Often, heartbreak is portrayed and described as a sharp, physically crumbling pain. When it comes to a broken heart, we imagine a flood of unadulterated emotions, anger, sadness, almost as if we have been informed of the death of a loved one.
But I see heartbreak differently. In my view, the feeling of heartbreak isn’t about a sharp pain, and it’s not just about the pain that develops when we’re reminded of the person who broke our heart. Rather, it’s a chronic, dull pain, that sticks with us from the moment we wake up, to the time we go to bed. Everything is dulled–even the good moments aren’t as good.
It’s kind of like wearing a thick, itchy sweater in 100 degree heat. We want nothing more than to rip it off, cut it off. We just want to feel normal again. But we can’t. And even when we do manage to shed that sweater, we still feel like it’s kind of on. We have to continually remind ourselves that it has been shed.
One of the major frustrations I hear from women is related to the process of dealing with heartbreak in their life. They are angered, frustrated, and awed by the ability of their former romantic partners to seemingly to move on in their lives, after the relationships end. These women often wonder: how can these men move on so quickly with another woman? How can they not feel crazy like me? Why am I the one who texts, calls, and emails him? Has he forgotten what we shared? Or did he ever care?
These women also wonder why they can’t shed the pain attached to heartbreak for weeks, months, sometimes years. And one of the biggest questions they ask themselves is how they can stay in control in every other part of our lives, process major issues with a healthy outlook, and still struggle with the absence of a lost partner, especially one who wasn’t very kind.
I don’t blame these women for feeling this way. After all, they’re just basing their observations about how men deal with the end of relationships from experiences in their own lives. They see his actions as indicating that he has moved on, appearing as if everything in his life is normal and happy, being social, exhibiting absolutely no symptoms of heartbreak. And it seems that the man in the relationship has completely let go of his feelings of the past and any connection he had with his partner.
A man’s sense of emotional expression may be different, but the way he thinks and feels are not. They are often struggling with heartbreak every bit as much as women.
While there are definitely instances of failed relationships where the man legitimately moves on more quickly than the woman, I find cases of men easily dusting themselves from an broken relationship, rare. The idea that men universally move on faster than women is absurd.
How do I know this?
Well, contrary to popular belief, I am a man. But more importantly, I inhabit a unique sphere where I hear the confessions of both men and women. And I always wish that the women I speak with and receive letters from could hear what men tell me in relation to their experience of heartbreak, because between men and women, there isn’t much of a difference. When it comes to a broken heart, men suffer from the same pain, confusion, sadness women deal with.
The difference with men is that they don’t share their heartache–they don’t talk about it. Their issue goes back to the way in which men in our culture are stifled, emotionally trapped by their conditioning. Their focus is to hide any visible sign of weakness, emotional fragility, and vulnerability. It’s the ultimate insult for a man to appear emotional, to be seen as “a pussy.”
A show of vulnerability is unimaginable for these men since we, as a culture, have managed to convince them that it’s not attractive or “manly.” So, the only acceptable way for a man to express pain over heartbreak is raw anger or silence. The concept of articulating the words, “I’m hurt by this,” or “This is making me sad,” is unfathomable to most men.
Instead we get, “How the fuck could you do this to me!” Or, nothing at all.
My feelings on this subject were further enhanced through the live, on-air radio show I occasionally co-host. During the advice portion of the program, all of the people calling in to ask questions about not being able to give up, moving on, or processing their feelings around heartbreak, were men.
In particular, there were three men who called into the show to pose questions and concerns about recovering from broken relationship. These men were asking the same questions about heartbreak as women: why am I still thinking about her months later? How has she been able to move on so quickly? Should I reach out to her and tell her how I am feeling?
Of course, the anonymity of radio allowed these men to feel comfortable enough to express these thoughts.
But more interestingly, these callers serve as a very clear reminder that the ability of men to feel emotion is not the issue at hand, rather the issue is about their ability to express it.
What I’ve learned in my short time on earth is that nobody, neither man nor woman, can wish heartbreak away. Everyone has to (or at least should) work through it, not around it or against it. And as long as you’re doing the right things, i.e., not hiding away from your life, you will eventually move past it. But that sucks, doesn’t it? You open your heart, have the best of intentions, then you’re left dealing with the pain. It’s no wonder that you ask yourself, “What’s the point?”
But there is a lesson in all of this. Who is ultimately suffering when it comes to dealing with heartbreak? The woman who shows and feels emotion, or the man who is silent?
In our culture, we constantly talk about the difference between the way men and women think–some people have accused me of doing this. This insinuates that I believe differences in the thought processes of men and women are based on biology.
It may be different, but it’s based on social conditioning, not biology. It’s that same conditioning that gives a man a map for a detour around the heartbreak, a map that is inaccessible to most women. But it’s ultimately sad, because while you grow stronger, driving through the pain, he has dismissed it and it’s just going to haunt him again, again and again.
That detour he took? It comes at a high price.
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I’m pretty young and don’t have a ton of experience with this. I’ve had one 3 year relationship and I’m currently in a relationship that will probably last much longer.
What I did notice is that a huge part of it has to do with who breaks up with who. Every relationship has its problems and one person might be thinking that this problem will work itself out, while the other person is preparing for the breakup.
I still feel a little bit bad to this day about how I handled things. I moved on right away and I know it hurt my ex a lot when he found out. Part of the problem was that after we broke up, he seemed to idolize our relationship as if it was this wonderful thing where he was the most doting boyfriend, when in reality, there were times I would walk into his house and he wouldn’t even say hi to me because he was playing video games. He was very delusional about what our relationship had been like, so it took forever for him to get over it, but I was able to move on quickly because I had made the choice to get out of that relationship and went straight into a much better one.
This experience is probably not typical because I tend to hide my emotions more than most women and my ex tended to show his emotions more than most men.
It would be interesting to see whether men or women are more likely to end the relationship.
Thank you for this article. It helped me to cry out some more of the heartbreak I have been feeling.. because only feeling it and experiencing it will help me finally get through it and move on – some day :)
You are right on the money. I like the clarity of pointing out that it’s not that men don’t FEEL, it’s that we don’t EXPRESS it, except in anger (Which has a “strong” quality to it’s subjective experience until it starts to take over.) or withdrawal/silence.
I also agree that this is primarily a socialized pattern. There is some research about some of the effects of testosterone on how male’s process information and make decisions but it’s hard to work out, because of all the politics enmeshed in these topics, how much that research is clean and how much it’s agenda driven. My own experience is that I DO feel, deeply and endlessly and that I DO ignore it unless I make the decision to look and notice, to sit with my feelings and learn them.
I really wish readers would understand the difference between the legitimate process of writing in generalities and the irrational process of speaking in absolutes. You write in generalities and that’s fine, it’s that or we only write “facts” as proved by peer reviewed research articles after ten years of research or we write personal anecdotal narratives as if community patterns don’t exist.
As a general rule I’ve found that my anger is a secondary emotion. There are a few situations where it’s primary, where the stimulus actually demands anger as the first response, the healthy response, the response that produces survival actions or change actions. Other than those few and rare moments, my anger is secondary – the moment I notice I’m feeling angry I ask myself, “What’s underneath that anger?”. Usually, for me, it’s “hurt”. So then I ask what hurt me and from there I start learning about myself and about things that are just unavoidable or that might be open to work and evolution.
Kinda strange to give my first response from Shanghai. Apparently holiday space raises my “joining” tendencies. :)
Bludog.
I like that you point out again and again that social conditioning has so much power. I could not agree more. I also agree with other commenters that we choose to accept that conditioning, and it is true that it is socially unacceptable to show one’s emotions. I think that’s incredibly sad. One would think emotions are demons set to make us all look (OMG) human.
As to biological make-up, I agree that a person’s gender has nothing (or very little) to do with it. Social conditioning plays a much bigger role, but I would also submit that there is an underlying makeup to a person that has nothing to do with body (either male or female), and this plays a big role as well. There really are people who take heartbreak quietly and deal with it within themselves. They are not conditioned to do so. That’s simply their natures. There really are people who are, by nature, very open emotionally, and when social conditioning comes into play it becomes a nightmare for the persons having this nature to deal with.
I do agree that the question of heartbreak is really more a question of grief and dealing with loss, and that this is indeed a dull, constant pain that stays with a person from start to finish.
I dislike the idea that women have more permission to express grief and heartbreak than men, although it may also be true. As a woman, I can tell you that this has not been the case for me. So many times I’ve been called a cry-baby, too sensitive, too emotional, too this, too that. I finally realized one day that my emotions were perfectly normal responses to the joys and pains of life, and that it was other people who were having the problem, but those other people’s responses can be quite intense.
Yashar, I’m not sure this as much a gender issue as it is indicative of how individuals deal with grief as it relates to loss. I have witnessed this kind of “easily moving on” behavior in both men and women. What I would propose is that what we might be witnessing is the bargaining and denial faces of grief. “If I move on, I won’t need to be present to the pain of the past loss.” And as you state, just because someone seems to have “moved on” it does not mean that they are not suffering (on some level). The tragedy, however, is when the denial is so deep that the individual never does the work of grieving the loss or doing the deep inner work of asking “What was my part in the failure of this relationship?” They are then doomed to simply repeat the same patterns over and over and over. Those who are “feeling the pain” may take some comfort in knowing that at least they are healing while their former partner who is living in denial, may not be healing at all, but may simply be setting themselves up for more failure. Just a thought.
Lauri Lumby, Spiritual Director, Lay Minister
Authentic Freedom Ministries
Oshkosh, WI
http://yourspiritualtruth.com
Sorry, I don’t buy it. As adults we all have choices about our actions. We all have the choice to conform to societal demands or to muster up the courage to do something different. Women also choose. A woman can choose to be the iron-lady bitch or to open herself to vulnerability and allow herself to feel the agony of heartbreak. You think going through that pain is socially acceptable? You kid yourself. It’s not socially acceptable to be the damaged, blubbering, insane person heartbreak turns one into. Our emotions are only acceptable when they’re pretty little tears men can fix. And yet, many women make the choice to journey through the darkness of heartbreak in spite of it making them ugly and unattractive for a few weeks, months, years.
The men who continue to conform, who choose to take a detour rather than deal, THEY are the pussies.
It’s not as simple as making a choice. It’s not like someone always consciously decides which emotions they’re going to express. Men are used to holding their emotions in, so it’s a habit for them.
I agree that showing too much emotion isn’t exactly socially acceptable for anyone, but this isn’t talking about a woman sobbing in public. This is about going through a grieving process in general.
It’s typical for a man to get a new girlfriend and act like he’s not hurt and it’s understood that the woman will be heartbroken for a while. But if the guy mentioned that he didn’t feel like dating just yet, his friends would probably tell him that he just needs to move on. Men are supposed to brush their exes off as dispensable.
Thank you – LOVE YOUR POST…
I like this article but the last part about the differences being attributed solely to upbringing and culture is highly inaccurate in my opinion. There are vast differences between the biological make-up of a man and a woman and one cannot ignore the influence of those differences on these kinds of behavioral patterns. Yashar, if you read this (or anyone else who is interested), I strongly recommend you read a book called “The Female Brain” by Louann Brizendine. It provides a great analysis of the biological differences between men and women and how those differences also contribute to these kinds of behavioral differences.
Yashar, you attribute the differences between men and women in terms how they think to “social conditioning, not biology.” Is this an absolute in your mind or do you think biology accounts for any differences in how men and women think?
“Who is ultimately suffering when it comes to dealing with heartbreak? The woman who shows and feels emotion, or the man who is silent?”
Yashar, though you have answered this question, I’m going to piggyback. As in, I too think that a man who is silent is suffering more when dealing with heartbreak. But, let’s expand this idea and just say: any party (man/woman) suffers greatly when dealing with heartbreak, if they do not show their emotions.
It’s the doctor to silent patient proverb: A patient walks into the doctor’s office for a checkup and decides not to tell the doctor about the stomach pain recurring in their body. Instead, they wait for the doctor to do a check-up. Well, a couple months later, the stomach pain is actually a tumor and the patient ends up dead.
The same goes for heartbreak. If one (man or woman) does not project the emotions that are bottled from the heartbreak…it will tear them a part. Of course, it’s a cultural thing (of some sort) and I think it’s a learned skill. And, your’e right. There is a high price when no emotion is shared (silence).