She Has It All, And Often Carries It Alone

I look at her at receptions. Composed, warm, fluent in the room. Amazing. She broke into a profession created for men, climbed through an institution that still rewards men more naturally, and got herself posted. Again and again. By every visible measure, she is the story of what is possible.

The having-it-all story is told about women like her, and she is living it. What the story omits is what all of it costs, and who is paying alongside her.

What the posting asks of her alone

Her male counterpart at the same mission did not have to negotiate his postings in the same way. His spouse often followed, adapted, built a life around his assignment. He may not carry the weight of what she gave up for him, or the guilt of being the reason she is there at all.

The female diplomat does. Always. She remembers exactly what he gave up for her to have this job. Her expectation of him does not go beyond support for the children. And she is grateful, extremely grateful, in a way her male colleagues simply are not. She knows that if he cannot cope, she likely goes to headquarters. Or loses him.

What the posting asks of him alone

Female spouses follow less automatically than they once did, but it is still the more socially acceptable choice. The household, the children, the school run: it maps onto existing expectations. Showing up at National Day receptions looks like support. Volunteering looks like initiative. She has peers in the same position and enough social permission to say, at least to her husband, when something is hard.

He has the same posting and the same routines, but on him they read differently. A man who left his career to follow his wife does not slot into an existing template. The community was not built for him, and there is rarely a peer group where he can admit that something bothers him. He chose this, and he would choose it again. But he is doing it without the infrastructure she would have had, and without the permission to say so.

What she can’t say and where it goes

She sees that he isn’t entirely fine. His look or sigh, that extra drink too often. She knows him well enough to hear what’s underneath that. And men in his position rarely ask for help, so he absorbs it, and everyone assumes he is fine.

But she is not everyone. She carries what she sees, admitting to no one "my husband is struggling." It’s her thought on the way home from the reception or on her tongue when she meets a trusted colleague. Yet, it rarely finds its way out because some things are too risky to say in diplomatic rooms. It stays with her and scares her, and hurts her.

She doesn’t have to carry it alone

The world has stopped pretending that having it all comes free for women. Diplomacy has not. It was built on one assumption: a man goes, and a spouse follows without complaint. Now the diplomat is a woman, and the institution expects the same silent, adjusting spouse. It asks this of a man who has even less to hold onto than the women before him. And both struggle.

They do not need to fix each other. They need to see what the posting is asking of them and face it together, before the silence decides it for them. If you are a female diplomat or a male spouse, both of your stories deserve to be heard.

Come over, I want to hear your story.

Photo by Aydin sefidi on Unsplash