Why don't some men feel? (a rant)

[ForeverFighting]

I was at a meeting that dealt a little with psychology last week. There weren't too many of us--maybe 15. It was a meeting about feelings of worthlessness and a lot of the emotions we deal with around here and it involved audience participation, which I did. Every time I get in a group of people who stay away from emotional issues, I blurt out something. I made a comment about how we need to show compassion to others who we find may be going through difficult times. I won't bore you with the details, but the "moderator" said something like, "Um, OK. Anyone else." And yes, he was a man. It was a meeting that was important to me, but I wanted to get up and walk out right there.

I know from where I came, from a family of secretive "perfect" people. I've always been an emotional case, the artist, musician, but it drives me nuts how people can completely shut off everything and deny the existence of people who do feel. And especially people like those here, men who feel such pain. It's like, "Maybe if I ignore them, they'll go away."

As I get to know more about some of you and what you've been through, how hard you try to maintain some sort of normalcy in a world that has handed us anything but--It tears me up. And the fact that the perps of the world are so consumed with covering their own assets while we try to determine which memories were true, how much to remember, how much to feel, how much to hate, how to keep going to work every day without crying at our desks, how to concentrate on the mundane in order to not go insane--it makes me incredibly angry. And that's another feeling that I'm not seeing enough of out here, outside MS. I just wish I could fix it. For all of us. But that's not an option.

I'm just grieving for all of us today. And the fact that some men are so totally detached from any feelings or compassions whatsoever, as if these meetings were purely academic, when that is not what the source material intended at all, that really irritates me.

 

[markw]

Foreverfighting,

I can understand where you are coming from, my father is a stone wall. He never shows emotion, never talks. He has never told me he is proud of me, let alone show any kind love or affection for me or towards me. I too, have a very hard time showing emotion or affection. I hate that about myself. I so do not want to be my father. It is such hard thing to change. We do feel these things, they are inside of us, we just do not have the know how to let them out. Maybe it is fear, fear of not being a man. Fear that if we do, we will loose control. It is a false fear, but it is there never the less. I think the more we keep such things inside, these emotions, feelings become un-natural to us, we become afraid of them, not knowing how to express them correctly. It is something I am trying very hard to change and it is not an easy thing to do. I am always amazed at the other posts here. How the other men are able to express their feelings in such an open and honest way without that fear. They are so very brave. I wish I had that within myself, to be that brave, that honest, is a treasure that can not be measured. You are a very brave soul, never give up the fight. For me, I am just beginning.

Mark

 

[Lloydy]

ForeverFighting

And the fact that some men are so totally detached from any feelings or compassions whatsoever,

My family are also stone cold, emotions are scary to them and always have been.
I also went to an all boy boarding school, where I was abused, and the whole culture was unemotional.
11yo boys who were desperately homesick weren't comforted, not even by the staff. The best we got was to be told "grin and bear it", the usual treatment was teasing and humiliation.

I left school at 16 and became an apprentice in heavy engineering, all men once again. I played rugby for a while, drank with the lads, and did all the young man stuff like fighting in dance halls and bars when I was drunk and stoned.

Somehow I got married, and remain so after 30 years. But it's only in the last few years that I've even admitted to having emotions and feelings.
And I love it.

The thought of owning my emotions and displaying them scared the hell out of me, and it took a great deal of self searching to recognise them.

The macho stereotype has a lot to answer for.

Dave

 

[Morning Star]

For years I thought that my parents didnt love me, infact I thought they hated me. So became more and more distant. In the end, my loss.

And then I saw Citizen Kane. To realise I wanted to love them the way I wanted. I wanted my parents to fit my requiements, not accept them the way they were.

They had their own way of expressing love. My mother did it thru food and my father...I remember the way he used to fuss over me when I was unwell.

My appetite for love was far greater than what they could offer. especially during abuse, which they had no clue. I was not just hiding my secrets from them, I was hiding myself from them. I was hidden so deep that no love could reach me. No wonder I have no happy memories of that period. Which is not their fault. The weight of abuse pushed every thing down.

When I connected with his childhood, I found that his father passed before his birth and mother when he was 12,I connected with his humanity. I realised that instead of learning the language of love as a child he learned the language of anger.

This empathy gave me the power to appreciate his mode of expression. Not verbal or physical, but just by being there.

Now I know he loves me, just as a father can. I dont look for proofs. Instead now I think of the ways in which I can give him the love he never got. Neither from his parents or from his children.

He is now teaching me break out from my shell of neediness and extend my heart to him just as a human being would do to another.

 

[Leosha]

I guess it is some the stereotypes. Because 'men' don't show emotion. 'Men' don't cry. 'Men' don't appreciate art. Whatever.

The fact is, intense emotion drives a response in EVERYBODY. Some people are more comfortable in showing that response, whether it is to cry, to hug the person, to take some other kind of action. But many people are so insecure in themselves, they are afraid to react. Because, what will other people think? It is a mindset we are all use to, in a different angle. But I do believe that is what lies behind the 'stone' men who do not react or respond with emotion. Stupid, but again, because of societies stereotypes and what has been told to us as acceptable.

Leosha