Page:The Art of Helping People Out of Trouble (1924).pdf/211

 made to a man who, while his wife was ill in a hospital, asked:

"What about my wife? Must I still stay with that woman?"

"Would you go and leave her now that she's sick?" said the social worker.

"I don't like her and I don't want to stay with her."

"Does it mean nothing to you that she is the mother of all your children?" was the reply. "Think what she has endured to bring them into the world and what it has meant to her to take care of them. You wouldn't want people to say, 'There goes Hansen. Look at the kind of man he is. He just walked off and left his wife and family.

A simple appeal of this sort to a man's pride is obviously not alone enough to solve a problem of maladjustment between husband and wife. There were many other things that needed to be done, but the use of this motive was not without its effect, as was also a reference to the welfare of his children.

"If you and your wife quarrel, your children can't be happy. You must find a way to be happy yourself if you want to have a happy home."