On December 24th, 2008 I was almost 21 and drinking wine at my Grandma’s house with my family. We were having a good time. I don’t really talk to that side of the family anymore though. I got a phone call from my best friend, Kyle. I joking let my uncle answer. Kyle asked to talk to me. He sounded angry.
The next few words he said were like a a fucking nuclear bomb that seared my fucking brain for life. He said, “NineMileTower, Steve died (in Iraq). A bridge gave out, his hummer flipped, and he drowned.”
That was in 2008. I’m 37 now. I have two beautiful girls and an amazing wife. I think of Steve all the time. I ask myself, “Why do I deserve these amazing kids, wife and life, and he had to die?”
I fucking hate Christmas. I hate the stupid music. I hate fake bullshit decorations. I hate that I’m supposed to pretend that every Christmas it doesn’t fucking kill me that he isn’t here. I’m here enjoying my kids and their holiday and he’s dead.
I fucking hate Christmas.
You don’t hate christmas, you hate that christmas reminds you of the loss of your friend.
You’re not “supposed to pretend that it doesn’t kill you that” your friend isnt there. It sounds like you’ve learnt a horrible toxic idea that men aren’t allowed to be emotional or that crying or being sad is weak, or that you have to bottle this up.
You need to allow yourself to grieve. I can understand hiding this from young children, but that doesn’t mean bottling it up entirely. Tall to your wife. Think about ways you could express and release this each year - maybe set a day aside to remember him and celebrate him with other friends?
And maybe think about therapy in the new year - you need to learn how to process and express how you feel, not bottle it up and let it eat your up with resentment and hate. It’s misdirected and is harming you and potentially your loved ones each year.
Would your friend want you to remember him by being miserable and resentful during the holidays? Or would he want you to remember the good times and share why you loved him and missed him with other people so they can know what a great guy he was?
I call bs in the “you’re not allowed to be emotional” you can repeat that all the times you want, but as a man, ESPECIALLY as a family man, you can’t be emotional. You’re the rock of the family and society stomps on weak men.
“Who cares what society thinks!” Unless you live in the woods or middle of nowhere you should care, the way people treat you and “use you” depends of how strong you look. That affects even the way they look at your family.
As a family man, I say fuck that toxic masculinity bullshit. We can improve our society. I’m not going to teach my kid emotions are bad. Sure, there are times to keep them in check, but it’s really unhealthy to just ignore your feelings.
Having the courage to talk about your own feelings is a sign of strength. Letting others control your life is weak.
I have definitely regretted talking openly about my feelings with a partner. It damaged the relationship because she was frustrated and not very understanding.
I don’ thind it matters who you talk to. I think that if noone in your life wants to listen or talk about how you feel, then you should get some new people in your life who will.
You can’t get a new family
I’ve spent many hours on the therapist’s couch and in group therapy. They’ve taught me mindfulness strategies that work on processing how I feel. This has made life dramatically simpler for me. The hard part in life for me now is just the one that’s always been hard: food, rent, bills. As for all other feelings? I know what I want and what to do about it. I’m very much at peace.
If your partner doesn’t properly value your feelings and doesn’t support you in your vulnerable moments, that is a bad sign for the relationship.
The point is many women are also impacted by toxic masculinity and will not positively receive their guy opening up / crying.
It’s not just a “be yourself dude” dynamic for many, many men.
For better or worse everyone in their orbit expects a certain behavior
That relationship is over but that wasn’t the reason it ended. My point is that my willingness to share my feelings wasn’t seen as a sign of strength and I wasn’t supported for doing so. The relationship actually worked better for quite a while after that when I learned to take care of my own feelings (as I do now as a single person).
I think we as a society idealize one type of relationship where your partner is everything to you: lover, best friend, therapist, mentor, tennis partner… It’s not realistic and I think it’s a major reason so few relationships succeed nowadays. Most people are simply not equipped to be all those things for another person.
strongly describes how most women treat men.