Bend Over Jessica

Why are men so useless at expressing their emotions?

I’ve suffered from it quite a few times in the past couple of weeks, not just from He Who Must Be Obeyed but The Lover as well. Basically, it goes something like this.

Jessica notices that all is not well in man world.

Jessica (knowing full well that this is the case): “Is anything the matter?”

Him (adopting either sulky or martyred look): “No, nothing.” (Deep sigh. Puffs out cheeks.)

Jessica (slightly irritated): “Are you sure?”

Him (bottom lip pushing out): “Yes! Don’t nag me!” (Deep sigh. Walks to desk and starts fiddling with handy piece of cable tie or other male item, occasionally opening drawer or typing with more force than usual)

Jessica : “I know something’s upset you.”

Him (vehement): “No! I’m fine!” (Deep sigh. Even deeper sigh.)

Jessica storms out in exasperation to cook dinner/do washing/clean bathroom/have shower (delete as necessary)

Later on, you catch them out when they actually say why they are upset or unhappy, normally when you have burst into tears and told them you hate it when they are cross. But by then, they’ve spent a minimum of six hours and a maximum of four days sulking and the whole time you’ve been trying to work out why they are unhappy – because you can’t take any steps to solve it until they say something. And then, because they’ve been sulking and upset you, you don’t feel remotely sympathetic to their plight. What you actually want to do it stab them in the eye with a pencil.

I find this so frustrating about men. As a woman, I’m used to having long and girly chats with my good female friends about everything. We analyse. We dissect. We surmise what he meant/what he said/did you see/did she really say/ Really? No! I don’t believe it! But whenever I try to talk to the man in my life, he adopts the pained expression of someone attempting to pass a watermelon without blinking. He dreads the words “I’d like to talk about something.”  If I ask to sit at the table for dinner, as all civilised people should, he attempts to eat in front of the telly, dreading that something emotional will come up over the broccoli.

One of the reasons that HWMBO and I fit together well is the opposition of our emotional states. I am all temper, hurricanes, shouting, ballistic missile-esque ball of fire and warmth. He is ice cool, snow, silence, hidden oceans of calmness and quiet. He calms me down. I rev him up. When I start shouting – and oh, how he hates that outpouring of rage, well-articulated by the pithy insult and the elephantine memory of All The Bad Things He Has Done – he literally waits for the storm to pass. Meanwhile, I am fuming at his lack of engagement, his refusal to argue, his careful eye-rolling, his calm voice saying “I’ll talk to you when you have let this out.”

I am from a large, extended working-class Welsh family with Byzantine style family feuds and old insults and any large family gathering is like a piranha pond – last person to bite gets their leg chewed off. HWMBO, by contrast is from a small, terribly polite middle-class English family with buttoned up emotions who would never have dreamed of smashing plates whilst screaming and drinking vats of red wine in the way my lot do. My family watch fights in the street whilst the women call encouragement out of windows. His family are the ones that complain to the police about the common people who fight in the street. So maybe I am just better at getting it out than he is.

So men of the world – please – you know how you complain that you can’t read women’s minds? Well guess what – we can’t read yours either. So either spit it out or for goodness sake, stop sulking!