At times like this, a girl's thoughts naturally turn to divorce. Don't get me wrong: I'm not keen on losing the co-parent just yet. My children are way too small to handle on my own. But it could be useful to know just how likely it is that he'll leave me. Or, for that matter, how likely it is that I will leave him. And, as we all know, if you need it, then the internet provides it: the good people at www.divorce360.com have a handy calculator to work out the odds of divorce.
The answer to its first question establishes your gender. Then, if you're a woman, the next question asks whether you have children. But, oddly, if you're a man, this question doesn't exist. I wasn't sure why children should affect one parent more than another.
Why have children not been factored into this quiz for men? Surely both partners contribute equally to, and are equally affected by, the making and raising of children? Surely. A little dumbfounded by the silliness of this, I browsed around for the answer to why children would affect one partner's marriage credentials more than another's. "Children throw a marriage out of whack," one wise person said on a marriage website. We know this.
Nothing is ever the same for anybody, man or woman , married or not, after a child is born. Once children enter the scene, and often the marital bed, there is no time, there is far less money, and there is often an end to a couple's romantic relationship. This, of course, could lead to all kinds of extra-mural activities, and often to divorce.
But back to the question of why having children is relevant to women and not to men in this calculator. Not, I hope, because of what some marital experts suggest. Women, they say, emotionally desert their husbands and "cleave" themselves to their children.
Nancy Cobb and Connie Grigsby, in their book The Politically Incorrect Wife, say that "to replace [your marital relationship with your relationship with your children] is to alter God's plan for your life".
I don't like the idea of somebody else planning my life. But I have to accept that for now, it is dictated by three small responsibilities. And for as long as they are small, there is little space in my life for the big, independent man who shares my home.
For now he'll have to hang in, as I do, and wait for some emotional space to be made available once the children's neediness eases up. There is little reason at this stage for me to want a divorce. The calculator depicts a less than 10% chance of my leaving, and a 10% chance of my husband leaving me.
But next year, on our 10th anniversary, if I have to hear that we've been married for "10 years each", I'll pack my bags immediately. A joke is funny once, if it's funny at all.