The Have a Quickie Blog

On the front page of today’s New York Times is an article revealing how a couple’s fighting style effects them physically. For men, keeping quiet during a fight didn’t have any measurable effect on their health. But women who didn’t speak their minds in those fights were four times as likely to die during the 10-year study period as women who always told their husbands what they were thinking.

Got that? FOUR TIMES AS LIKELY TO DIE if you don’t speak up! Yikes. In the interest of my own health, it makes me want to go yell at Mark–even though I’m not mad at him.

And what exactly are these “self-silencers” suffering from? Well, they say women who stay quiet can end up with depression, eating disorders and heart disease, confirming what we’ve always kind of known. That swallowing negative emotions and shutting down isn’t good for us (well, us women) and that it is actually healthy to tell our men off now and then, particularly if it is deserved. I’m not advocating nagging. No, not that. I’m talking about saying that something is bothering you when it is. Getting it out. Talking it through. Well, after you have a good shout.

I know those women, plenty of them, who do suck it up, claiming that they’re just trying to keep the peace. Or they fear their volatile husbands and are simply afraid to speak up. You know them, too right? Those women who do and do and do some more. And even when their husbands stop, they keep doing. Quietly. They are often the women who work outside the home and still carry out about 80 percent of the household chores. They take care of the kids, fill out the PTO forms while putting in the 12th load of laundry. They call the sitters, pay the bills, make the social plans and are forever sucking it up, even if they need help.

I’m delighted to report that I don’t fall into this category, but I can see how easily it can happen. Sometimes the path of least resistance really is the easy one. Sometimes, it’s probably even the right one. But apparently it’s not the one to regularly tread.

Because in the end, where does all that sucking it up get you? Resentful. Overtired. Grouchy. Yes, all of those. And, now, you can add to that list: into an early grave.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007 at 10:13 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.