Why Men Don't Want To Try Therapy @TomBilyeu

Dr. K’s Guide to Mental Health explores Anxiety, Depression, ADHD, and Meditation

#shorts #drk #mentalhealth

[Cat_Coon]

Dancebattle instead of discussing emotions?! I'm in!

[redgreen]

As someone who tends to be really really good at articulating my emotions, even more so than most women I’ve met, I can say from first hand experience that the sad reality is no one actually likes it when a man can talk about his feelings. It weirds people out subconsciously because it goes against their ideas of masculinity. In my experience even the people that talk a big game about supporting non-traditional masculinity still end up being put off by it when they actually experience it

[Disqualified_Identity]

Its also true that men on average tend to resort to anger when sadness is the real emotion felt. Men are taught that there is no place for their sadness. It tends to be viewed as weakness. Women are more likely to express sadness.
Sadness is comforted and anger is seen as hostile and evil. In a situation where both partners are sad and the woman is the villain, the woman's outward expression ot sadness will win the day. Damned it he does and damned if he doesn't.
Woman have their own unique struggles. That is simply the reality for many men.

[morningplum]

I saw a video that said anger is men's tears and it became a lot easier to be understanding of what my partner was feeling. With that said, there's a balance of not allowing yourself to be bullied in the process. However, that little dose of understanding did wonders for our progress in communication.

[enjybenjy]

As a guy that is vocal about his emotions and about going to therapy
You get kicked a lot by society
If they don‘t outright demonize you, they will belittle you
if they don‘t belittle you, they will treat you as lesser
if they don‘t treat you as lesser, they prejudice you
I‘m nearly done with therapy after some years, got away from addiction and overcame a lot of trauma, just to have everything people don‘t like about me instantly be reduced down to me being in therapy therefor I am an issue
But yeah, the guys that have mental problems, suffer under chronic alcohomism, and behave outright under domestic violence to bring their own point home are the ones seen as being kept well together
Why would you go to therapy as a man when that is the average way a man gets handled by society if they go to therapy?

[ErikTheWiz]

It truly is. I genuinely thought i was good at talking about my emtions until i was face to face with someone and realized I couldn't put my thoughts into words, and that i was afraid to put my thoughts into words.

[itsasecret]

Obviously Dr.K isn't advocating for this, but...
Three years ago I became a commercial fisherman. It's about as "macho" of a work environment as you can get. Socially there is respect but very little of being "nice". If you suck at what you're doing, people will tell you. If you're tired and working slow, people will cuss you out and tell you to hurry up. If you get hurt and complain about it you will be called names I can't put on YouTube. Whatever insecurity you show about your looks, physical state, abilities etc will be turned into a recurring joke or nickname you deal with everyday. Unsurprisingly, physical fights are very common.

Sounds kinda hellish, right? It must be insanely stressful to work with such unbearable pricks all the time, right?
Actually I've found it's the opposite.

There was a difficult adjustment period but now when I return to land and more "normal" social interaction I find all the mind games and passive aggression unbearable and anxiety inducing. Instead of conflict being direct and dealt with quickly bitterness, resentment, and hatred build for years without ever being resolved.

Additionally when people are constantly lying to you about your insecurities and telling you that you're perfect instead, it allows you to deny them rather than accept them as a perfectly valid part of who you are. In a strange way being constantly confronted with your shortcomings and insecurities in an honest way actually makes you more confident. At least it did for me.

I'm not saying that this kind of overltly-aggressive social environment is healthy. Everyone reacts differently and I have seen several complete mental breakdowns as a result of it. My point is that being focused solely on feelings and the appearance of kindness as most people are has it's downsides compared to directness.

[cadavison]

My current group therapy is mostly women, and i can tell you the women are able to emote but they are not great at honestly articulating what is really going on. We all seem to be bad at that until we learn the skills

[kristianniss]

The worst thing I can be as a man, is a burden upon others. I can't express negative emotions to others.

[unknown-kjqp]

I think the reason putting emotions into words is valued because you can express much more complicated ideas. The physical expression might tell you the "what", but it won't tell you the "why".

[hastalavista]

In a couple communication is important. If you have a disagreement, you can’t just go to the gym do some reps and expect that disagreement to be resolved. Verbal communication is important for both genders, just like physical exertion is important for both genders. The most at peace I’ve ever been in my life was when I was going to the gym 5X a week, but that didn’t substitute the importance of effective verbal communication with my loved ones.

[pineapplesandthegovernment]

As a man who generally can articulate emotion, the major problem is that it's just very rarely helpful (for me or others) and sometimes makes things worse.

My family has always been good at emotional exploration and I did this for years, until after about 20 years or so I realized it had never actually made anything better.

You go round and round talking about issues, feel worse, drag up conflict from the past, then eventually you all move on because other things in life need immediate attention, and the minute you're not thinking about what you've just talked about, you realize you're right back in the same emotional ups and downs you had before.

Because life is about moment-to-moment happenings and happiness, much more than it's about past issues or latent dynamics.

Every relationship needs a level of compromise and that means accepting when things and people aren't perfect.

Sometimes gambling on changing relationship dynamics and everyone sharing deep emotional problems makes things worse, or brings painful issues to attention without any ultimate major resolution, when instead you could be having enjoyable conversations/activities.

Sometimes deep sharing is necessary, but it's probably less than pop/therapy culture assumes. And sometimes being good at talking about emotions is really just being addicted to giving oxygen to negative emotions and problems that would fade if given less attention.

Anyway, rant over! (Ironically, I've probably heard the simplistic ''everyone needs to talk about everything all the time" message so many times and got so frustrated at it that I couldn't stop expressing my emotions about that.)

[joshrowe]

We're also aware that therapists are aware that the majority of people who insist on counseling are women, and women won't go back to counseling if they feel like they're not being sided with. The therapist will automatically be financially incentivized to side with the women.

[jerlinej]

Physical expression is fine if you need to let off steam via sports or taking a walk, but how does that translate to communicating your needs? To do that you need verbal communication. Otherwise physical expression of emotions can lead to attempted mind reading, passive aggression, or outright aggression. I wish he gave examples. But in general, everyone should practice verbal communication to get by in life. We should give them guidance and space to learn to verbally communicate, but at the of the day, everyone has to learn how to do it.

[ActionBob]

Not just they invalidate the emotions that men express, it's wrong to have anger or jealousy or frustration with our partner.

[stifledmind]

I think I can articulate my emotions better than my wife, but my wife can express them better than I can.

[CrizzyEyes]

Not specific to couples counseling, but as a man, I view therapy as basically a non-option because when I've tried to find a therapist, I got no results. The database provided by my health insurance provider was woefully out of date. Some of them had moved out of state half a year ago. One of them told me I "wasn't the type of patient she normally deals with" even though I was 29, and she said she deals with adult men on her website. She then immediately tried to push pills on me over the phone without even having seen me, let alone diagnosed me. The only empathetic response was from a guy who was on vacation and got back to me half a week later. He was no longer practicing in my state but we did talk about ways to self manage anxiety.

[tinalanger]

In a contest between a fist fight and articulate words, I knew I would never "win" a fight with my father no matter how eloquent I was. Society may favor words over physical violence, but at 5 yrs. old, I knew my father's fists would always prevail against my words.
But how do a couple solve a problem without words? Bully the articulate one into silent acquiesence to doing whatever the physical non-talker favors?

[zerodegreescelsius]

Self-expression and articulation are skills; no one's born with those. Skills can be learned and refined. There exists both men and women who are both good and bad in articulating emotions; this condition is not exclusive to either genders.

I think it's time that we stop justifying a weakness in self-expression as something innate; instead, see it for what it is: a lack of skills. And what should a person do when they do not have the skill? Learn.

Sounds too harsh? What does one do when you lack physical strength? Hit the gym. Need to lose body fat? Adjust dietary habits. Need to pass an exam? Study.

I see zero reasons that this is a gender/biological "condition". It's merely societal expectations.

[JoeDuke-PhD]

He jumped over... 'female counselor'. Women have allies professionally, men get attacked.