Sorry ladies, we really don't know how you feel

Ladies, if I may, I would like to offer some free relationship advice.
I would like to talk about communication between men and women - neither of whom actually speak the same language.
Men can communicate, but not in the same way you ladies can. When guys get together there is tremendous communication about important things like hockey, cars, the job and other matters men can relate to one another about.
What men rarely talk about is emotions.
"Y'know Bob, when you said my moustache looked cheesy, it made me feel all bad inside. It made me feel less attractive."
"I'm sorry Frank, I meant it as a joke. C'mere, gimme a hug. I love you, man."
I have never, and I mean ever, been a part of such a conversation and I have been a guy for as long as I can remember.
Because men rarely talk to each other about emotions and feelings and all that gooey stuff, we are not very good at talking to our spouses about those same topics.
Women talk freely about their feelings and emotions and how their emotions make them feel.
Practice makes perfect, and when it comes to talking about inner-most feelings, men are sadly out of practice, while women could make it an Olympic event.
My wife could easily make the national team on sharing feelings, while I would be relegated to the water boy.
So here is where I will impart my meagre wisdom upon the world whether they want it or not.
When it comes to talking about feelings and emotions, ladies, I implore you to talk slowly, use simple terms and most importantly of all never assume we know how you feel, because we don't - ever.
It is not that men are dumb (I know, there's lots of room for argument there), or we don't care (still more room), it's just we can't pick up subtle hints the lady in our life thinks is a blaring clue as to what is wrong.
If there is a problem, subtle hints work about as well as trying to knock out an elephant with a feather.
But if you say it in simple, straight-forward terms, the chances are much better our man brains will be able to connect with that little, tiny, minuscule part of our gray matter that controls emotions.
Yes, men (most men anyway) do have an area where they can look at and examine their emotions. It is typically buried under a pile of brain clutter consisting of information about motorcycles, hockey, movies and why beer and nachos are possibly the greatest food combination ever devised by the human race.
But once you get through all that stuff, the emotional brain does exist. Subtle hints have little chance of penetrating the man brain and getting past all the other stuff we men find interesting and important.
Not that our significant other's feelings are not important, they are, honest, really, I mean that, but over the centuries men have had to concern themselves with matters other than our emotions such as hunting for food, defending their land from attacking hoards and watching the play offs.
I doubt there is a man alive, now or through out the history of time, who has not had the line, 'Well you should know how I feel' dropped on them.
We don't know. It's that simple.
After more than two decades of marriage, I can tell when something is bothering my wife, but she has also learned after 27 years subtle hints don't work and the direct approach is most often used, thus allowing me to detect how she is feeling.
See how it works? My wife tells me how she is feeling and I recognize how she is feeling and then we have a big, happy talk about how she is feeling, I apologize for whatever it was that made her feel that way and life can get on as normal.

Copyright 2015, Darren Handschuh

Yes dear, you're right, I'm sorry - and repeat until discussion is over

Relationships can be tricky things. There are multiple factors at work at any given time that can influence, impact or in general screw things up.
There are the easy things to deal with like what to have for supper, what movie to watch and other trivial daily topics.
But then there are the more in depth and challenging aspects of a relationship which encompass a much wider and complicated relationship realm. There are children to raise, money to carefully spend, households to run and many things to apologize for.
Past issues tend to press their way into the present and can often create challenges and difficulties for years, even decades depending on what the problems are and the willingness of everyone to deal with those problems.
Niether side is innocent of these issues even if they won't admit it. The problem I have found is women are much better at expressing their feelings and therefore have an unfair advantage over us somewhat emotionally diminished men when it comes to discussing things.
It's not really our fault though. Throughout time, the vaginally challenged members of society have had the role of hunting, gathering and protecting the rest of the village from bad guys intent on doing bad things.
You do not need a lot of emotional enhancement to club a marauding raider over the head, or spear a mammoth for dinner. You need a thick skull and a strong arm.
Emotions were not going to help you stop a charging sabretoothed tiger, brute strength would. The tiger or marauders are not going sit down and 'talk it out.'
It is with that influence of ancient lineage that modern man finds himself severely outgunned in the communication department.
While modern man no longer has to fend off attacking hordes of nasties - well, not around here anyway - thousands of years of the emotionless, warrior mindset has put us at a slight disadvantage in the modern world we find ourselves in.
There are not a lot of sabretoothed tigers running around anymore, so men have had to play catch up in the emotions department.
Suddenly, men need to be in touch with their feelings, to be sensitive, to be able to express themselves in a way a woman can understand. And by the way, if anyone out there knows how to do that, let me know - please. No really I mean it, send me a note because I have had as much success in that area as a one-armed juggler,
I have, however, learned there are six words that can make a huge difference when having an, er, um 'discussion' with your significant other. "Yes dear," "You're right," and "I'm sorry" if said often enough and with an air of honesty to them, will end just about any 'discussion.'
Sure, it may not resolve the issue for the man, but at least it sort of an emotional response - sort of. And it will bring peace to your home - which is really the end goal of any 'discussion.'
And what can you expect from a gender that spent centuries being hard, cold and emotionless.
Ladies have generations upon generation of sharing emotions and us men have some serous catching up to do because we are all now supposed to be one with our feelings.
So ladies, if we don't gush with words of emotional sentiment or show a deep understanding of how you or we feel, all I can say is "Yes dear" "You're right," and "I'm sorry."