Dear Past Myla,
Love these articles you saved in your gmail few years ago... Kudos, girl! I think I'll be needing this in dealing my boyfriend/fiance for 10 years.
Get Him to Open Up
If there's a No. 1 complaint about men, it's that they don't listen. In fact, one Men's Health survey shows that 70 percent of women complain that their men don't listen to them at least some of the time.
To which most guys would reply: "What did you say, hon?" But in defense of my fellow men (and myself), I believe that only half of the fault lies with us. For a guy, talking to us is a lot like making love: We, too, need to be warmed up, and the mood and the time have to be right.
Fact is, your man may be dodging "meaningful" relationship conversations not because he can't stand them or fears them, but because he's just not prepared to talk at the times you approach him.
You can increase your chances of being heard, and earning a response, by maximizing his listening powers and attention span. Here are four ways to achieve that.
Pick the Right Time
To you, his schedule of "important" basketball games and "critical" fantasy baseball planning sessions and "interminable" bathroom time might seem to be crowding out "together" time. But all that may be a sign that he's feeling emotionally overloaded, not emotionally numb.
He needs his down time, just like you do. Maybe even more so. It's long been known that women are more emotionally fluent than guys - more verbal, with more people, on more topics. Guys tend to withdraw, in part because the areas of their brains that process speech and emotion are less fully developed.
All the more reason, then, to schedule your big discussions at smart times. The worst times: In the hour he gets home (he needs to cast off the office demons), right after the kids go to bed (everybody needs a break at that moment), and especially not right after the two of you settle heads on pillows (you need to gentle each other to sleep then, not rile each other up).
Better options: On a walk over the weekend, or over a mug of hot chocolate in the middle part of the evening. Another way of showing him conversational consideration - broach the topic du jour in an afternoon text or email, so he has a chance to think about it a bit before the conversation begins.
Save Heavy Convos for the Car
If you need to have a long, deep discussion - like about the direction of your relationship, or your suspicion that his grandmother is turning into a cat lady - then it seems natural to want to have the conversation on the couch or in the kitchen. But do that, with lots of intense eye contact and close scrutiny, and he may retreat, be defensive, or clam up.
It's the old cornered-animal syndrome, and that won't facilitate the interchange you're after. So when the topic is serious or involved, initiate the conversation in the car. Side-by-side, the way you sit when you're taking the interstate to grandma's furry palace, means he'll feel less on the spot, more comfortable.
If he's behind the wheel, he's in control and feeling confident. If he's the passenger, he's got time on his hands. Either way, he'll listen - and say - more.
Ask for His Help
Women and men tend to talk about personal problems with different goals in mind. She tends to talk them out in order to simply be understood and maybe to engender some sympathy, while he may come into it with a strict handyman psychology: You got problems, I've got answers.
So she gets upset when he tries to fix her problems instead of sympathizing with her, and maybe accuses him of not fully listening. Then he gets upset for being stonewalled when he offers solutions.
It's true: Men need to be better at refraining from an "I got it" solution for every problem, but maybe women need to meet them half way, and make finding a solution part of the sympathy session. You're both happy if she fully vents, and he helps brainstorm a way out of the mess. A team approach here can work wonders. Believe or not, every guy wants to be considereda perfect partner, as this amusing and perceptive article points out.
Do it Naked
Yes, a good time to talk can be, indeed, right after the deed. It's one of the times he feels closest to his woman, and that's when he's most likely to feel a little more comfortable talking about deeper issues. The lights are down, the bonding hormones are flowing, and you're a team. Like women who may feel less inhibited about their bodies in the darkness, men feel the same way with their words.
The love you've demonstrated physically just might spill over into kind-hearted considerations of the verbal variety. And the deeper the talk, the more you'll learn about each other.
Have other ideas? Please share them here.
