“Breaking the Chains: The Perils of the Tradwife Dream and the Quest for Liberation”

As an individual compelled into a life I never desired, I am dismayed that women, now more empowered than ever, are opting for a life devoid of choice—constructing their own confinement.

Brides ought not to be contemplating schoolwork just before their nuptial ceremonies. Yet, when I entered into an arranged marriage with a 28-year-old unknown individual, I was merely a 17-year-old girl with a passion for her exclusive British school, her literature, and cricket. Consequently, I found myself preoccupied with a recent creative writing task: I had penned a narrative about a young woman adorned with jewelry shaped like snakes. I described how they inexplicably animated and slithered toward her throat, constricting her.

This tale would serve as a dismal precursor for the ensuing 12 years of my existence. 

Not long after our ceremony in the Middle East, my new spouse and I relocated to a suburb in Canada. I felt elated about the North American education he had assured me—perhaps, I mused, I could even pursue a career in medicine. However, everything shifted dramatically when I unexpectedly found myself pregnant. School was no longer an option for me, and gradually, through both insidious and subtle means, I forfeited more of my liberties: I could not leave the house, possess my own finances, or own a cellphone. When I raised concerns regarding my marriage, I was informed it was a woman’s fate, the decree of our deity. My aspirations, over time, became tainted, and I was engulfed by the conviction that if I failed to cater to my husband’s needs—ironing his shirts, preparing his meals, tending to the dishes—I would be deemed a failure as a wife and mother.

It didn’t take long for his verbal abuse to escalate into physical violence. He would grip my wrist and shove me; he’d strike me; he’d yank me by my hair and spit at me. On one occasion, he smashed a hole in the wall adjacent to my head and warned me, “Next time, it’s going to be you.” Another time, he picked up a knife and threatened to end my life, then his own. At a certain moment, I took a razor blade into the shower and contemplated self-harm, halting only when I heard my infant cry. Amidst all this turmoil, I became convinced that my misery was my responsibility.

Thus, believe me when I express that I understand what it means to live in a reality where women are stripped of their rights. Within my marriage—my “family”—I was essentially deprived of my freedoms.

Consider my astonishment when I became aware of the social media trend known as “tradwives”: influencers clad in beautiful gowns, cheerfully relinquishing their rights to serve their husbands. These women romanticize a nostalgic vision of America’s yesteryears that never genuinely occurred: a fictitious era where the husband was the wage earner and provider, while the wife was the dutiful homemaker and caregiver … as is instinctual, as God apparently intended.

As an individual compelled into an existence I did not choose, I find it disheartening that women, who are more empowered today than ever, are voluntarily embracing a lifestyle without freedoms—entombing themselves in a self-constructed prison.

Their endorsement—alongside the support of men who fetishize the so-called “traditions” that claim to restore America’s “greatness”—also facilitated Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Both the president-elect and his VP JD Vance have positioned themselves as advocates of “family values”—a vague rationalization rooted in the toxic notion that a woman’s role is confined to the domestic sphere.

 In my marriage—my ‘family’—I was effectively stripped of my freedoms. … The last thing we want is to be dragged back to the past and relitigate the battles we’ve already fought and won.

“If your perspective suggests that it’s detrimental for women to become mothers but liberating for them to toil 90 hours a week in an office at The New York Times or Goldman Sachs, you’ve been deceived,” Vance stated in 2022. Linking “family values” with nationalism forms the core of Project 2025, the conservative strategy asserting that “families consisting of a married mother, father, and their offspring are the bedrock of a well-structured nation and healthy society.”

I have witnessed the reality these individuals yearn for, where the man serves as the breadwinner, masculinity is portrayed as brawn, and dominance is equated with control. It’s an environment where women are docile and require protection—in Trump’s terms, “whether the women like it or not”—and where feminism is perceived as a danger to the family unit. It’s a reality that slowly pushes women backward.

I comprehend, from personal experience, what occurs when authority transforms into violence. I understand what it means to be monitored and to tread lightly to avoid upsetting a man’s emotions. I reside in Canada, where abortion is completely lawful and publicly funded, yet I also recognize what it feels like to perceive that you cannot obtain one. My daughters are the most precious gifts in my life, but having them at a young age had the potential to jeopardize my health; nevertheless, abortion never appeared as an option due to the stigma of faith and community expectations. However, I wish for my daughters to possess the autonomy to make choices if they ever find themselves in a similar predicament.

I reside in Canada, where abortion is completely lawful and publicly funded, yet I also recognize what it feels like to perceive that you cannot obtain one.

The ballots hadn’t even been entirely tallied in Pennsylvania when Nick Fuentes, a cartoonish villain white supremacist notorious for propagating hate speech, revelled in Trump’s victory on X by twisting a well-known feminist slogan. “Your body, my choice. Forever,” he tweeted. Perhaps more problematic, thousands of individuals promptly reshared or liked his post, quickly dismissing any backlash: Relax, can’t you take a joke? But it’s no joke.

Among those celebrating Trump’s triumph was a high-ranking official of the Taliban—the extremist group that has essentially silenced the voices and rights of Afghan women—boasting that “Americans are not prepared to entrust the leadership of their esteemed country to a woman.”

I have existed in the reality these individuals desire. You would not want it.

However, I can also assert that Fuentes is mistaken when he claims it’s eternal. When you find yourself ensnared in that reality, devoid of your rights, it can seem as though despair is consuming you. But there is always a way forward.

I dedicated my evenings to studying diligently to finalize my high school education. Following the birth of my second daughter, I earned an undergraduate degree, then a master’s in economics, graduating at the top of my class, and worked for years at one of Canada’s largest banks. Then, motivated to assist others on their own paths of recovery and informed by my own encounters, I completely shifted tracks to chase my childhood aspiration of becoming a doctor at one of the world’s premier medical institutions.

Now, through my work in psychiatry, I comprehend that we do not completely move on from trauma; rather, we progress alongside it—and that our ability to heal is even greater and more formidable than the gravest events we endure. Women grasp this concept better than most, as we are consistently advancing. The last thing we desire is to be pulled back to the past and rehash the struggles we have successfully faced and overcome.

I have fought vigorously in my own existence to ensure I could make my own decisions, and so my daughters could do the same. The crux is in choice—it is as vital as breathing. We must not allow that essential aspect to be stifled by those intent on dragging us back.