The first use of “trailing spouse” appeared in print in the 1981 Wall Street Journal article “Problems of Two-Career Families Start Forcing Businesses to Adapt,” written by reporter Mary Bralove. (An amazingly strange last name.) “By far the majority of those ‘trailing spouses’ are women. The Catalyst report finds that wives tend to relocate for their husbands’ careers. In most cases, such moves are decided by whose salary is higher,” she wrote. It’s true we are moving for his academic career. But I am not a wife. I am not moving because J’s salary is higher. Although it is also true that I do
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