The Washington Post's "Ask Amy" columnist recently doled out some harsh words to a cohabiting couple who were wondering if it was couth to ask for money in lieu of wedding presents. (Answer: It is not.)

In some cultures, brides and grooms are traditionally given cash at the wedding. I can see how fetching that idea is to you, but if this is not your cultural tradition, and if asking outright makes you squirm, there is a fair chance it would make your family and friends uncomfortable too.

You've been living together for many years. You've flouted marriage tradition and enjoyed the benefits of cohabitation. Perhaps you could also reject the tradition of expecting gifts to establish a household you already maintain.

It is not your guests' job to help you recoup the cost of the wedding. Your wedding should be a gift from you to your friends and family, who will share this day with you. You shouldn't have a larger wedding than you can afford.

Ouch. But this makes sense.

We, too, got married after three years of living together and grappled with some wedding traditions. Because we had our ceremony in El Salvador, we decided we did not want to lug back a bunch of gifts to California. We actually wrote "no gifts, please" on our wedding invitations, although DH's family insisted on giving us presents since they had no traveling expenses. They gave us typical art and relics from El Salvador, which we so appreciate eight years later.

How did you handle gift-giving and some of the more traditional aspects of the wedding? What did you change? What was unique about your ceremony?

The good thing about getting married in El Salvador in 2000 was how affordable it was. We were able to pay for airfare, hire one of the best salsa bands in the country, have a fireworks display, and a tasty buffet for well under $10,000. Then again, my free wedding planner, dear mother-in-law, was quite resourceful!

Wow, it must be summer as there is nothing but dreary puff pieces in the news. Newsweek's Lorraine Ali reported that parents are not as happy as non-parents, but there is a lot of nuance in this article I agree with:

Is it possible that American parents have always been this disillusioned? Anecdotal evidence says no. In pre-industrial America, parents certainly loved their children, but their offspring also served a purpose—to work the farm, contribute to the household. Children were a necessity. Today, we have kids more for emotional reasons, but an increasingly complicated work and social environment has made finding satisfaction far more difficult. A key study by University of Wisconsin-Madison's Sara McLanahan and Julia Adams, conducted some 20 years ago, found that parenthood was perceived as significantly more stressful in the 1970s than in the 1950s; the researchers attribute part of that change to major shifts in employment patterns. The majority of American parents now work outside the home, have less support from extended family and face a deteriorating education and health-care system, so raising children has not only become more complicated—it has become more expensive. Today the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that it costs anywhere from $134,370 to $237,520 to raise a child from birth to the age of 17—and that's not counting school or college tuition. No wonder parents are feeling a little blue.

Yes! This is what gets me: Everyone likes to point out how miserable parents are, but no one is willing to lend a hand -- unless there is payment involved. Thankfully, I can afford the occasional babysitter, which is saving my marriage. But what if you can never leave your home? Of course parenting isn't bliss!

I would disagree with this paragraph in the story though, only because I do believe the lack of help -- a "village" -- is what is ailing parents -- not the fact they have kids:

Societal ills aside, perhaps we also expect too much from the promise of parenting. The National Marriage Project's 2006 "State of Our Unions" report says that parents have significantly lower marital satisfaction than nonparents because they experienced more single and child-free years than previous generations. Twenty-five years ago, women married around the age of 20, and men at 23. Today both sexes are marrying four to five years later. This means the experience of raising kids is now competing with highs in a parent's past, like career wins ("I got a raise!") or a carefree social life ("God, this is a great martini!"). Shuttling cranky kids to school or dashing to work with spit-up on your favorite sweater doesn't skew as romantic.

I don't know. I felt that the puke on my favorite shirts humbled me and I love my children more than any other accomplishment in my life -- which leads me to the often underreported aspect of this story. While the study in question reported that parents experienced "lower levels of emotional well-being, less frequent positive emotions and more frequent negative emotions than their childless peers," it also stated that parents felt a greater sense of purpose and meaning in their lives than their child-free peers. Said Ali:

And there are other rewarding aspects of parenting that are impossible to quantify. For example, I never thought it possible to love someone as deeply as I love my son. As for (Ali's childhood childless neighbors) the Sloans, it's hard to say whether they had a less meaningful existence than my parents, or if my parents were 7 percent less happy than the Sloans. Perhaps it just comes down to how you see the candy dish—half empty or half full. Or at least as a parent, that's what I'll keep telling myself.

What do you think? Have your relationships or happiness suffered because of children? Please take our own internal poll!

Charla Muller made her husband Brad an offer he couldn't refuse:
one whole year of daily lovemakingas his 40th birthday present.

"This is something no one else would give him," she said in an interview. "It didn’t cost a lot of money. It was highly memorable. It met all the criteria for a really great gift."

Brad was less than fully enthusiastic, mostly because, he says, his wife often has big ideas and poor follow-through. After all, she hadn’t been especially generous in that department since they’d had their two children. He paid closer attention when he realized that she was serious.

She followed through, all right, and even wrote a book about their journey titled "365 Nights."

Another couple from Colorado has written a book about their 101-night sexual marathon. Their title? "Just Do It."

And were it not for her competitive zeal, their streak might have died well short of 100 days. Annie even forced her husband to have sex during a bout of vertigo. "I’m not a quitter,’ she said. "The night he had vertigo, I said, ‘I’m sorry, guy, but you’ve got to keep going.’ "

Doug said in an interview that on their 101st day, he felt "sort of like you had some long-forgotten appointment to hear some tax attorney talk about estate planning."

After that, he said, "I think we didn’t do it for a month."

I was a latch-key kid from the time I was 10 years old. I would come home from school and watch TV or do homework until my parents came home about two hours later. But sometimes, the phone would be ringing when I walked through the door.

It was my mom.

“Mija, can you check the mailbox? If there’s a bill from JC Penney, HIDE IT.”

Other times she would ask me to throw suspicious packages in a closet. My mom wasn’t a compulsive shopper and she wasn’t in danger of bankrupting our family; but for some reason, she couldn’t bring herself to be honest with my father about her purchases. So she preferred to hide and lie and obfuscate...and make her 10-year-old daughter an accessory.

Turns out this unfortunate habit has a name: financial infidelity. Lying to your spouse about your spending habits is dangerous, according to the couples therapist interviewed in this eyebrow-raising Wall Street Journal piece. And often times it is symptomatic of much deeper issues.

The newlywed woman interviewed in the segment is astonishing. She freely admits to shopping at her favorite boutique at least twice a week, asking the salesgirl to cut off the tags and put the item in her purse so she doesn’t come home carrying shopping bags. She says she lies so much and so often that she can’t keep track of it all.

She also says she shops out of revenge– like the time her husband came home with some pants and shoes for himself, and she went on a huge shopping spree because, she reasoned, “What about me?”

My mother still hides purchases from my father, like the new Coach bag I complimented her on recently. “Oh, it’s not new, I’ve had this for a while,” she claimed, casting a telling sidelong glance at my dad. Oops. I’m guessing that after all these years, it’s tough to break the habit of lying.

I do the exact opposite: I am completely open about everything I buy and confer with my husband before any purchase over $100, even though I am the one who balances our checkbook and pays the bills. I think financial infidelity can lead to distrust and deception, but mostly I refuse to feel like a misbehaving little girl just because I want to buy something. Money has so much power over us already– why grant it even more?

What about you? Have you or your partner ever been guilty of financial infidelity? Any tips on how to deal with money in order to avoid marriage counseling?

Crossposted at The Mom Blog.

A very happy wedding day to Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon, who will marry today at 5:01 p.m. Pacific, after waiting over 50 years. Two other plaintiffs in the marriage case, Robin Tyler and Diane Olson, who got the ball rolling for the lawsuit when they were denied a marriage license at the Beverly Hills Courthouse in 2004, will also get their license tonight in the selfsame city. (Martin and Lyon will receive theirs in San Francisco from Mayor Gavin Newsom.)

Marriage is all over the news and likely to remain so all week. I particularly like this article on New York Governor David Patterson, and the straight people who are thanking him on behalf of their daughters and sons for his recognition of out-of-state wedded same-sex couples. I also think it's cool that the California ruling is boosting the sales of a company that makes same-sex cake toppers. (The company was started several years ago by an African American woman who could not find a cake-couple for herself and her fiance, a Japanese American man.)

Lest we forget, too: marriage isn't the solution for everyone. Read Nancy Polikoff's well reasoned Beyond (Straight and Gay) Marriage: Valuing All Families under the Law for a look at why we also need to be thinking about recognizing other forms of committed relationships.

Finally, the title of this post is not just a comment on geography, but a nod to Katherine Lee Bates, author of "America the Beautiful," who lived for 25 years with fellow Wellesley College professor Katherine Coman in what is commonly called a “Boston marriage.” (When students and alumnae sing this song at Wellesley, we always change the last line of the first verse to ". . . and crown thy good with sisterhood.") As we move forward into a future of increasing equality, it's good not to forget the past.

Congratulations to all the same-sex couples about to marry!

Mildred Loving, a black woman whose marriage to a white man led to the seminal U.S. Supreme Court that overturned Virginia's ban on interracial marriage, died today at age 68. NPR has a good interview with her from last year, on the 40th anniversary of the Court's case. Pam at the Blend observes that Loving is also a beacon of hope for supporters of same-sex marriage:

Those of us eagerly waiting for the day when same-sex marriage is finally legalized across the land owe a debt of gratitude to Mildred Loving, whose 1967 case (Loving v. Virginia) resulted in a landmark Supreme Court decision that broke down a major social and legal barrier  - interracial marriage.

A moment of silence for a woman who once said she wasn't trying to change history; she just fell in love.

(Crossposted at Mombian.)

Wow...This conjured mixed feelings but I thought that this would be an interesting read. (Long-but well worth it.)

The author seems to be making a case for settling for a man who is "good enough" - while you are young and still actually appealing to men.

I bolded the more "interesting" statements...

Yikes!

When I was in the 4th Grade I was on this Oldies kick that had me sailing past a lot of the New Kids On the Block songs and grooving with my grandpa to some fun tunes. One of my shameful favorites? Jimmy Soul's "If You Want To Be Happy"

If you wanna be happy for the rest of your life
Never make a pretty woman your wife
So from my personal point of view
Get an ugly girl to marry you

Don't let your friends say you have no taste
Go ahead and marry anyway
Though her face is ugly, her eyes don't match
Take it from me, she's a better catch

Cracks me up. Well according to the Daily News, it's the opposite that's true.

Editor's Note: This is one of two stories on the same theme. Check out Dana's response just below. -Elisa

I do not read Slate’s “Dear Prudence” column on a regular basis, but I was disappointed at her personal vendetta against single mothers. In case you missed it, she recently went on a tangent on how single mothers are hurting their children, calling single parenthood a "national catastrophe." (Hey, with the Iraq War and impending recession, this would not top my list of concerns. But there you go!)

Studies have found that children born to single mothers are vastly more likely to be poor, have behavioral and psychological problems, drop out of high school, and themselves go on to have out-of-wedlock children.

While I do not doubt that a disproportionate number of single mothers live in poverty -- who the heck can afford to live on one income anymore? -- it is important to note that the mothers in question are already poor. Many have no college educations and were already living in poverty before their baby’s daddy came along. The fathers are also poor. My conclusion would be vastly different from Prudie’s: These children are poor because their parents are poor. Period. It is overly simplistic to solely blame the mother’s marital status.

Also, I am a big fan of the institution of marriage for the emotional security and financial perks it offers. But the last thing I would do to a sister or friend is encourage her to marry a guy she does not get along with or might be in trouble with the law or be in such bad financial straits it actually holds her back.  

I was chagrined that Prudie dismissed all this, saying she cheered on the ultrasound technician in the movie Juno for making disparaging remarks about children born into these circumstances.

Since many working-class men do not offer the financial stability they used to provide, women see little incentive to marry them. As (Sen. Barack) Obama said, "[M]any black men simply cannot afford to raise a family." (The out-of-wedlock birthrate among black Americans is close to 70 percent.) I'm trying to follow the logic here. I can understand that a woman looking to get married may decide that a man is such a poor economic prospect that he's not husband material (even if a husband with a low income is better than no husband and no income). But how then is that same man, or a string of them, worthy of fathering her children?

That’s right. Shame these women into becoming better mothers. Way to go, Prudie!

Except for Obama’s mother, she conveniently never mentioned the many single mothers who manage to raise successful children, probably because the economics at play would defeat her argument. Single mothers like Obama’s mother who had her parents nearby to help or celebrity moms like Angelina Jolie who have money to hire nannies don’t seem to have trouble raising well-adjusted children. I suspect it has to do with the fact they had resources to raise their children, more so than their marital status.

Rather than continue to kick down low-income single mothers who are already in the hole, may I suggest a hand-up? Prudie’s column could have been a call for universal healthcare, scientifically-based sex education in high schools or funds for high-quality childcare to help out single mothers. Instead, we were subjected to this clueless dribble.

Being a Midwesterner, I am not much for the New York Politics, but who DOESN'T know the saga of Gov. Spitzer by now? 17 Diamond rated hooker, $5.5K an hour- it couldn't be juicier, you know?

And with it? Comes the Wife Bashing of 2008. I'm not going to go on and on about how much I pity Silda Spitzer and her plight- I don't know her, the dynamic she had with her husband, what she's thinking right now or what's influencing her decisions. What I do know is that issue? Ain't really the story here. But as we're into day 2 of this thing, it's inevitable- the flaying of the wife is afoot.

Anyone else see this article in  Atlantic Monthly this month?  In it, the author makes the argument for "settling" in order to get married.  Parts of the article sound more tongue-in-cheek than real

And all I can say is, if you say you’re not worried, either you’re in denial or you’re lying. In fact, take a good look in the mirror and try to convince yourself that you’re not worried, because you’ll see how silly your face looks when you’re being disingenuous.

 But the overall theme is provacative - can an over-romatic view of love and marriage prevent us from finding life partners?

Editor's note: I apologize in advance if this post is TMI for anyone! I just thought with Valentine's Day coming up, it might be interesting to, in the words of Salt 'N Pepa, "talk about sex." -Erika

I love those goofy surveys that always seem to come out around Christmas or Valentine's Day and unearth some surprising information.

This survey, from a British electronics retailer, claims that almost half of men in the U.K. would give up sex for 6 months in exchange for a 50-inch plasma TV. Interestingly, just a third of women surveyed said they would forgo the nookie.

This, to me, proves just one thing: men are WAY more into fancy TVs than women are.

I asked my husband if he would give up 6 months of sex for a TV. "No way," he said without hesitation. Then again, he already has a 46-inch HDTV, so that wouldn't be much of an upgrade.

So I decided to raise the stakes: would he do it for a cool $1 million?

After a moment of consideration, his first question: "Could I masturbate?"

Then another: "While you lie naked next to me?"

For argument's sake I said no. No orgasms for 6 months. He grudgingly said yes, while admitting that we would probably be on the brink of divorce by the end of the experiment.

That may seem drastic, but I believe him.

We've been married 10 years and together for 11, but my husband's libido hasn't waned one bit. If a week goes by without some form of intimacy, he feels rejected and goes from mild-mannered to short-tempered. For him, sex is a deep expression of love, and I have learned to accept and respect that as best I can.

Believe me, I'm no Ayelet Waldman. It can be challenging to find the time and energy for sex when you work full-time and are raising a young child, but we do our best. We drop the kid off at Grandma's for the night and occasionally spend a night or two away. We arrange sitters so we can go watch a movie and occasionally, I will play hooky on a day when Maya is in preschool so me and the hubby can spend a quiet day together.

This article listed some tips on how to keep sex alive after kids. They won't work for everyone but I thought this would be an interesting discussion here on MotherTalkers:

How important are romance and sex after parenthood? How often are you getting busy? And what would YOU want in exchange for giving up 6 months of sex?

I'll go first: we probably average 2 to 3 times per week. And $1 million is about the only thing that would inspire me to go without...mostly because I believe the financial security will make me more relaxed, and will mean more sex in the long run. :-)

As for that survey, here's a funny tidbit: just 25 percent of respondents would give up cigarettes or chocolate for a plasma set.

Which means for Brits at least, Marlboros and Milky Ways beat out makin' whoopee.