This article makes a point that too often we automatically blame men because they are not more like women and assume they need to be fixed.  

Give Your Husband a Break  
 
Article by Jim Stephens on material by Scott Haltzman
 
Dr. Scott Haltzman, a psychiatrist, thinks that married men are being held to a female standard. "They're being prodded to communicate in ways they find exceedingly uncomfortable, and then they get blamed for stuttering and squirming."
 
As Haltzman sees it, men are naturally -- indeed, biologically -- inclined to express themselves through action rather than words.
 
But women, and often the therapists who work with troubled couples, expect men to just get over it, and learn to talk and talk -- to share intimate feelings that many aren't even sure they have. 
 
Haltzman's angle is that married men deserve more credit for all they do, and more acceptance for who they are. 
 
"Men are OK the way they are," Haltzman asserts. "They really get a bad rap for their style of doing things. Society these days says that men have to be fixed." 
 
Haltzman says he's trying to advocate the view that we shouldn't make men feel intrinsically inadequate. 
 
Haltzman says that in his own work with couples, he keeps seeing the same patterns. It goes like this:
 
She says, "He doesn't talk. He doesn't listen. He doesn't pay attention." He says, "I can't communicate in the way she wants. I show her that I love her by what I do."
 
Haltzman tells about a conversation he had with a therapist who suggested that a troubled couple set aside a half-hour every night just to talk. Haltzman said he shot back: "Why didn't you say, 'Go home and set aside a half hour each night to have sex'?" By emphasizing talk, Haltzman argues, the therapist was forcing the man into the arena where he is least comfortable, and least capable, while asking little of the woman.
 
"Men may not be able to easily recognize their feelings and communicate their feelings to their wives in a supportive way." Women are setting up an expectation that men need to become like women. It won't work.
 
"I want to pull away from the automatic expectation that the way to correct the problem is to change men."
 
"No one is turning to women and saying, 'If you just tried harder you should be able to bench press 400 pounds.' On the other hand, everyone is turning to men and saying, 'Just work harder at changing this.' "
 
But Haltzman says there's plenty of evidence that men's brains work differently than women's. For example, he says, brain scans using positron emission tomography (PET scanning) show that men's and women's brains respond in different ways when recalling words connected with emotions.
 
In any case, Haltzman doesn't seem to want to tip the power balance within marriage. Rather, he wants men to feel strong and worthy within the existing structure.
 
Women, he says, should accept men as they are, give them credit for their actions, and express more of their appreciation. Then, once in a while, do things his way: "Sit in front of the TV watching a sporting game and not talk. Play a card game and not talk. It really makes a man comfortable."
 
But even if a woman can't or won't do those things, men can -- and should -- do what's needed to preserve the marriage, Haltzman says. For starters he advises men to listen. When she's telling you something, don't answer back for three or four minutes.
 
"At very tense times, you might send her flowers, even if you don't actually feel the romantic sentiment." While some might call such a gesture insincere and manipulative, Haltzman says that a man who sends flowers even when feeling unromantic is saying something much bigger than the sweet nothings: He's saying that he recognizes his wife needs such tokens, that he's committed to her, and that her happiness is important to him. 
 
"Those are things that men rarely get credit for," Haltzman said. "We men have an intense honor and sense of loyalty to our wives." 
 
If it's important to your wife that you hang your tie in the closet when you get home, rather than draping it over a chair, he says, then hang the darn tie in the closet. In doing that, you're not agreeing that it really matters where the tie ends up. You're merely showing that you want to make her happy.

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