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Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

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Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#111

Post by avtar »

nadermx wrote: post #83
purple-leafy wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is sadly true, my long term partner left me last night. I really thought it would go the distance, and I’m almost not sad - it’s just typical

[flagged]

> And if she leaves me, it's because I failed in some way or another

With all due respect, chances are this view won't be helpful in the long run. It's challenging enough to influence our own minds or predict with certainty what journeys they'll embark on, let alone assume we can be responsible for another person's happiness.

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#112

Post by em-bee »

sosuke wrote: post #58
iterance wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally I'd say I can't imagine living with like, one or two people I turn to for emotional support. Would be a nightmare. I know probably 20 or 30 people I could turn to if I needed something, even just to vent. I wouldn't even necessarily say I'm that close with most of them. It's sort of just... table stakes?

Imagine three other possibilities: You have a dozen people who would give you emotional support but you don't ask for any because you aren't sure you could give emotional support in return. You have a dozen people you think might give you emotional support but you don't want to burden them with your problems. You have a dozen people that would give you emotional support, maybe once, but you are too afraid to burn the…

i have one friend that i can trust to be able to talk to with challenges in my life and especially with challenges in my relationship. i know that because he has been open and sharing many of his personal challenges for by now decades with a group of friends that i am privileged to have been invited to.

for everyone else it is pretty much like you describe. i have probably over time met people from each of those categories. and some of them may actually have turned into real friends that i could trust like this one friend above. but moving around meant that we didn't keep in touch. (and it's worth mentioning that almost none of them are from my home, so without moving around i would not have even met them)

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#113

Post by watwut »

swatcoder wrote: post #105
watwut wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Women do not build these networks by needing frequent emotional support. It is build on mundane stuff, when you do not need support, when no one need support. The emotional support thing is a consequence of building relationships when you do not need help, when you are fine. If you build them only when you need emotional support, you will be perceived as needy and people will get tired of it.

If that's all it was, there'd be no distinction at all. Men, broadly, have plenty of "relationships" that they invest themselves in and are extremely loyaly to. What the study was about, and the discussion is about, is emotional support, and that quality is often not seen (or at least acknowledged) in the intense, loyal, committed, and earnestly worked on relationships that men do form, because its only one quality a…

I get it, but my point was that it is not the frequency of the need that makes the difference. The acts/discussions/whatever that let you find and get comfortable with people able to provide emotional support are happening when no one needs emotional support.

You build emotional support network by building it when you do not need emotional support.

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#114

Post by watwut »

matrix87 wrote: post #54

Once you're an adult, do you even need one in the first place? I'm 24, I don't go to anyone for help pretty much ever, I just follow my own goals. That's gotten me way farther than most people I know I don't think this talk about "male emotional support networks" is actually intended to help men, it's meant to infantilize them. They'd be better off just buying into the nietzschean "support yourself" type of worldview

I think that this ideology is one of reasons why men get less emotional support and why many cant provide it. They cant provided because they don't want to, because they look down on people who want or need it. And consequently they cant really talk openly with other men, because they will look down at them.

> Once you're an adult, do you even need one in the first place?

Yes adults need it. Humans are animals like that.

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#115

Post by Rhapso »

dijit wrote: post #9

Only half? Thats a really wide range too. By 90 it is increasingly likely your spouse and close friends are mostly dead. My emotional support network consists of two people, my long-term partner and my parent(s). My long term partner loves me conditionally (and don’t let anyone fool you into thinking that this is abnormal). Only your parents might love you unconditionally, and they have a pretty decent head start wit…

Loving is the easiest part of having a healthy relationship. Love can be unconditional where a relationship shouldn't be.

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#116

Post by watwut »

constantcrying wrote: post #82
matrix87 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, I talk to friends and family about stuff that's going on. But I don't turn to them for actual advice because usually my own advice is better

I like to talk to my friends about many things, my emotions just do not include that and at no point in my adult life have I ever felt any inclination to do so.

You have never talked about being angry, about being happy? Those are emotions. And I see men writing about feeling lonely on hacker news all the time.

Developers talk about being frustrated by tasks. Frustration is an emotion.

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#117

Post by bowsamic »

dijit wrote: post #93
horrible-hilde wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you even want unconditional love? Are you planning on abusing and taking advantage of your spouse? People who want this are not ready for marriage.

Maybe I want to be vulnerable sometimes, or weak sometimes, or to have unfinished opinions on things and be listened to in good faith without risking an entire relationship because I would like to talk about it. Like privacy, people can come up with nice catch-alls like “nothing to hide”, but the default is not abuse.

You can have that with conditional love. It sounds like your marriage is just bad

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#118

Post by drdec »

constantcrying wrote: post #90
drdec wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's right in the name, it helps you handle and process your emotions.

I can do that on my own perfectly fine.

That's fine that it is not for you.

(Username does not check out)

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#119

Post by drdec »

some_furry wrote: post #110
drdec wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had none for a very long time. Happy to report I have someone now. Your dismissal of people with small emotional support networks angers me if I'm being honest.

> Your dismissal of people with small emotional support networks That's not what I was doing. Like, I'm an extreme introvert. Most people are more extroverted than I am. Despite this, I have more than two close friends. Whatever's causing some people to have small emotional support networks is something that should be studied by scientists, rather than taken for granted like this article does. Preventing unnecessary…

Thanks for responding and clarifying. My apologies for misreading your intent.

Re: Emotional support across adulthood: A 60-year study of men’s social networks

#120

Post by acuozzo »

formerly_proven wrote: post #47
supportengineer wrote: post #22

We get an emotional support network? Nobody told me.

I know it's supposed to be a joke but it actually encapsulates one of the core issues about this already on the language level, men thinking they'd "get" something out of thin air. Do you think women have 31.41x larger emotional support networks out of thin air? Of course not, they put the effort in. Men don't.

It's a problem of the commons.

It's particularly hard to bootstrap. You can take the plunge, attempt to open up to dozens of different guy-"friends", and repeatedly run into replies like "sucks, bro" or even "man up".

I have a hobby which exposes me regularly to men of different ages, backgrounds, financial circumstances, etc. This seems to be the case for all of them.

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