On the other hand, an enduring couple should never be totally dependent on their children or their shared project as a way of keeping themselves together. Typically, when this is the case the parents are lousy parents and the children are left with a legacy of guilt and resentment, or the partners are lousy business people who soon burn out or use the project to enact (though rarely resolve) their own domestic problems. Nevertheless, the children or project can be a wonderful focal point for the shared aspirations and values of a couple.
Bessy and Bill keep bringing up words like protection, safety, security, responsibility and pride in their child-rearing when talking about their relationship. They have created a life that embodies all of these values, specifically with regard to their role as parents. Bessy’s interest in and connection to child rearing provides continuity in their relationship. The interviewer suggested that Bessy and Bill’s own personal need for protection, safety, security and shared responsibility is the key to their mutual interest in these values. In seeking security and safety for their own children, Bessy and Bill are creating a home that is safe and secure for themselves.
The problem that Bessy and Bill must face in a few years concerns the termination of their primary role as parents. Their children will be leaving home and they must directly address the issue of safety and security, rather than working on it indirectly through their children. Bessy and Bill have already begun to take constructive steps. Bessy has begun to meet regularly with a group of women friends, and Bill has a sailboat to which he devotes an increasing amount of time. They are both quite involved in their work outside the home as well, though there is not a very good match in this regard. At this point, Bessy is looking forward to having more time to put into her job and Bill is hoping for early retirement.
Bessy talked a bit about other people, suggesting there is something “weird” about Bill having a boat which is not a part of her life. Then Bill said, “My Dad had a shop. He’d go out and work in the shop. My Mother never entered that shop.” What will become of this couple after their child leaves home? What will be their common, shared purpose? When asked about their hopes and dreams for the future, when their child is gone, Bessy spoke of having the opportunity to work fifty to sixty hours a week if she wants 50, while Bill wonders how to incorporate sailing and traveling with Bessy (who gets sea sick). As they both spoke about their different ideas for the future, they showed little concern for any problems of working out a life that could be increasingly separate.
