Ahh! The fairytale of Happily Ever After! Growing up in a divorced household in the 70’s and 80’s I will tell you that I witnessed my mother go through literal hell and almost into the depths of insanity and disparity.
Ladies, you think we’ve come a long way? Think again! Women’s inequality has always stemmed from internalized sexism, but I will save that for a later date and just give you a prime example. My mother, like most of us women believe … fell for that media and religious driven age old message given to women before they are able to walk … Prince Charming will take care of me and our children and treat me like a queen.
My mother found herself at the age of 30 with two small daughters and pregnant with me when my cheating, deadbeat, alcoholic, abusive father walked out. She had no financial stability, no clue about finances, no education and no emotional support. It seems once responsibility set in for my father, like so many “man children”, he ran from anything remotely considered responsibility.
Let’s face it. There are so many real men out there but too often women choose poorly and raise their sons to be “man children”. We will save that topic for a different day, too.
The wives in my mother’s neighborhood that were once her friends quickly dumped her and shut her out of their lives for fear she would move in on their husbands. Women that once cherished my mother’s support and friendship behaved cruelly toward her.
I remember my mother telling me a story that she was shoveling snow when she was 7 months pregnant with me. The neighbor husband and wife were walking into their home at the time. The neighbor husband noticed her exhaustion. Once good friends of hers the husband was about to come shovel for my mother when his wife called to him, “Jim … ah? You are needed in the house”! Tail between his legs, Jim walked into his wife’s house. My mother remarked, “The last damn thing I need is another child husband”.
My mother so desperately wanted to be a mother but she became so depressed and despondent and on top of that was forced to work two jobs to make sure her children had food, clothes and a roof over their heads. Overwhelmed and exhausted she became the walking dead that resemble most single mothers we still see today.
Again, not much has changed for our single mothers today. In fact, things are much, much worse because the economy and our lack of community support make it almost impossible for women to get ahead.
So the cycle of hell for our youth and the destroying of our women continues. And we do nothing about it as a society.
I want to introduce you to a woman who has beat the odds of being a single mother and becoming one of the most inspirational women that I know.
Better still, she lives right here in Milwaukee. Doris Appelbaum is a pioneer for all women. As such, we couldn’t fit all of her accomplishments into one series. Her story is the precursor to her accomplished company, Appelbaum’s Resume Professionals, Inc. In Part Two we will walk you through her unique style and I will become her client. Appelbaum will work my resume over and teach us all what women need to do in order to become independent and powerful members in our society.
Appelbaaum’s story is a testament to her “no holds barred” can do attitude. Pay attention, ladies. Listen real close. Doris believes we all can really do it.
If it is one thing I can impress upon women is that we must never allow ourselves to become dependent on any man. This is not a bad thing when I say this. This is a healthy thing. When young women decide to marry we should enter into our marriages with a business plan and an exit plan. Marriage is never a guarantee.
*Applebaum was an honor graduate of Hofstra University in New York with a BA in English/Journalism at the age of 19½ and a MS in Secondary Education 5 years later. Her original profession was high school English teacher (1957-1958) in a suburban Long Island school, the one from which she graduated. She and her then husband had three male children in the next five years, the first of which was a Rubella baby and is currently living in a group home in New York. He is legally deaf, blind, and developmentally disabled but attends the Helen Keller Institute in Hempstead, New York.
The marriage took the young family to Cleveland, Philadelphia, and Cherry Hill, NJ before the family moved to Milwaukee. During those years, Appelbaum continued to work in the field of education, both as a part-time teacher, placement director, and career counselor. In 1971, Appelbaum made a dramatic career change and took employment with Secretaries/Resumes Unlimited. When the business was sold three years later, all employees were replaced and Appelbaum found herself with a new skill set and no place to take it. In 1975, with the assistance of Van B. Hooper, Appelbaum’s Resume Professionals, Inc. was founded as the second resume writing service in Milwaukee. In 1979, she divorced and became a single parent of two teen age boys.
Her employment history also includes 15 years with the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (concurrent with the business). They terminated her employment in 1997. After a long and painful legal battle, she won an age discrimination lawsuit against MMSD in Milwaukee Federal Court and an appeal in the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago (six years total).
A frequent speaker, trainer, and workshop presenter, Appelbaum has made presentations to the military on several bases, at the Department of Defense in Virginia, various colleges and universities, associations of commerce, Mensa Regional Gatherings, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Career Fairs, New York City’s Job Expo IV, Women for Hire in Chicago, and many more. She delivered a seminar at the 440th Airlift Wing in Milwaukee in October, 2005. Her resumes have been published in 5 books.
Between January, 2000 and November, 2004, Appelbaum was the primary caregiver for her mother who suffered from Alzheimer’s Disease. She took facilitator training from the Alzheimer’s Association and co-facilitated a support group. In her “spare” time, she helped in her grandson’s classroom once a week, took the toddler grandson to “Story Time,” and modeled costumes for The Milwaukee Repertory Theater. She is a member of a social Broadway Musicals Theater Group, Granville-Brown Deer Chamber of Commerce, Focus, Human Resources Management Association, Friends of the Milwaukee Rep (model), and Mensa. Her volunteer contributions extend over 20 years in civic, social, professional, political, and religious organizations.
The former host of Career Quest and Career Fair on the Air, Appelbaum has been a guest expert on numerous radio and television shows. She was a columnist for Transition Assistance Online, About Military.com, Military Wives Ezine, Wijobs.com,andMilwaukeeJobs.com. Her articles have also appeared in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The Business Journal, The Military Times – Second Careers, Life after Service, IT Recruiter, North Shore Lifestyle, Employment Times, Military Spouse Magazine, The Scholar, and many other publications. She has also been quoted in numerous newspapers and has provided placement services on college and high school levels.*
(*written by Doris Appelbaum)
1. Melanie: How did you cope when you realized you were trapped in an unhappy marriage and financially handicapped with small children? So many women go into marriage for love. They trap themselves and rely on their husbands to financially take care of them and their children. Then, many women wake up to realize that they have done their very best, worked themselves to the bone, and rarely did their husbands contribute anything to their lives or their children’s lives but a paycheck and “fun.” (not discipline)
Doris: Well, I didn’t cope. I drank too much trying to soften the pain and vented with friends. It was a nightmare until one day I woke up. I found a counselor, stopped drinking and went “on the wagon” for three years.
There was an irony that my counselor was a Lutheran Minister and I am Jewish. After three years of being alcohol free, I decided that I would test to see if I was really an alcoholic. I learned that my drinking was a symptom of stress. So, I feel very lucky to enjoy a drink now and then.
2. Melanie: Is it extremely important for women to stay in the workforce even if they are stay at home mothers?
Doris: Extremely important. I don’t know who put this “finding the prince” in the heads of these young girls but that is just not reality. Marriage is a partnership and must be treated as such. I have seen far too many women’s lives destroyed because they buy into this imaginary fairytale that a man will treat them like princesses and they will be taken care of forever - free to dote over their children and shop in expensive stores. . They place all of their trust in their husbands and then - “bam” - they wake up one day to find that the fairytale never existed.
Women need their own credit cards and checking accounts. Women must get college educations and/or degrees and acquire a solid career before they even think about having children. Women must get a grasp of the family finances. When are they going to get that?
3. Melanie: When you realized you had to end the marriage… did he help you financially?
Doris: He made it very difficult for me. There was no 50/50 law in place at the time. He moved out of state. There was no way for me to collect child support money or garnish his wages over state lines in the 1970’s. I was lucky that I had managed all the finances. I am a child of Depression-era parents. As much as I am a free spirit, I know better than to give up control to just stay home and be the housewife. I stayed active in volunteer organizations and stayed current in life events. My life was hard. From 1975 to 1997 I held two jobs. I worked for the MMSD during the day and ran my business on evenings and weekends. I sued the MMSD for age discrimination, and I won. My inner circle told me to give up, but it was the principle. It was never about the money. It was about the injustice of age discrimination. It was about people’s rights. If you Google my name, I pop up under at least six law firms as an example.
4. Melanie: What was it like being a single working mother in your era? On a scale of 1-10 … how hard was it?
Doris: It was an 11. I was such a minority and felt isolated by other women. I had one best friend but she was out of state. I did have my mother. Yet, she was old school and thought I should stay with my husband, put up with the issues and work it out. It was awful.
5. Melanie: What do you want young women to know before they get married?
Doris: More than anything you have to listen to your own complaints. So, you call your girlfriend and complain … However, men in your life are not going to change unless they want to. And, even then the odds are low. You can’t change anyone. Smart women look for men who will constantly evolve along with them … not men that they have to drag along and that act like children.
6. Melanie: Do you think women should aspire to be stay at home mothers? Is it safe?
Doris: NEVER!!!!! It is never safe to let go of your livelihood or career. How many women do we have to see go through financial crisis? Being financially stable is life support!!! You do it as a team; the love life, the house, the finances, the kids … everything. I also suggest premarital counseling. Don’t make a move until you know that you will handle life’s challenges together.
Women must stop thinking they can depend on others to take care of them. Too many women wake up in nightmare marriages with nowhere to run.
7: Why is society teaching our young women to be dependent on men?
Doris: That is one of the biggest flaws in society … it is what our media does to women of all ages and women, who are 90% the consumers, continue to allow this. I want to tell our girls and women “Just Do It”. Get away from “What If” and focus on “Why Not”!
Surround yourself with positive people, upbeat reciprocal people who carry a healthy set of ethics. Get rid of toxic people when you notice them. Toxic people creep in, but once you notice them - just wash your hands of them. This will always get you places and help you reach your goals.
Some people say I fit in the category of a “bitch”. I used to get really upset about that until I turned “bitch” into an acronym. Now if I am called a “bitch” I consider it a badge of honor. To me “bitch” means “Babe In Total Control of Herself”! And, that is exactly what I have become.
