Most straight men are traumatized IMO (history of being bullied/ emotionally neglected/told to ignore feelings) and believe me, no woman can fix your childhood wound. Pay for a therapist and treat the woman in your life like a partner, not an employee. https://twitter.com/elithadon_/status/1302648267545739265

You also cannot replace therapy with "talking to friends." First of all, your friends will always project their own trauma. Second, venting is not healing; they do not understand how to heal your pain. Third, friends can say the wrong thing and inadvertently deepen your wound.

This is why I will not date any man who has not specifically been to *therapy* and shown progress from it. Straight men largely have stunted emotional growth unless they do something about it.

You know that thing where someone brings everything back to themselves all the time? That insufferable thing where they center themselves? A lot of men do that. It's not narcissism. It's that they don't feel seen and so they obsessively narrate their own existence and motives.

Some women do it too; we all have known people who drag back everything you say to make it some way to explain themselves. It's equally insufferable. The point is, these people are emotionally stunted and avoidant because they have never had their emotions validated.

Next week in Free Mental Health Corner we can talk about the people who refuse to talk about themselves -- also the same thing! No emotional validation, feeling unseen, emotional neglect pervasive in childhood and in life -- but just know now that it's similar. Go to therapy.

You know that old saying about partnership/marriage being about "having a witness to your life"? That's very true for many straight men. They're taught to do almost everything performatively, as a form of self-advertisement. So: Being unseen/unacknowledged is their identity wound

Anyway consider this the straight men stop messing everyone else up with your trauma and go to therapy challenge

Adding a key thing: The reason a lot of straight men don't know how to take care of other people is because they don't know how to take care of themselves, because they were emotionally neglected by parents, teachers and everyone who came after.

Straight cis men also cannot take care of anyone else because they're so emotionally exhausted by having to front all the time and repressing their emotions. This takes considerable bandwidth. What these men should realize is that with good therapy they can free up that bandwidth

Anyway I very specifically want straight cis men to understand how much is riding on their mental health. It's not about finding woman after woman to put your trauma on. You'll never find (or even see) the right woman as long as you have not had therapy to understand your blocks.

I am putting a lot of weight on therapy here and I should mention: GOOD therapy is important. Bad therapy will keep you in a behavioral loop for years or even decades. Good therapy empowers you to heal yourself and move past your challenges so you're not feeling stuck.

A lot of straight cis men are living in a state of emotional scarcity -- feeling like they never have enough care, time, attention for themselves. That comes from emotional neglect as kids. They become emotional hoarders, in a sense, to fill up that well of neglect.

This is a good book that, IMO, all straight cis men should read. It's very healing. You will feel very seen.

I mean, you're stuck with yourself in a pandemic, you might as well learn how to befriend yourself. Really befriend yourself, I mean, with compassion and useful self-talk and understanding your triggers. Not bluster and self-narration. You're not a character on a TV show.