I found this excerpt at Ummah.com, its from a book about the supposedly ideal Muslim woman according to the Quran & hadiths, they speak of this woman Umm Sulaym as the ideal.
The IDEAL MUSLIMAH
The True Islamic Personality of the Muslim Woman
as Defined in the Qur'an and Sunnah
By Dr. Muhammad ?Ali Al-Hashimi
Translated by Nasiruddin Al-Khattab and Revised by Ibrahim
M. Kunna and Abu Aya Sulaiman Abdus-Sabur T
he Ideal Muslimah: the true Islamic personality of the Muslim woman as defined in the Qur'an and Sunnah
The Ideal Muslimah is proud of the great position that Islam has given her among humanity. She performs her duties knowing that her role is clearly defined and that her rights are still, even today, greater than any other ideology has provided. She is a woman of moral excellence, true to her nature, not confused by alien and morally bankrupt ideas. She preserves her self-respect and dignity through her piety in obedience to Allah (swt) and His Messenger (saw). She is the role model that every true believer hopes to emulate.
CHAPTER 4: THE MUSLIM WOMAN AND HER HUSBANDShe endears herself to her husband and is keen to please him
The true Muslim woman is always keen to win her husband's love and to please him. Nothing should spoil his happiness or enjoyment of life. So she speaks kind words to him, and refrains from saying anything hurtful or upsetting. She brings him good news, but she keeps bad news from him as much as she can, or postpones telling it until a more suitable time when it will not upset him so much.
If she finds that she has no alternative but to tell him upsetting news, she looks for the most suitable way to convey it, so that the blow will not be so hard on him. This is the wise approach and good conduct of the clever woman, but it is very difficult to attain and only a very few virtuous women ever do so. One of those who did reach this high level was the
great Muslim woman Umm Sulaym bint Milhan, the wife of Abu Talhah al-Ansari. Her son passed away whilst Abu Talhah was travelling, and her attitude was so unique that if Imam Muslim had not reported this story we would have taken it to be a mere myth. Let us hear her son Anas ibn Malik tell the story of his remarkable mother and her unattitude:
"A son of Abu Talhah by Umm Sulaym died.
Umm Sulaym told her family, `Do not tell Abu Talhah about his son until I tell him about it.' Abu Talhah came home, so she prepared dinner for him, and he ate and drank. Then she beautified herself in a way that she had never done before, and he had sexual intercourse with her. When she saw that he was satisfied, she said, `O Abu Talhah, do you think that if a people lent something to a household, then asked for it back, do they have the right not to return it?' He said, `No.'
She said, `Then resign yourself to the death of your son.' Abu Talhah became angry and said, `You let me indulge myself and then you tell me about my son!' He went to the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) and told him what had happened. The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said, `May Allah bless both of you for this night!' Umm Sulaym became pregnant. The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) went on a journey, and she accompanied him. Whenever the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) came back from a journey, he never entered Madinah at night. When they (the travelling-party) approached Madinah, her labour-pains started. Abu Talhah stayed with her, and the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) went on ahead to Madinah. Abu Talhah said, `O Lord, You know how I love to go out with Your Messenger when he goes out, and to come back with him when he comes back, and I have been detained, as You see.' Umm Sulaym said, `O Abu Talhah, I do not feel as much pain as I did before, so let us go on.' When they reached (Madinah), her labour-pains started again, and she gave birth to a boy. My mother said to me, `O Anas, nobody should feed him until you take him to the Messenger of Allah in the morning.' So when morning came, I took the baby to the Messenger of Allah (PBUH), and when I met him he was carrying an iron tool. When he saw me, he said, `I hope that Umm Sulaym has given birth.' I said, `Yes.' So he put down the tool and I brought the child to him and placed him in his lap. The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) called for some of the dates of Madinah. He chewed it until it became soft, then he put it in the baby's mouth and the baby began to smack his lips. The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) said: `See how much the Ansar love dates!' Then he wiped the baby's face and named him `Abdullah."*
How great was Umm Sulaym's faith, and how magnificent her patience and virtue! How bravely she hid her pain from her husband and endeared herself to him. She managed to conceal her grief at the loss of her beloved son and spent that time with her husband patiently hoping that by being a good wife to her husband she might earn the pleasure of Allah (SWT).
*Sahih Muslim, 16/11, Kitab fada'il al-Sahabah, bab fada'il Umm Sulaym.
Their son died, she cooked for him & they had sex, then she told him, but why?
What good would concealing her grief to this extent do? Rather, they could've shared the grief, cried together
, that would've lessened their sorrows. And whatever love she felt for her husband, does she not love her departed son? Do his parents have to have sex before they cry over his death? This is slightly disrespectful of the child's death, sex should've been postponed.
Anyway, the man wasn't particularly happy with the way he'd been told the news, which is why he rebuked his wife with-"You let me indulge myself and then you tell me about my son!" I would've said the same thing if my (hypothetical) husband had revealed news to me in this way.
The man wasn't old & sick anyway
that he'd get a heart attack on hearing this news, so why not reveal it to him without all this fuss?
Topic: Umm Sulaym bint Milhan-The Ideal Muslimah!