| Women |
Women are better equipped to create relationships to maintain relationships and yes to save relationships, says Therapist Carole Altman
Carl and Sandra glare at each other. The only sound in the room is their heavy breathing. They are furious at each other. They are at an impasse, and nether are is willing to budge, neither one of them is wiling to admit the truth--that they are both miserable and they are both in pain. Neither of them wants to feel this unhappy. Neither want to fight. Yet there they stand paralyzed with pain and fear. They feel anger because of the pain they are inflecting on each other but they also feel fear because they are afraid to lose one another. They are both afraid of rejection, and of ultimate loss. Let's look more closely at the situation. Carl is the sum total of all of his experiences as a male in our society. This means that he is: 1. Trained to be totally independent. 2. Thought to be totally sure or him-self. 3. Expected to be firm, like the Rock of Gibraltar. 4. Expected to be proud and inflexible. What about Sandra? She too is the sum total of all of her experiences as a female in our society. This means that she is: 1. Trained to be dependent on a man. 2. Taught to be insecure, needy and often helpless. 3. Expected to be soft, flexible, understanding and very sensitive. 4. Expected to forego pride, to be compassionate. Given these axioms, which of the two is best trained or most adept at making the first move across that impasse between them? The answer is indisputable. Despite women's liberation, role equality and the fact that feminists across the county may attack me vehemently, I am positive that there is only one possible answer. The female--Sandra--is best equipped and best trained to de so. She will find it easier to geld out her hamd to Carl and bring him to her side. Since Sandra is able to "give in" to be less concerned about losing a fight, and since it's "all right" for her to be dependent and needy, she could play the following scene with ease. Sandra: "I love you, Carl. I need you. I'm miserable when we fight. Please put your arms around me and hold me." (As she speaks she touches him gently, pressing her body to his. She may stroke his hair and kiss his chin.) Carl remains rigid at first. But with each word, each touch, his body begins to yield. He becomes soft and malleable. His hands become free of the temporary paralysis caused by his misery. He is released from any responsibility or fear of having to "give in," and he puts his arms around Sandra (because she needs him so much, of course.) But he, in fact, needs her as much as, if not more than, she needs him. He is very grateful to her for allowing him to save face and for doing exactly what he'd been dying to do all the while they were spewing venom at each other. But he was unable to do anything. Years of training and indoctrination held him paralyzed. Years of training and indoctrination allowed her to help him so that they could both get what they wanted, what we all want: Love. In studies regarding sex differences, repeated findings indicate that women are not as competitive as men. They do not see every argument or issue as a win/lose situation, as men do. Women are also much more sensitive than men in terms of their awareness of their environment, their ability to listing and identify with others and their ability to express their emotions. This does not mean that men are unable to have these characteristics, or that they don't have them. What it means is that, in our society, most men are trained out of abilities such as being less competitive, being sensitive, being able to empathize, to listen to others, or to show their feelings. In our society such behaviors are considered feminine and to be shunned like the plague by real men. This does not mean that that this is right of as things should be; it merely means that this is the way things are. Another trait which is considered very necessary to males, yet much less important to females, is pride. Although pride is considered by most religions to be a cordial sin, it is still cherished as part of the macho image. A twenty-year-old college student told me that she feels pride is definitely a barrier to a good relationship. "I'm glad that women are more flexible when it comes to their pride," she said, "because there could never be any compromise, or making up, if both men and women were so concerned with their pride. I feel that if a woman is wrong she'll say so easily, but a man can't ever admit it if he's wrong. Even if a woman is not wrong, she'll be more able to give in, because women don't consider pride as essential as men do when it comes to relationships." A friend's sixteen-year-old daughter, Ellen, is a feisty, beautiful, wonderfully independent and liberated young lady who recently went through an experience which well illustrates women's lack of false pride when it involves love. She had decided that she was too young to go steady and wanted to date other young men, much to her boyfriend Peter's chagrin. However, they discussed the situation and both agreed that they would try dating others. After one week, Ellen decided that she did not want to date others, and that, indeed, she certainly did not want Peter dating others. But being a smart young lady, and a very sensitive, empathetic person, she allowed Peter to "save face." All of their friends and even their teachers knew that Ellen had dated other boys. So Ellen began telling everyone that she'd made a very bad mistake. She readily admitted that she loved Peter and only Peter. She repeated again and again that she no longer wanted to date others, and hoped that Peter would also decide that he wanted to go steady again. Peter and Ellen are going steady again. They have a truly warm and caring relationship which is mature and loving beyond their chronological years. Ellen feels no shame or guilt that it was she who initiated the decision to go steady again nor is she concerned that she admitted her "mistake" of going out with others and her fears that Peter would not "take her back." All of these revelations came naturally and positively. The relationship is the winner. So they both win. Bruno Bettleheim, a world-famous author and psychologist, has said, "We must start with the realization that as much as women want to be good scientists or engineers, they want first and foremost to be womanly companions of men and to be mothers." I quote Dr. Bottleneim because he is representative of a genre of psychologists, psychiatrists and sociologists who feel strongly that women's first concern is to be with a loving man. I strongly disagree that there can be no sense of fulfillment or happiness for women unless there are children and a man in their lives. However, I do agree that, again because of our society, there is more pressure on women to be with a man that there is on men to be with a woman. A discussion of this issue would take another article, but I mention it merely to stress that women do indeed have more of a vested interest in making relationships work. To further substantiate my remarks that we are each products of our socialization, and behave in ways we are expected to behave--that is, that women are soft and giving, but men are hard and unyielding--let's look at some recent experiments. Dr. Robert Risenthal and Dr. Lenore Jacodson described a 1968 study of theirs in their book, Pygmalion in the Classroom. They found in their study that if teachers were told their students were very bright, these same students achieved much higher levels of learning than students whose teachers did not believe then to be very bright. Rosemthal and Jocobson termed this the "halo effect": you behave in the way that people expect you to behave. Dr. Stanley Schachter and Dr. Jerome L. Singer, in a 1962 article in The Psychological Review, showed that subjects who were injected with adrenalin, which produces a state of fear, behaved positively euphorically, despite the drug, when they were in a room with a person who was behaving euphorically, demonstrating again that we imitate and behave exactly as we're expected to behave. Thus, if little boys are told, again and again, not to cry and not to show their emotions, to be sure to win all the time and to compete viciously and climb the ladder of success regardless of anything else in their lives, this is exactly what big men do: What they were told to do as little boys. Similarly, a little girl is constantly told to be loving, sensitive and understanding, to find a nice boy and live happily ever after and that it is her role to "make her husband happy." This is exactly what big women do: What they were told to do as little girls. In his book, In Defense of Women, H. L. Mencken wrote: "The essential traits and qualities of the male, the hallmarks of the unpolluted masculine, are at the same time the hallmarks of the numbskull. The caveman is all muscles and mush. Without a woman to rule him and think for him, he is a truly lamentable spectacle: a baby with whiskers, a rabbit with the frame of an aurach, a feeble and preposterous caricature of God." What I feel Mencken is saying is eventually what I am saying: When it comes to certain behaviors and situations, men are indeed lacking, and are at the caveman stage of life. They are not trained to be otherwise. And Mencken also said, in this same book: "Women, in fact, are not only intelligent; they have almost a monopoly of certain of the subtler and more utile forms of intelligence. The thing itself, indeed, might be reasonably described as a special feminine character." Again, I am not saying that this is how it should be. Of course it would be ideal if both partners in a relationship had equal responsibilities and abilities. Of course, it would be wonderful if we were indeed equal in all respects. If we could pass an ERA which would force mothers, peers, teachers and everyone to relate to each other as humans, rather then as male and female, I would be the first to vote for it. But the truth is that this is not the reality. We are indeed raised differently, with different expectations, and therefore develop different abilities and traits. I recently met a man, Elliot, who conducts various skills workshops, teaching people to communicate and to present ideas to others. He is forty-six years old, has been divorced, and is now remarried. He told me, "I can categorically state that I would be married to my first wife if she had taken the initiative to create a more satisfactory marriage. I literally did not know that she was unhappy, and that I was not behaving as I should have been. I'd come home late without calling, not thinking that it mattered, since she was home all day anyway. She never complained, or asked me to be more considerate of her. I'd work long hours, but ignore her, because I came home tired. I thought she was happy. She had a nice home, clothes, everything I thought a woman wanted. Then one day she left me. "If she had only communicated with me, discussed her problems, her displeasures, I'm sure we could have worked it out. "Now that I've gone through a great deal of training and a new sort of socialization I realize how ridiculous and lonely her life must have been. But as I said, I just didn't know any better. I did what I thought I was supposed to do; earn a livening to make her happy." Elliot is not an unusual man. He is a product of his environment. Many men believe that material "things" are what a woman wants, and that she will be happy if she has them. I recall vividly how my ex-spouse (my ex-husband) told a group we'd joined for marriage counseling that he didn't understand me at all. (JJt.) I admit that, at that time, I wasn't trained enough and didn't understand that I could have made that marriage work. I take full responsibility that I, a therapist and marriage counselor, did not know then what I know now. We had enough love between us to work with. I didn't know how. Now I feel I do. I am a woman, with skills and abilities which men do not have. This is a truism. It is due to our socialization processes, our mores, our short comings. But it is a truism. I know that I am out on a very shaky limb by asking all women to recognize their special traits and their inherent abilities to be stronger and more giving emotionally. I am not saying relationships should by all one way, from the female to the male. But what I am saying is that we are experiencing a vacuum of feelings and emotional commitments. We are lonely and afraid of each other. We are seeing more and more relationships collapsing around us every day. And we are asking, why can't they work? I suggest that relationships can and do work--if women wake up to their responsibilities in this battle. I suggest that females take more initiative to help the male with tasks which are difficult--or impossible--for him, such as "giving in," or "losing." Allow him to be "manly" and "masculine" as you allow yourself the luxury of being "feminine," and "loving." Women must realize that they are indeed better equipped to be the mediator, the softener, the more loving of the two, and to take the initiative to "give in" or "make up." Of course, this is not always the answer. Some relationships are doomed to failure and no amount of love or sensitivity can save the situation. But when two people do care for each other, and when there is a genuine desire for success, the woman can and should be the one to keep refueling the motor of caring, as that it keeps operating in perfect order. Hold out your hand since your arm is less rigid and your muscles less hard. Give soft words of love and desire since it is such a delicious female trait. Show attention with surprises, trips, sexual delights and expressions of untarnished desire. These behaviors are not a "game" for the female, since she loves being sensitive, she loves giving, she loves being a wildly desirable woman. And most important she loves being loved, just as he does. Editor's note: The viewpoints presented in Forum are not always those of the magazine of its publisher or editors. In fact, we may even disagree with them strangely, but if they are well thought out, they will be printed in the interest of stimulating thought about the controversial issue they raise. What are your thoughts and insights about the essay printed above? Forum would like to know. Send replies to: Forum Magazine, 909 Third Avenue, New York City 10022. Replies become the property of Forum. Carole Altman is a psychotherapist and author of the book You Can Be Your Own Sex Therapist (Berkley). |