How to keep your man a la Michelle Duggar

Feb 21, 2012 2:56 AM by Caroline Goddard

Posted in Entertainment / Celebrity Gossip / Hookups, Breakups & Babies

Michelle Duggar's Awful Marriage Advice

Michelle Duggar has some advice on how to keep your man. Hint: Be totally submissive and don't make a move without asking first.

Michelle Duggar Jim Bob Duggar

Having a hard time keeping a man? Maybe it's because you're a shameless hussy who makes your own money, doesn't cave in to his sexual demands when you're not in the mood and goes to your girlfriends for advice. Luckily for you, Michelle Duggar is here to set you straight. Follow her tips and you'll be on your way to a near-abusive marriage in no time!

The mother of 19 -- who is, to be fair, by all accounts very happily married to Jim Bob Duggar -- was shown on the season premiere of 19 Kids and Counting speaking at a conference, and as part of her presentation, handed out a list of ways to fulfill the needs of your husband. Only one of these methods is even remotely reasonable.

The Duggars endorse Rick Santorum >>

A poster on Television Without Pity was able to transcribe part of the handout, and this is the advice she gave. Remember, this is the year 2012.

"Seven Basic Needs of a Husband"

1. A husband needs a wife who respects him as a man.

How does a wife destroy her husband's manliness?

A. By expecting him to know what protection you need

Physical
Spiritual
Mental
Emotional

Tell your husband how he can protect you.

B. By being financially independent

Love is killed by self-sufficiency.
Whoever controls the money controls the leadership.

Center your work and your ministry in your home.

C. By giving greater loyalty to outside leadership

Pastor and church leaders
Men and women Bible teachers
Relatives and friends

Ask your husband your spiritual questions.

D. By resisting his decisions in your spirit

A wife's spirit controls her husband's ambitions.
Reviewing past failure destroys a husband's self-worth.

Learn to wisely appeal to your husband

E. By resisting his physical affection

This is the unspoken crushing of a man's spirit.
A wife's Godliness is a powerful guard against her husband's abuse of…"

The Duggars escape for Valentine's romance >>

Unfortunately, that's where the first page cut off and the transcription ends.

Let's examine this, shall we? The first part actually sounds like pretty decent advice: Don't assume a man can read your mind. Tell him what you want. Easy enough, right?

But it's immediately after that lesson that things rapidly go downhill. The rest of Duggar's relationship advice reads like a chapter from The Abusive Husband Handbook. According to her, the woman should be financially dependent upon her husband, never ask anyone but him for advice, let him make all the decisions and always give him sex when he wants it, even if you'd rather dig your eyeballs out with a spoon than take your skirt off.

No wonder she has all those kids. Saying no to that hunk of a man Jim Bob is simply out of the question.

Tell us: Is Michelle Duggar's marriage advice brilliant or BS?

Image courtesy Scott Enlow/TLC

Tags: 19 kids and counting michelle duggar

Comments

Comments on "How to keep your man a la Michelle Duggar"

The Duggar clan sickens me. Her marriage advice is about as good as their tips for birth control. Jim Bob needs to be neutered & Michelle needs to go through menopause.

Michelle is right on all points, if you want that very specific type of marriage. It is not abusive, but most modern-American women would find it hard to live within those parameters for any lenth of time. Her way is not right or wrong, it is just her way. Yay for the Duggars and their seemingly happy marriage.

Sorry, hun, I don't agree. If I let my husband make the financial decisions in my marriage, we'd be begging in the street. HE can thank ME that he has a roof over his head and food on his table. Same for the spiritual aspects of our life. HE asks the questions and I answer them. And you can ask him if he feels less manly for it. No, I won't be taking marriage advise from a baby factory. But thanks for sharing your views.

I think Michelle's advice is awesome, and she has an amazing marriage and family to show for it.

I would rather strip for money than to be held prisoner in a patriarchal marriage. May I say, Ms. Duggar, have you ever heard of marriage equality, hmm???

It would be the day when i would have shut up and let my husband make all the decisions in our marriage. To have him tell me what to do...NO WAY! If he asked sure but no demanding. But be submissive i don't think so. I ran our home as my husband was working and it had to be that way. I was a stay at home mom the way i wanted it as did he. We had great communication and we respected each other. It worked for us and we loved each other so much..We were married 34+ yrs. before he passed away at the age of 55. Those were the best yrs. of my life and his too.

Leave Michelle alone!! It's lighthearted ADVICE for God's Sake. (unintended pun) It's essential to possess an IQ score that exceeds tooth count to understand/decipher Michelle's advice as "what works for her". I live in Bible Thumper Hell (NC/VA border in NC). "Christians" proudly announce the source of any knowledge "Cause the Preacher said so". (Dear God) MANY Self-Appointed Preachers "got the calling"..no education required. .. Mr. Preacher will impress you with his knowledge of the bible. (Preaches the entire BIBLE in two syllables or less).. (insert Genius speech). The 16th disciple claims he talks to JEEZUS during morning bathroom activities...no s*** (oops.. pun). His word is gospel (oops)..."Bad stuff don't happen to people who come to church".. (sans brain and ears) My destination A.D. is Hell 90210..Hangin' with my Catholic Peeps'. ("cause the preacher said so")

Wow, the writer made a lot of assumptions with things. You just shouldn't elevate outsiders to a power of position in your family. EVEN CLERGY. They're saying don't run to mommy or your best friend, bad mouth your husband and then do what they say. For the most part, that's true. If you made a good choice, and your spouse is your partner and not abusive, this DOES make sense. But you're going into it assuming the husband is a sick, twisted individual and isn't working on the family. There ARE roles in a relationship, this just spells it out. And I think, too, with physical affection, you should (male and female) always at least give it a shot. Physical affection is an important part of a relationship, and if one is always rejecting the other, it can make things very, very bleak. The only one that bugs me is the financially dependent one. Although I am, it's for a number of reasons and I would be ok if something happened. But not for any reasons of submission. That's wierd, very weird.

somehow I feel like the Duggars have a much more successful marriage than the writer of this column. Too bad people want to slam what works for someone else. Who's writing an article on all the failed marriages in Hollywood in this same tone? Geez.

While I cannot imagine living her life; I surely believe the Duggars have every right to live how they wish to live.

I do not agree with the Duggar's political choices, but I do admire the marriage that she has. Her husband is devoted to their family. He is a Christian man, and handles the responsibility of having a large family very well. Michelle seems to be truly content, and although raising a family of any size can be difficult, it is so much easier when you are in sync with your spouse and you are both adhering to the spiritual blueprint offered by the Bible. The man is supposed to be the head of the family. I have had enough of men screaming that they should be respected, but rely on their wives to be everything that they should be. My ex-husband was one of those: He was laid off for a long time, became lazy and didn't TRY to find work, he cheated on me and had two children outside our marriage, started abusing drugs and then started physically and verbally abusing me. I worked 40+ hours every week to keep a roof over our heads and to keep food in our kids' mouths and to keep our bills paid. Then, when he decided that the woman he cheated on me with was not a good enough mother, we brought their two children to live with us. After all this, he wants to still yell about being the king of the castle? I think not. I would rather have a husband like Jim Bob Duggar and 25 biological children than to put up with the mess of a man that my ex was any day of the week.

I think it is great that she knows how to have a correct, lasting relationship with a man and make him more than just "babies daddy".....

"Wives submit to your husbands, husbands love your wife as Christ loved the church" Christ had an endless, unconditional love for the church. If our husbands love us as such, it is then a joy to submit to them. Doesn't mean we are expected to be door mats. When a husband and wife fulfill the roles directed in the Bible, the marriage works wonderfully.

Caroline, don't you have something better to do with your life than berate the lives of others?

I think she fell thru a time warp. She is clearly going to have alot of health problems when her uterus starts to prolapse. I feel sorry for all the older kids having to do all the work while mommy and daddy are busy fooling around all the time.

I'd listen to Michelle Duggar over Caroline Goddard (author of this article) all day long. People complain that Christians don't live Christian lives, and here is a family living right, standing for what they believe in, trusting each other, working together and setting a good example, and being mocked for it. They understand marriage is about putting the others' needs above your own and you openly put them down. Would you also ridicule Jim Bob's marriage advice about laying his life down to put his wife and family first?

So, it's seems to me that: 1. Michelle must submit to her husband's sexual desires. 2. No birth control due to religious reasons. 3. After illness of one child, death of another, Michelle will continue to try and get pregnant. 4. Michelle continues to have dead or ill children or she DIES in childbirth. 5. Is her husband's sexual needs more important than her children having a mother while growing up? She will be dead soon if she continues to have unprotected sex. Quit being so SELFISH. God doesn't like SELFISH! P.S. A baby doesn't need to eat every moment she's awake. Give her a few moments of mommy time other than on your breast, trying to make her go back to sleep ASAP.

I agree with Michele. It's EXACTLY how God wanted marriage! Obviously these days MOST people don't even OPEN their Bible (IF they have one) to even HEAR from GOD. That's why MOST people are going to Hell, anyway. NOT my opinion. It's in the BIBLE. Matthew 7:21, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that DOETH THE WILL OF MY FATHER which is in heaven.”

I am a very "modern" woman, I own my own business, work hard and am enjoying a wonderful marriage of 18 years with my husband. I find the tone of the writer of this article offensive but not Michelle Duggar's marital advice. She and Jim Bob seem pretty happy, people ask them for advice and she is telling everyone how she does it. More power to her and Jim Bob! It's wonderful to see people happy and in love. My relationship with my husband is more 50/50 and that works for us. I will also tell you that if you are married to a man who likes sex a lot and you deny him a lot, than he will be miserable. But if you take the time to meet his needs in this area he will appreciate it and in turn be the man of your dreams. This is a fact about men that women just don't want to accept, they are sexual beings and wives just need to give it up. We'd probably have a lot less road rage, war, and aggression if men got more sex! Also, I just don't understand why people have to tear down everyone else and criticize them at every opportunity. Michelle does not at all say "be totally submissive and don't make a move with asking first". Why even have such a negative and judgmental phrase as the Subtitle of this article? Why not just put the article out there without making such critical assumptions? Just let Michelle and Jim Bob have a happy marriage for God's sake, why try to tear it down?

Two things and most of you will not like either of them, but that's fine. Whether you like it or accept it or not does not detract from the fact that it is truth. Before I begin, no Michelle was not abused as a child. Her tone is low like that for real. One, her advice comes from the context of being in a loving relationship with both adults being Christians. Not "I go to church every once in a while "christian by title only" but someone that lives the principles of what Christians should reflect. Without that relationship with Christ, you will not only not understand her advice, but you will ridicule it. Two, submission has been taken by the modern world and twisted. Submission is not being a doormat for the man to walk all over you. Submission is not being passive and having no opinion of your own. Michelle's husband values her opinion, and they make decisions together. Submission is a means of the woman putting her husband first, just like the man should love his wife which means putting her first. Each caring for the other over themselves is how a marriage works. Being a "Modern woman" does not put you above having princples. Modern women that is a christian, loves the Lord, her husband and her children will fare much better than a "modern-feministic women" trying to do it on her own. Funny, instead of seeing the joy she has with her family, the fact that she is doing something none of you could do (raise a big family, teach them properly, and be a witness as a modern woman)...instead of saying "Good for her" you have to ridicule. Michelle would never say this, but I will. I hope you chock on your own pride.