Maybe it’s just my personal experience, but is there a man extant who can survive when faced with the fearful spectre of a woman crying? Is it possible to not give a woman her way once she starts crying? Why is that?
I don’t know the answer to your question, but let me tell you, it drives me f*cking nuts.
Now, I know that women don’t appear to make sense, and that’s fine. So I will spell out my exact feelings on the subject, with the understanding that it will probably make most men say “Geez, women don’t make any sense!” I know it. We know it. The best I can do is try to explain it to you.
Here goes:
I cry more than I should. I can’t help it. Long distance phone plan commercials, weddings, the 6:00 news, a particular line in a Joni Mitchell song. Whatever. It’s mostly physical, or hormonal, but it usually does not mean that you’re in trouble.
But if you do feel that you are responsible, the way to exacerbate it, the guaranteed, 100% certain way to make me cry harder and feel worse, is to say something like
“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to make you cry, are you all right …”
Man. Makes me nuts.
Tip: The tears are the way my body says “I’m upset.” You cannot tell how upset I am by the presence (or quantity) of tears, or why I am upset: for that you need to listen to what I am trying to tell you.
Also, if I’m crying and trying to tell you something, guess what I want you to do:
(a) try to make me feel better (“It’ll be okay, don’t cry …”)
(b) listen (actually listen, don’t just smile and nod, I can tell) to what I’m saying
Hint: it is impossible to do (a) without first doing (b). Truly.
It’s always been a big turning point in my relationships when men have realized that fact. Ignore the tears (but listen) and they will go away. I swear.
I’m a guy, and it took me a long time to learn the wisdom contained in cowgirl’s post. Crying is a much bigger deal to some people than to others, and is usually a bigger deal to men than to women. Although I will cry at a particularly moving book or movie, it takes a pretty serious event in real life to make me cry. Thus, someone else crying who wasn’t watching a movie or reading a book used to seem really serious, as I projected my own experience onto the cryer. If the person crying was a girlfriend, then it also awakened Protective Male Feelings. In general, I dealt with crying badly, either trying to fix things or conceding all my positions in an argument just to stop the tears.
The way I learned how to properly deal with crying was from my sister. She and I are really close, and she cries at the drop of a hat. I eventually just realized that, for her, crying was just how she expressed unhappiness or stress, major and minor alike. Knowing that makes it easier to react appropriately to her, rather than comforting her for major grief when she’s just minorly frustrated.
I’m exactly the opposite. If I’m crying, I’m probably too upset (not to mention hyperventilating) to explain why. Nothing drives me more crazy than being interrogated at that moment, especially if you then pass judgement on whether whatever it is is worth crying over.
I understand that this stems from guys’ impulse to fix things. So look at it as a task that needs to be broken down into sub-tasks: first get the waterworks turned off (i.e., shut up and hug me); then when I’m calm, listen to me. After that I’ll be ready to discuss what to do next.
I do agree with cowgirl on one thing: never, ever (a). Don’t tell me everything’s OK when you have no idea what’s what.
And BTW, I don’t recall ever crying to “get my way.”
I’m a very emotional woman - not just when it comes to crying - but every emotion for me is pretty much over the top.
Somehow I managed to find a b/f who’s calm and who has the knack for mellowing me out … when I’m crying whether it’s caused by ER, or Monster House (long story) or a friend’s sad state, or pms … he just hugs me, listens, and makes me laugh …
It’s wonderful!
I guess maybe I COULD use tears to get my own way, but I never would - it’s LOW, dishonest and manipulative. And I love him too much.
Another reason I’m glad top be a guy. Rather than crying, we just get pissed off, and hit stuff (or people). Folowing that: Girls, if a guy gets into a fight, or gets really agressive, it’s probably no big deal (bad day, tired, or some such).
Maybe it’s the web they weave.
The only crying girls I’ve known have been soothed by…
(1) Tea. Great for flatmates who’ve finally split with the guy who was on-ooff for ages. Requires Englishness to be fully effective.
(2) Dope. Simple…let them roll their own Camberwell Carrot, and send themselves into oblivion.
(3) Hugs and cuddles. This is the trickiest, given the assumption of some romantic involvement. But it tends to work.
I think the answer’s easy. Because most men are encouraged not to cry, we have a hard time putting ourselves into the crying woman’s situation and envisioning how we’d like to be treated. Some men are embarassed to cry and would prefer that everyone simply not mention it, so they assume they should keep quiet out of respect for the woman’s dignity. Some men only cry when something is terribly, terribly wrong that we can’t fix—and assume that if a woman’s crying, she must have some very big problem she needs help with.
Most men, I feel, don’t cry for the same reasons, don’t feel the same way about crying themselves as women do, and for that reason, we have no idea how she wants to be treated.
Maybe that’s because we never ask women what it means when they turn on the waterworks. Maybe it’s also because women never think to tell us, too.
Men don’t get any practice with women crying until they’re confronted with a woman crying, and then it’s too late. There are no ways to simulate the event (watching sport --> talking about sport --> playing sport). We also know that there’s no guy-thing we can do to fix it (power tools, socket set, gaffer tape), just like a crying baby. Touchy-feely emotive stuff is not our forte (nature or nurture?). The crying activates our danger mechanism but we don’t know what to do (fight or flight?).
Still, I’d rather be a clueless guy with a crying woman than a crying woman with a clueless guy.
I agree with the gals that have posted so far… let me cry and then listen to me. Crying lets me get out all the crap, all the hurt, all the frustration and anger. It doesn’t always mean the guy has done something wrong. I cry when I’m sad, mad, hurt, scared, pissed beyond BELIEF, wistful, lonely, stressed, depressed and so on. I cry during the sad parts of movies or when I hear a sad song. I’m not a wedding cryer type though, which may seem odd, but still… I do my fair share of it.
I want my SO to listen, to understand the reason behind why I’m so upset I’m shedding tears before he goes into Fix-it mode. He can’t help me with every problem and that’s not why I’m crying. Just listen to my problem and then hold me for awhile. Let me get it out.
And for all I’ve posted so far, does anyone find it odd that it’s very, VERY hard for me to cry in front of my SO, even though he is a wonderful guy? Even though he’s a talker and a listener, he cares and it hurts him to see me upset? I can’t cry in front of him without feeling embarrassed about it so I try not to cry in front of him. We don’t live together, wonder if that’s part of it somehow.
For a long time, in other relationships, everytime I cried, I got a reaction of “crying is for the weak” and sometimes it led to the guy getting mad at me or making comments about stupid women. Maybe that’s why I can’t cry in front of him, I’m scared he’ll judge me that way, too. I’m not sure. He’s a great guy but I don’t want him to ever think I’m weak or too emotional.
But I am emotional… sigh
When I cry (which is *extremely]/i] rare) for emotional reasons, I want everyone to leave me the hell alone. I had a father who wouldn’t let me cry and therefore I hate doing it in front of people.
OTOH, I cry during movies all the time. My dh thinks its cute for some reason and always has to peek.
I’m going with the old genetics argument, (most) men are predisposed to come to the aid of a distressed anything, especially a woman. Crying equals distress, distress equals problems, problems need solutions, ergo, men want to, if even in a misguided way, provide those solutions, even, perhaps, when none exist for the problem in question.
I’ve been around a LOT of crying women (in my job, it’s kind of status quo) and the one thing I’ve always taken away from every experience, is exactly what Cowgirl and Spider have so eloquently said. The feelings are in, and they’ve got to come out, crying is just the mechanism by which those feelings are purged in many women.
Sometimes, it just needs to happen, and all you’ve got to do, is shut your mouth, and open your ears and hold a hand (if it’s appropriate of course) or touch a shoulder. And fellas, the secret is empathy. You can empathize with out having to sympathize. It’s not necessary for you to have the exact same experience as the hysterical woman (because there’s no way in hell that you will have) to let her know that you feel her pain and are more than willing to listen, and don’t, whatever you do, offer advice unless you’re asked for it. Trust me on that last bit, if nothing else.
I’ve given this matter some thought over the years, and I think Fish is on the right track.
When men cry (for the sake of this argument I’m going to pretend all men are exactly like me), it’s because something really incredibly horrible has happened; for example, the only time I recall crying in recent memory was when my dog died in my arms six months ago. Well, OK, I got a little misty when Brett Favre threw a perfect game the day after his dad died, but beer had a lot to do with that.
Oh yeah, also I sobbed like a baby when I had my wisdom teeth out and the novocaine wore off about an hour before I was able to get any painkillers. But back to the point here:
My point is that men associate crying with hideous tragedy. Argument with the girlfriend over whose turn it is to do the dishes? Don’t be such a sissy. Just lost an arm in a combine thresher? Cry it all out, amigo.
For me at least, when a woman starts crying, I sort of assume she’s in the kind of emotional pain I was in when I lost my doggie, and frankly, if anyone had tried to continue a conversation, or especially an argument, with me at that moment I would have completely flipped. So my instinct is first to do something about the horrible pain I assume she’s in, so that we can maybe later after she’s calmed down get back to the topic at hand.
Note: After long years of training with an ex who would cry at the drop of a cat, I am now much better about this. What I describe above is my emotional gut-reaction to the sight of a woman in tears, which years of training and discipline have taught me to control. Mostly.
When a woman cries around me, I’m usually the impetus behind it all. So basically I try to just leave them alone and figure they’ll get over it sooner or later.
Uh oh, buttonjockey308… you “said” the H word. Hysterical woman? Uh oh. I’m hoping you aren’t implying what I think you’re implying. I hope it just came out wrong. Just because we cry doesn’t mean we are nuts or “crazy”. Hysterical sort of implies that the woman has gone off the deep end. I hope I’m wrong about your post. I am PMSing right now and that caught my eye. Not trying to be a comment cop or a member of the post police, just curious.
It reminds us of our poor mothers… and how much we have disappointed them over the years.
I cry when I’m watching a sad movie or listening to a sad song. I cry happy at weddings and other events. I’ve unfortunately been to a student’s funeral, and I cried there. But that’s the quiet crying - just basic leaking with no sound effects. I would be surprised if that upset any guys.
No, it’s the other kind of crying - the stressed out/angry/depressed crying with sobs and a red face that’s probably the kind to freak out any bystander. Thankfully, I haven’t done that in front of any guys in a long, long time. I can see why another person would have trouble dealing with that, because when I’m in the middle of that kind of crying jag, I am not sure what’s to be done. The upside is that I always feel better after I’m done. It’s a catharsis, and it absolutely helps.
I feel bad for people who are around women like me when they cry. You see, just as many boys are encouraged not to cry, so are some little girls. I just happen to have one of them.(My dad was/is a really good parent… except for that)
If I cry when I read a book or watch tv and am alone that’s perfectly acceptable. But you don’t cry in front of others. It’s bad. Manipulative. It makes a scene and draws attention to you. You really really shouldn’t unless there’s been a death or dismemberment. (for the record, I deal badly with other people crying too)
But sometimes it happens because you can’t help it, no matter how much you tell yourself that you’re not going to, you do. So I feel guilty and weak, and you want me to explain myself too?! Oh please, don’t try to comfort me, just leave me alone, I’m already making a fool of myself as it is.
I can’t stand crying in public (“public” being defined as "in front of any another person who does not share your reason for crying) by anyone of either gender. I’m usually tempted to tell the other person to quit snivelling like a baby.
This does not tend to endear me to my peers, let my tell ya, although it is a GREAT way to discern if a woman is simply trying to manipulate me. I have found that was exactly their intent roughly 2/3 of the time. That includes relatives (mother, sister) who cried in front of me.