and prospects that, at the time, seemed rosier.
Worse was to come when I was a young newspaper writer,
in the form of a City boy who began by declaring himself in love
with my intellect only to become threatened by it. Our relationship
quickly became a power struggle. ‘You’re so clever,’ he would” IT FEELS L IKE AN
EXERCISE IN WORLD
domination, WITH
US ON OPPOSING
SIDES. Our ambition
WAS EXHIL AR ATING
AT 28. NOW,
IT FEELS LIKE WAR ”