You DO understand me!!!
Posted on 01/20/2008 9:42:43 PM PST by Bear_Slayer
Now obviously I can't speak for every male, but I feel qualified to speak in general terms.
This is aimed at the married woman, but is applicable to the woman that is involved in a long term relationship.
Learn these things and you might get your relationship to last. Ignore them at your peril.
1. He is not your zit. Stop picking at him.
Women love to pick at zits. They'll sneak up on you while you're shaving and start squeezing. It's an annoying habit they can't break. They also do this emotionally and intellectually. This is done when they ask us silly questions like:
"Do you love me because you need me, our need me because you love me?"
The fact is we love you and need you. Beyond that, we have no idea. Some invisible rock hit us in the head one day and we realized we can't live without you, until you drive us insane, then we can't live with you.
Similar questions are along the lines of, "Do these pants make my butt look big?"
The fact is, you have a big butt and your butt makes those pants look big. Another fact: we don't care. When the invisiable rock hit us, it didn't clue us in that you had a big butt; it simply made us aware of the fact, "Girl nice. Me like girl, lot."
I knew a woman once that had a big butt. She wasn't even the most beautiful woman I had ever seen, but the invisible rock was huge and I would have crawled through broken glass to be with her if she were single.
You have a big butt. Get over it. If you are constantly aware of your own big butt, you will make us constantly aware of it and you don't want that.
2. It's ok for him to compare you to his mother, as in, "That's not how my mother does it."
The fact is our mother is the only significant woman that ever loved us, until you came along. She fed, bathed, dress, nurtured, encouraged and loved us -- and we like how our mom made our potatos, cookies, &etc. Don't change the recipe. We like it that way. There is nothing Freudian about it.
3. Don't expect a deep relationship and don't try to draw us into meaningful conversations.
We're not comfortable exploring our inner feelings. Most guys don't trust their feelings and the smarter ones recognize that its their feelings that got them into the relationship in the first place.
Do you want a meaningful relationship? Go sip lattes with your friends and explore each other's cavernous feelings. It's a level you can all relate to and prop one another up.
4. Don't trust everything your girlfriend tells you.
Just because they read it in Redbook or Ms. does not make it so. Those magazines are written by women, for women, that grew up on Danielle Steele.
And don't ask us. We don't know and we're not that complicated anyways. If you simply watch us, without over-analyzing you'll figure us out. At a basic level we eat, we sleep, we copulate, and we play sports. Not necessarily in that order and not necessarily at different times.
5. You don't always have to be talking.
Men can communicate through subtle mechanisms. It's how we know when a woman likes us, or when the guy across the bar is looking for a fight, etc.
6. Don't make us carry you through life.
We're trying to get through it also. We'll be happy to stand in front and take some of the blows, but listen, carry your own baggage. We got our own to deal with.
Lastly,
When the big rock hit us, it really didn't matter what you looked like on the outside. Love is blind. We fell in love with the way your eyes twinkle when you smile. When you giggle when we say something silly or funny. And yes, even the way your breasts look in that tight sweater. However, none of that will matter ever again if you screw it up by driving us insane.
You DO understand me!!!
Read my posts too ;)
Much of it seems like basic common courtesy...something we owe to everyone, not just our partners.
As a mother, I'm assuming that you have an excellent mother!
Puhleeze! No woman has ever been a jerk or a pain in the arse, eh? It’s always the guy’s fault, hmm? Ok Alan Alda. Whatever you say.
Then you have an idea why so few men watch television. Not just the daytime stuff but the evening sitcoms and even the commercials.
Probably a guy that’s had a sex change operation.
I just watch educational stuff.
Anyhow, is FR supposed to be the guys place for balance? If so, I’ll go elsewhere.
LOL! If you read Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus, you will know that women do need to talk about, or at least mentally explore, all aspects of their feelings in order to understand them and be at peace. However, it would probably be better for your girlfriend to do this with other women, rather than with you. Or maybe she needs to see a counselor, LOL! An hour or two a day is a lot. My husband and I hardly talk that much in a week! ;-)
Some of the women I have met are lazy. They don’t want to do anything. They are nice at first. Things go well and then they don’t want to do anything. One or two of them were more conservative than me. I consider myself a moderate.
I am a reasonable, easy going person. Tolerate a lot of things that I probably shouldn’t.
I don't think either side should ignore the other's needs, but there also needs to be some understanding when the differences emerge.
Men need to understand that she may not ALWAYS be in the mood...she doesn't exist to service you. At the same time, women need to realize that he doesn't ALWAYS want to share feelings or thoughts...he does not exist to be your sounding board or confessor. If your partner is not ready to meet you needs from time to time, it doesn't mean they no longer love you.
If they are constantly indifferent to your needs, then you have a problem. A headache every night of the month, or refusal to discuss anything beyond work and ESPN, is a legitimate reason to end a relationship.
Oddly,
you’re supposed to love your spouse.
I say oddly, because I rarely see it talked about.
Oh yeah, I guess that's kind of important, too.
That’s to be expected here, I think where the men outnumber the women by a pretty large degree. I’m happy that we can give them a different viewpoint from a sane level.
It’s the hate that wears me down.
I can banter and joke, but some posters (not on this thread but others) are The Second Coming Of Ted Bundy, the vitriol gets wicked.
There are two sides to every story. Neither person is perfect.
Women simply don't behave like that toward men they respect and trust. Change yourself and she will follow your lead. If she still refuses, simply "fire" her and find one who will. Don't get hung up on trying to force any one woman whose physical appearance you happen to like to be what you want - this is where men get into huge trouble.
I know woman who are financially set and work like dogs but can’t even find a date.
Go figure.
No it's not. Please stick around. This is a place where current issues are discussed.
That includes the hostility that boys are treated with in our school systems. There's also comments about the man-bashing on television.
We also talk about the disgusting way many men treat their wives and daughters in muslim countries (and in some cases; the way muslim men treat women in general). A lot of men here get quite hostile about that.
You should know all of this. You've been here longer than me.
I guess it's true. Most people see what they're looking for.
The wife and I have adjusted to each other over those years, neither of us are the "same person". When we got married I was just out of the Army and was in the best physical shape I would ever be in. Now I am just a old bald headed fat guy. My wife was a cute girl with a great sense of humor. I am fortunate, she has not changed much.
A lot of those issues went away many years ago, generally we already know the answer to any question the other will ask, so much of our communication is silent.
There are some things that she does that annoys the hell out of me, and I know there are some things that I do annoy the hell out of her. We simply agreed to accept the fact that we will on occasions annoy each other and let it go.
We still say "please" and "thank you" to each other and on those rare occasions we have a disagreement we never resort to name calling or belittling the other. (Our family are convinced we never fight, but we have had a few at family functions but no one was aware of it but each other). Most fights only last a few minutes and we either accept the others view point or agree to disagree (there are not many things we disagree on, but there are some and we just accept it.).
While we both are can spend our money there is an unspoken agreement that neither will make a major purchase without the other's approval. Sometimes it takes months to make a major purchase. If we both don't agree, it does not get bought.
We usually tell each other we love each other daily, and give each other good bye kisses if one is leaving the house.
I buy her flowers two or three times a month because I know she likes to have fresh flowers in the house, and in the same token, she will often do something special for me.
So perhaps the seacret is to understand the two of you are a team and you are in it for the long haul and you should not sweat the small stuff, and almost everything is the small stuff.
I think we are more sensitive to what we know, or we, like Don Quixote, have our own windmills.
Mine is abuse-— kids, elderly, the insane and females.....all from a personal or work POV. So yeah, it’s what I zoom in on.
And yes, if someone calls me on bashing men, I’ll own up to it. I’ll admit, I will go to my grave with a twerked view of life and a bone deep fear/mistrust/love/hate of males. But I sincerely am trying to understand the hows and whys and whats of it. It’s not their fault, but mine.
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