Men Step Up

[chaz345]

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[Conservativation]

What book or who was the author? And more importantly how long ago was it written? I'm asking because while I've seen the idea that men will tend to do that, I've never seen anything saying that it's OK.

Follow her links, its all there.

 

[chaz345]

Follow her links, its all there.

I started but didn't read the whole link. Are there actual, in context quotes of the book or is the thread just reactions to what was heard, not necessarily what was said?

 

[Conservativation]

Some interesting comments about men stepping up, and the expectation thing I keep mentioning.

It may take 2 or 3 posts to list it all, its a bunch of new data and such about expectations and what maybe this emotional aspect of men (stepping up) COULD look like and how a therapy culture (note the instant -get counseling- advice here) that has led to the "gotta talk about it" as salient advice:

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There is barely a man alive who does not dread the moment when he hears these words: "We need to talk about our relationship."

He feels as though he is being thrown onto a stage, handed a microphone, and told to start reciting his lines. Only, he does not know what his lines are. He does not even know the name of the play. But he knows that he is supposed to perform, and that if he gets it wrong he is going to start having some serious problems.

Susannah Breslin raises the issue at The Frisky, and concludes that talking it over is not necessarily the best approach to relationship harmony. Link here. Breslin prescribes less talk and more action. No man is going to object to that.

Dr. Helen Smith then picked up the question on her blog. She explained that she finds relationship talk discomfiting. And rightly so. If you put your partner in an uncomfortable situation, you would normally feel a connection with those feelings. And who would want that? Link here.

I would guess that the "relationship talk" is a relatively new phenomenon in human history. It seems to derive from the therapy culture and seems to aim at putting your relationship in therapy.

In Breslin's words: "For as long as many of us can remember, we've been told that if we've got a problem, particularly a relationship problem, the answer is to talk it out. Go to a therapist and talk to a shrink about your issues. Boyfriend or husband acting distant? Well, you better talk to him about that."

Doesn't this culturally induced prescription sound intrusive and disrespectful? If your husband or boyfriend is acting distant, why not respect his feelings. Maybe he is not ready to talk to you about it.

And what makes you think that he is acting funny because of some relationship issue? If you insist that he come clean about his feelings for you, you are making something that might not have been a relationship issue into one.

If he is upset about something that happened in the office or on the ball field, might it not be better to let him feel that you are with him, rather than that you want to confront him and make him confess... God only knows what?

For my part I suspect that such thinking is a vestige of what psychoanalysis used to call transference analysis.

Putting a man on stage and insisting that he talk about his feelings is a genuinely bad idea. As Breslin explains: "... many relationships in tough times become a tug of war in which the woman tries to get the man to talk about his feelings, and the man, who may be disinclined for a variety of reasons in that directions, withdraws from her desire to talk, talk, talk about it."

Speaking for the other gender, I will tell you that most men, when you ask them to talk about their feelings, do not know what you are talking about.

Let's say a woman wants to connect with her mate. Breslin is saying that when she asks him to talk about his feelings he is going to withdraw from her. The more she insists, the more he will withdraw. Thus, the effort to connection has produced a more radical disconnect.

It makes sense in another way. To talk about your relationship you have to step out of it, put it under a microscope, and look at it as though it were a foreign object.

How can you open a channel of communication? First, by respecting his right not to tell you everything that he is feeling. Second, by following Breslin's advice and arranging for the two of you to do something together.

She counsels women to play frisbee or to have sex or to cook a meal. She adds, wisely: "You might find that turning your relationship into a safe haven from relationship discussions will lessen your need to have relationship discussions at all."

A "safe haven" is a place where a man might express an emotion or two without expecting that he is going to be interrogated about it or called upon to justify himself.

If your man does not confide in you, you should first ask yourself whether you have created such a safe haven. You should next ask yourself whether you keep his confidence. And you should third ask whether you maintain a balance between what you share with him and what he shares with you.

If you are bubbling over with feelings, he is going to want to reciprocate, only he will start feeling that there is no way he can reciprocate in full measure. As you keep expressing your feelings and your mate does not reciprocate, you are indebting him to you.

And if the debt becomes too large he will feel that he cannot possibly ever pay it back. Then he will declare bankruptcy, and shut down completely. We know that that is not what you want.


Had Enough Therapy?: That Relationship Talk


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I KNOW that lots of women would consider this near sacrilege, because to some extent for them, the talking about the relationship IS the relationship. Is that not why "they" dig and mull and read is search of issues TO discuss?

 

[Conservativation]

And the natural end to the above....the OBVIOUS where it will end up generally if you think about it objectively. In a way, its analogous to some men actually BEING over sexed, and the fallout relationally from that, there are women I assert and as is in evidence in this article, "over relationship(ed)". But, because, as chaz has said, men things start on a negative and must earn their way neutral or positive, must be brought to heel and controlled (often BY women) is the norm thats taught, while women things are all the virtue, and to be praised and nutured and therefore CANNOT reach unhealthy levels regardless how they affect their mate.....you get whats discussed here:

Essay: Christine Wicker asks why women are walking away from marriage | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Life/Travel: Health

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[SIZE=+2]Essay: Christine Wicker asks why women are walking away from marriage

[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]12:00 AM CDT on Sunday, August 15, 2010

[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]By CHRISTINE WICKER / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
[/SIZE] A lot of midlife women in my acquaintance are leaving what appear to be perfectly good and loving husbands. Or thinking about it. Or cheating on them. Or wanting to. Or staying married and faithful but buying their own houses, which they either live in or keep as a bolt hole.
This astonishes me. I grew up believing it was men who had midlife crises that threatened marriage.
I decided one recent morning to list women I knew who fit the profile. In 15 minutes, I came up with 30 names. Some families on my list have more than one walk-away wife.
One Texas friend's 40-something daughter is divorcing her husband. His son's wife had an affair and they're also divorcing. In another family, an uncle and nephew are both being divorced by their wives. These women had once been renowned for their utter, perhaps excessive devotion to family. The men are both handsome, kind, good fathers. Great catches. Both women have new boyfriends, while the men are still too broken-hearted to date again.
You may be thinking I have lowlife friends. Not so. Or if so, irrelevant, because I also have stats.
In a 2004 AARP survey of divorced people 40 and older, 66 percent of wives said they had requested the divorce, and 26 percent had surprised their husbands, often after planning for years. Women were especially likely to have no regrets, and 43 percent did not want to remarry. In another national study that year, ex-wives were three times more likely to say that they wanted the divorce, rather than their husbands wanting it. Fewer than 40 percent of marriages of more than 15 years were rated as successful by respondents.
When Atlantic magazine ran a story last year with a headline that read, "The author is ending her marriage. Isn't it time you did the same?" I knew something big was afoot.
Sandra Tsing Loh, a 47-year-old mother of two, wrote of having an affair and divorcing only to find that her friends weren't happy with their husbands either, and they envied her.
What's going on? The rise in women's education and income has given them new independence. Maybe lifelong marriage is harder as people live longer. Or maybe it's that with women working, cellphones providing privacy and the Internet giving easy access to old and new romances, it's easier than ever to start and maintain an affair.
Even women facing illness and possible death are stepping out, it seems. When research came out recently indicating men are six times more likely to leave their wives when the wives get seriously ill than vice-versa, Melinda Henneberger, editor-in-chief of PoliticsDaily.com, objected. Henneberger, a breast cancer survivor, suspects that women with breast cancer may be more likely to leave than be left.
"I don't mean to suggest that I saw anyone trolling for dates in the ICU, but when you are forced to confront mortality, everything – and I mean everything – is suddenly up for review," Henneberger said in an e-mail. "So that if your marriage wasn't happy before cancer, you might not be as likely to keep cruising on fumes afterward."
In a column for PoliticsDaily.com, Henneberger backed up her opinion with experts. She quoted Dr. Susan Love, author of Dr. Love's Breast Book, as writing that many women find an affair is "part of the healing process" after a cancer diagnosis. She also quoted Sheila Kitzinger in Woman's Experience of Sex as saying that these wives may begin affairs thinking that "it was all well and good for a husband of 35 years to still love them without a breast, but they needed to feel they were still sexually attractive to feel whole again."
Married, differently
Most of the wives on my list, however, are still married. Just differently. There again, the stats support. Studies all over the place show women's rate of infidelity growing to equal men's. Whether that's because more women are cheating or more women are telling the truth, nobody knows.
At 45, Cathy De Anne had been married 21 years and planning to leave for three years. Infidelity was not an issue, but his drinking was. He quit but then she found him reclusive and dull. Once her daughter was in college, she called him from a Florida vacation to say that she had a job, a place to live, and she wasn't coming home to upstate New York.
"He was in shock," she said.
During the nine years they lived apart before divorcing, she realized childhood dreams of singing professionally and becoming an excellent ballroom dancer. "I never want another husband," she said. "I like it just as it is." Her ex has since died.
Even as men are doing more housework and child care, the idea that husbands are simply one more child to take care of is a common gripe.
"I think women just get tired," said one happily married mother of two.
One divorced mother of two sons put her complaint succinctly: "I realized my husband was of no added value."
To get the full chill of that statement, try imagining a husband who had divorced his wife saying it, or this next one.
"My married friends seem to envy me. They think I have so much freedom," she said. "I don't think their husbands like them coming around me."
Expectations
University of Virginia research shows that progressive wives are less happy than traditional wives.
"More traditional women may wear rose-colored glasses, but they also benefit from a sense of male and female roles," said sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project, who conducted the research. "They don't expect their husband to act like a woman."
In contrast, the idea of marriage with a soul mate "who will meet their deepest needs for human connection" may ask too much of marriage, he said.
Austinite Laura Habbe, 38, did want an emotional connection with her husband of 11 years, whom she describes as a good father and a nice guy. Instead, she felt "invisible, like I was not on his radar."
She felt abandoned during her two miscarriages and the death of her brother.
"I just kind of felt insignificant. I thought, 'I can't do this when I'm 80, I'll be dwindled away to nothing,' " said Habbe, who divorced a few months ago.
Rutgers University biological anthropologist Helen Fisher sees the rise of working women as a cause of women asking more from marriage, but she's not worried.
"Women have always commuted to work to gather fruits and vegetables, and for millions of years women were just as economically, socially and sexually powerful as men. ... Data suggest that many ancestral men and women had two or three spouses across their lives," she wrote on The New York Times' Room for Debate blog.
"The same occurs today: I have examined divorce patterns in 58 societies and everywhere that spouses have some independent means, both sexes leave bad marriages to make better ones."
Others blame midlife female restlessness on menopause, which causes oxytocin, the bonding hormone, to go down and testosterone, the independence hormone, to go up.
One study showed midlife wives feeling especially unhappy with what they haven't accomplished in life, while midlife husbands were feeling pretty good about themselves.
Years ago an older woman told me, "I'm going to live my real life now."
I asked, "What have you been living?"
She said, "I've been my children's mother. My husband's wife. Now I'm going to be myself."
It could simply be that long marriages don't get happier as most of us have been led to expect. A sophisticated 2001 analysis of studies on marital happiness showed a steep decline toward the later years.
So what do wives want?
Wilcox's research found that emotional commitment – how affectionate and understanding husbands were – was the most important factor in wives' happiness. Fairness was also important, but women didn't need strict equity to be happy.
Affectionate. Understanding. And reasonably fair. That sounds doable.
But Sandra Tsing Loh isn't optimistic about anybody's chances. She ended her Atlantic essay by advising readers: "avoid marriage – or you too may suffer the emotional pain, the humiliation, and the logistical difficulty, not to mention the expense, of breaking up a long-term union at midlife for something as demonstrably fleeting as love."
AT A GLANCE
About the author
Christine Wicker spent 17 years as a feature writer, columnist and religion reporter at The Dallas Morning News. She is the author of several books, including the best-seller Lily Dale: The True Story of the Town That Talks to the Dead and The Fall of the Evangelical Nation: The Surpising Crisis Inside the Church. She lives in California. Why are women walking away from marriage? Author and journalist Christine Wicker looks for the reasons behind a surprising trend.

 

[Conservativation]

duplicate

 

[Conservativation]

Note the author of the Dallas Morn News article, if you look into her, is NOT a traditionalist Christian who decries divorce....and is in favor of women home and married etc. She is the opposite, critical of the church, pro-choice, and definitely one who would NOT tilt towards a direction unflattering to women.

 

[JanniGirl]

I'd give the same advice. "Don't marry." Personally, at my stage in life, I don't see any advantage to it. I'll be, at the end of my life, still as alone "with" my husband as I am now. What's the use?

I guess if I were a stay at home mom or had a gaggle of kids, I'd be about staying married . . . . but I'm not. I'm financially stable, and think that if I don't, at least, get friendship and emotional connectivity from my spouse -- well, what's he good for?

Women are no longer content to be second-class citizens or doormats for their husbands who really, only want sex from them. Why would I possibly want to be treated like a harlot by someone who cannot be bothered to work on bonding with me emotionally?

He doesn't want to talk and have a real relationship . . . . . its likely that over time, I'm just not going to put forth the effort to make myself sexually available to him. That's the reality of life, guys.

 

[chaz345]

He doesn't want to talk and have a real relationship . . . . . its likely that over time, I'm just not going to put forth the effort to make myself sexually available to him. That's the reality of life, guys.

But, as you've said or implied dozens of times, the conditionality flipped around, where he may not want to more deeply emotionally bond in the absence of sex is a completely unacceptable thing, isn't it? Or is that "just reality" too?

 

[Conservativation]

Talk about relationship, frankly, is a sorry definition OF relationship. I guess I realized i felt that way, but when I read that it hit me as so true. Just like there has to be more to a relationship than sex, there has to be more than talking ABOUT the relationship. That isn't connecting....its like a hobby that one person likes and the other doesn't.

Its almost like all talk and no action...that expression, applies....I dont mean sexual action....I mean there IS an "action" of just BEING in relationship, that if it must be set out, like some kind of thing to roll around on the table and observe like some 3rd thing and discussed....thats like talking about a bike....looking from the side, the bottom, and never riding the bike (again, no sex analogy here).

When I read women complaining about "he never wants to talk".....tell me, is that not really meaning he never wants to talk about the relationship? Or, "whats wrong?"...that kind of thing....If there are problems, OK, but as some basic building block to relationship, talking ABOUT the relationship is not a very lofty goal for one, and if thats all you want out of a relationship, its no less shallow than being sex focused.

 

[Pink Platypus]

Talk about relationship, frankly, is a sorry definition OF relationship. I guess I realized i felt that way, but when I read that it hit me as so true. Just like there has to be more to a relationship than sex, there has to be more than talking ABOUT the relationship. That isn't connecting....its like a hobby that one person likes and the other doesn't.

Its almost like all talk and no action...that expression, applies....I dont mean sexual action....I mean there IS an "action" of just BEING in relationship, that if it must be set out, like some kind of thing to roll around on the table and observe like some 3rd thing and discussed....thats like talking about a bike....looking from the side, the bottom, and never riding the bike (again, no sex analogy here).

When I read women complaining about "he never wants to talk".....tell me, is that not really meaning he never wants to talk about the relationship? Or, "whats wrong?"...that kind of thing....If there are problems, OK, but as some basic building block to relationship, talking ABOUT the relationship is not a very lofty goal for one, and if thats all you want out of a relationship, its no less shallow than being sex focused.

This is really interesting. It's a problem we've had, and I think...oh, I don't really know what I think.

To me, deep conversation strengthens the emotional bond. That doesn't have to be talk about the relationship, but I do enjoy hearing about how my husband feels about things or felt about things in the past. Problem is, like many men, he doesn't really tick that way. If he recounts something that happened in his childhood, for instance, and you say "how did you feel about that?" he won't be able to tell you. He probably can't tell you how he feels about anything in much detail. He can tell you if it makes him uncomfortable or angry or happy. But beyond that? Not really. I guess it's a gender difference.

I know beyond doubt that my husband loves me. I also know that the kind of deep conversation that I find really fulfilling isn't going to happen very often, and in fact it's probably not all that good for our relationship when it does, because it makes him very uncomfortable and even unhappy. It's a dilemma.

Now, I can also enjoy other kinds of long, drawn out conversations with him--philosophical, political, religious and so forth. The thing is, these topics are all most fun and interesting when they're spontaneous, and I haven't figured out if there's a way to interact that makes them more likely to pop up. (If anyone reading this knows, speak up!)

One of the things I've been working on is trying to clarify for myself exactly what things make me feel like my emotional tank is full. My husband wants to know, and I want him to know. And of course, I want and need to know what makes his emotional tank full. We're working on it.

 

[Created2Write]

Janni, just because it's YOUR reality, doesn't mean it's EVERYONE'S reality. I know for darned certain it isn't mine.

 

[Robinsegg]

Now, I can also enjoy other kinds of long, drawn out conversations with him--philosophical, political, religious and so forth. The thing is, these topics are all most fun and interesting when they're spontaneous, and I haven't figured out if there's a way to interact that makes them more likely to pop up. (If anyone reading this knows, speak up!)

What has worked for us was to have a daily time when we came together to read some kind of devotional. Sometimes it was the daily reading for our Sunday School class, sometimes it was a page-long written devotional, sometimes it was a Psalm or Proverb or other verse we'd been thinking about. Then, we'd talk about that devotional reading. We felt like it gave us spiritual time together, bringing us each closer to God and us closer together. But it *also* gave us something to talk about.

Rachel

 

[Conservativation]

This is really interesting. It's a problem we've had, and I think...oh, I don't really know what I think.

To me, deep conversation strengthens the emotional bond. That doesn't have to be talk about the relationship, but I do enjoy hearing about how my husband feels about things or felt about things in the past. Problem is, like many men, he doesn't really tick that way. If he recounts something that happened in his childhood, for instance, and you say "how did you feel about that?" he won't be able to tell you. He probably can't tell you how he feels about anything in much detail. He can tell you if it makes him uncomfortable or angry or happy. But beyond that? Not really. I guess it's a gender difference.

I know beyond doubt that my husband loves me. I also know that the kind of deep conversation that I find really fulfilling isn't going to happen very often, and in fact it's probably not all that good for our relationship when it does, because it makes him very uncomfortable and even unhappy. It's a dilemma.

Now, I can also enjoy other kinds of long, drawn out conversations with him--philosophical, political, religious and so forth. The thing is, these topics are all most fun and interesting when they're spontaneous, and I haven't figured out if there's a way to interact that makes them more likely to pop up. (If anyone reading this knows, speak up!)

One of the things I've been working on is trying to clarify for myself exactly what things make me feel like my emotional tank is full. My husband wants to know, and I want him to know. And of course, I want and need to know what makes his emotional tank full. We're working on it.

Youve nailed it. And this loops back around to a point in another thread about someone doing something that "hurts"....well, youve noticed this makes your husband uncomfortable...I wonder how those who SOOOO railed about the atrocious massage because it hurts his hands, well, what about THIS? It comes down to, as you have done, seeing that he DOES like to have conversations, deep ones, passionate ones, spontaneously, and MAYBE dare I say even on your cue sometimes, BUT, NOT laser focused, the the meat potato and veggy of the topic is ONLY, "how'd you feel about that". His feelings on things, philosophical, political, religious, should be manifest by the passion and intensity with which he deals in the topic....not something that is utterly foreign, like "how'd you FEEL then?" Its like asking me about the newest botanical research or something....I have NO IDEA, and no matter how bad you WANT me to get that, I CANT.....what I CAN do, is PERFORM....is that whats wanted? I can make things up and make it like sugar and medicine and it goes down good. Inst that kinda cheap? See, he/I AM having long and deep and passionate talks......just not so often ABOUT , well, "US".

That counseling is foisting this on people as THE remedy, isnt helping. interested to discuss this with folks who , like Pink here, know what i am saying and what Im NOT saying, as apposed to those who will inevitably pop in with something about yea, just stay quiet and put out...I will ignore that tripe.

Id be

 

[Pink Platypus]

Well, Conservativitynishness, it's interesting to me that this need for meta-talk has developed over time. It's pernicious though, because once the habit/need grows, it's hard to let it go. There are a number of more recent books that make the point (as in your previous posts) that meta-talk is toxic to relationships because it makes men miserable.

I simply don't believe that it's always been this way. I can't believe that women have been broken and unfulfilled all down the years of human history because their husbands wouldn't talk about their feelings. Maybe it is an outgrowth of feminism, or maybe it comes from therapy culture. Or maybe it comes from the media, like the sit-com attitude that husbands are little more than irresponsible children.

If I think about myself and my relationships over the course of my life, I wonder when the need for meta-talk developed. Back when I was a teenager and in my early 20s, I was perfectly content to enjoy my boyfriend's company without meta-talk. Just be in the moment. Now? It's a struggle for me. Honestly, I am not sure that meta-talk is really what I want, it's just that I've somehow got this idea that it is symbolic for emotional connection.

So I guess the root question is, what else can one do to feel emotionally connected to one's spouse? Sex obviously works. But what else?

And a related question (which just occurred to me): is this female need for emotional connection a manufactured one? What I mean is, have women been taught to believe that they don't have something that they actually do have? What does it mean, to be emotionally connected to your spouse? Isn't it enough to build a shared history together, with all that entails; daily routines, experiences good and bad, adventures, wild [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse], comfortable silences, the onset of gray hair and all that? How has it happened that these things are not enough? That building a life together and being present in it is not enough?

 

[waxlion10]

We feel emotionally connected when we share experiences together (at least, I feel emotionally connected to him) because I can look back and say, "Remember that time we..." and he will remember. Usually

I also feel connected when he comes home from work and gives me a big hug, and just holds me and tells me how glad he is to be home. Then he can go to the bedroom and unwind on his computer or whatever for an hour and I don't feel neglected because I know that him seeing and hugging me was important to him.

Doing acts of service for one another also makes us feel connected. Whether it's doing chores or picking up a favorite candy bar at the store, we try to do things that show we're thinking of the other person. We send short, random texts throughout the day (as we're able) that just say, "I love you!" or "Can't wait for our date tonight!"

For me to be emotionally connected to my husband means that I just feel close to him. There's no anxiety or tension or unresolved matter that is wedging itself between us, even a little, because we're communicating with and loving on each other.

It might mean something different to someone else.

 

[Conservativation]

Well, Conservativitynishness, it's interesting to me that this need for meta-talk has developed over time. It's pernicious though, because once the habit/need grows, it's hard to let it go. There are a number of more recent books that make the point (as in your previous posts) that meta-talk is toxic to relationships because it makes men miserable.

I simply don't believe that it's always been this way. I can't believe that women have been broken and unfulfilled all down the years of human history because their husbands wouldn't talk about their feelings. Maybe it is an outgrowth of feminism, or maybe it comes from therapy culture. Or maybe it comes from the media, like the sit-com attitude that husbands are little more than irresponsible children.

If I think about myself and my relationships over the course of my life, I wonder when the need for meta-talk developed. Back when I was a teenager and in my early 20s, I was perfectly content to enjoy my boyfriend's company without meta-talk. Just be in the moment. Now? It's a struggle for me. Honestly, I am not sure that meta-talk is really what I want, it's just that I've somehow got this idea that it is symbolic for emotional connection.

So I guess the root question is, what else can one do to feel emotionally connected to one's spouse? Sex obviously works. But what else?

And a related question (which just occurred to me): is this female need for emotional connection a manufactured one? What I mean is, have women been taught to believe that they don't have something that they actually do have? What does it mean, to be emotionally connected to your spouse? Isn't it enough to build a shared history together, with all that entails; daily routines, experiences good and bad, adventures, wild [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse], comfortable silences, the onset of gray hair and all that? How has it happened that these things are not enough? That building a life together and being present in it is not enough?

Good words.

I say this same thing, and have wondered it as well. I often point out that before the ind revolution, this "need" didnt exist...oh the regular nay sayers will claim that the women were miserable cattle dying to talk and no outlet....I reject that out of hand. They had no TIME, they had OTHER priorities, and therefore they accepted what they got, men and women.

I do NOT mean to replace talk with sex, and my comments are expressly not about sex as the other side of the fulcrum...in fact to keep the topic pure it should only be used comparatively, not as a substitution.

The wax post that followed was good, saying just talking while experiencing life...excellent. But you cannot MAKE a man understand how to emote about things on command. And that's the central focus of relationships these days, counseling, etc......"communication" is taught AS emoting, rather than just exchanging thoughts, it necessarily MUST be exchanging feelings that CREATE the warmth of empathy. Realize men empathize, just not overtly in the same way as women, and men do NOT have some need to explore how we felt (past) about something, and see that it lines up with how someone else felt, and then that's like an accomplishment in talking. Seeking to find, hey we agreed on how we FELT, is so foreign to men that it screams discomfort and creates issues, because we are constantly dangled a need we CANNOT fill.


I have always found the modern dichotomy that women demand this thing that men are truly NOT equipped for, in order that men earn something both parties are FULLY equipped for (sex). Its a powerful realization, that....and gives over to being able to give him credit for effort, because he isnt made that way.

I know, lets say I have a heavy discussion on the phone, with a bill provider etc.....my wife wants me to recount the literal words spoken, trying to glean the feelings that were exchanged and find insight in them, I boil it down, and say, net net we owe X by said date, no negotiation.....its NOT sufficient for her at all...she NEEDS to FEEL the conversation and I have no earthly idea how to make that happen, so.....I do what lots of men do finally and say, you asked me to call, then you want to feel it vicariously.....YOU CALL next time. How can those little arguments be healthy for a marriage? I simply and truly CANNOT do what she wants...I CANNOT...not will not CANnot.

Its the same in relationship talks, which hear me, yes they MUST occur, I just think they are WAY overdone now days. The guy stated it quite well in his write up as to what the effect is. Its negative. The more pressure, the less results, until......museum silence reigns.

 

[Conservativation]

Well, Conservativitynishness, it's interesting to me that this need for meta-talk has developed over time. It's pernicious though, because once the habit/need grows, it's hard to let it go. There are a number of more recent books that make the point (as in your previous posts) that meta-talk is toxic to relationships because it makes men miserable.

I simply don't believe that it's always been this way. I can't believe that women have been broken and unfulfilled all down the years of human history because their husbands wouldn't talk about their feelings. Maybe it is an outgrowth of feminism, or maybe it comes from therapy culture. Or maybe it comes from the media, like the sit-com attitude that husbands are little more than irresponsible children.

If I think about myself and my relationships over the course of my life, I wonder when the need for meta-talk developed. Back when I was a teenager and in my early 20s, I was perfectly content to enjoy my boyfriend's company without meta-talk. Just be in the moment. Now? It's a struggle for me. Honestly, I am not sure that meta-talk is really what I want, it's just that I've somehow got this idea that it is symbolic for emotional connection.

So I guess the root question is, what else can one do to feel emotionally connected to one's spouse? Sex obviously works. But what else?

And a related question (which just occurred to me): is this female need for emotional connection a manufactured one? What I mean is, have women been taught to believe that they don't have something that they actually do have? What does it mean, to be emotionally connected to your spouse? Isn't it enough to build a shared history together, with all that entails; daily routines, experiences good and bad, adventures, wild [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse], comfortable silences, the onset of gray hair and all that? How has it happened that these things are not enough? That building a life together and being present in it is not enough?

The bold above is a heavy admission. I think its profound though, because I perceive a need, that is so ill defined, how can I meet it if YOU dont get it? Youve just admitted that and thats great. Ive seen countless posts asking what do you want bonding wise from your hubby. The answer is rarely if ever what she wants him to DO.....its what she wants to FEEL as a result of whatever he does. Realizing the one day X may make you feel something and the next day X will create the opposite feeling while husb. blathers away trying to duplicate success, is a good thing to realize.

 

[Pink Platypus]

The bold above is a heavy admission. I think its profound though, because I perceive a need, that is so ill defined, how can I meet it if YOU dont get it? Youve just admitted that and thats great. Ive seen countless posts asking what do you want bonding wise from your hubby. The answer is rarely if ever what she wants him to DO.....its what she wants to FEEL as a result of whatever he does. Realizing the one day X may make you feel something and the next day X will create the opposite feeling while husb. blathers away trying to duplicate success, is a good thing to realize.

Well, my need for meta-talk has nearly destroyed my marriage. I hope and pray that it's not too late, but it's like an addiction. I need to re-learn the ability to feel emotionally fulfilled without it. Yes, I am in counseling. To talk about it! But seriously, it's pretty easy for me to understand the problem intellectually. It's not easy at all to work through it in the moment, when I'm feeling vaguely bereft and think that "talk" is what I want. I see my husband's pain because he just can't do what I'm asking and it makes him feel lousy on multiple levels. So I'm trying to change my behavior, knowing that my feelings will follow.

My goal is to stay married, because I love my husband to pieces, and I know he feels the same way. It's just plain tragic that in spite of that, we're miserable. And yes, I do believe that it is largely my fault. Not that he's blameless, but my "thing" started the downward spiral, and I didn't even realize it until recently.

 

[Conservativation]

Well, my need for meta-talk has nearly destroyed my marriage. I hope and pray that it's not too late, but it's like an addiction. I need to re-learn the ability to feel emotionally fulfilled without it. Yes, I am in counseling. To talk about it! But seriously, it's pretty easy for me to understand the problem intellectually. It's not easy at all to work through it in the moment, when I'm feeling vaguely bereft and think that "talk" is what I want. I see my husband's pain because he just can't do what I'm asking and it makes him feel lousy on multiple levels. So I'm trying to change my behavior, knowing that my feelings will follow.

My goal is to stay married, because I love my husband to pieces, and I know he feels the same way. It's just plain tragic that in spite of that, we're miserable. And yes, I do believe that it is largely my fault. Not that he's blameless, but my "thing" started the downward spiral, and I didn't even realize it until recently.

I think you will find this at root of a statistically significant number or divorces, AND just plain unhappy marriages.
I keep calling it expectations too high, and here, the church BUILDS these expectations, even sets them up as conditions FOR a good marriage, counselors too. Im impressed youve found a counselor that isnt saying you have no issue, get that lousy communicatin husband in here for some empathy lessons.

Remember that old photocopied joke in offices....the flogging will continue till moral improves

Revise that

"The flogging will continue until you demonstrate empathy"

You can say I have this problem at home as well, my wife is needing more then I can give, yet for me I see peace, decent calm, getting on about life, etc. IF I do make initiative, and it creates space....she will rush in and fill that space and that sets the new norm FROM where we need to again "improve communications"....seemingly a bottomless appetite.

Note the lady saying in one article her husband added no value anymore....this is part of what she meant. Early in relationship, folks like to THINK their husband was better at this.....but actually he wasnt, its an illusion, because what LOOKED like discussing the relationship was really getting to know each other. NOW, he feels that ground was covered....and filed, and done. So....NO, he wasnt one way then and another now. Its a misconception to compare the talking of new love to the talking after 20 years so much. ALSO I assure you, she, in the early days, was thrilled with what there WAS....because it was all fresh new ground...so less could count as more.
Now, rehashing things is either like arguing, or useless to him. I'm being very general, so please someone spare me the anecdote about the husband who is the one who wants to talk....of course there are some.

I don't think you should make killing the urge the goal, its a compromise. Evolve the need into something more doable....change the expectations into realistic ones...then give A's for effort.

My wife and I recently needed to discuss something relational, and serious, so she (and I love her for this) said she'd send me an email. She wrote and AWESOME crafted worded clear email, her heart, her concerns, etc. I was therefore able to ponder, to edit, to ALLOW myself to feel, not while under her gaze expectantly, but REALLY mull and feel in my response. Im impressed greatly with her evolution in our communications, on all levels, and I think she would say same. But she STILL like you is a little disappointed because there is an EXTRA need beyond what REALLY NEEDS to be discussed, that is just a need TO discuss....undefined, just discuss things. But we are not at loggerheads over it...at least not often.

These thoughts go 180 degrees against what we are being taught about marriage...as if, the last 100 years we FINALLY learned what it takes, those thousands of years prior, women were miserable as a rule.....NOW though we KNOW what to do, funny, relationships are failing faster and faster now that we figured this out