I don’t know what to talk about

27 Jan I don’t know what to talk about

Finding the words, finding the space to talk

“I’m not sure why I’m here. My wife said I should speak to someone”.

Jackson was silent for a while. He looked around my office, taking in the space around and between us. His eyes rested on a painting behind me. It’s a print by Didier Lourenço called Paseo. People are milling around in the picture as if they are floating in fog. Jackson won’t have seen the other objects in the room. Most people don’t until they start to see parts of themselves that they’ve hidden, and then the room reveals its contents.

Jackson looked at me as if waiting for a question. There was a sense of sadness about him. While he said he didn’t know why he was here, there was something underlying that he seemed not able to escape.  As I uncrossed my legs, I asked, “What does your wife see in you that she is worried about?” He looked at me, a little apprehensive as his brown eyes narrowed, then widened as he tried not to become emotional. “She thinks I haven’t dealt with the trauma in my childhood. She thinks it’s affecting me now”.

“Can you tell me more about what’s affecting you?”

Jackson went on to explain that he’s secretly started to drink. It’s his escape. He feels relaxed when he drinks. The problem, he explained, was the day after a late night of drinking. His work suffered, which made him more anxious, and so he started to plan when he might have his next drink to escape.

When Jackson has a drink, he disappears. This was the concern his wife had.  He wasn’t himself, and he wasn’t with the family.  He would say, “I’ve got some work to do”, and disappear into his office to do some “research” for his job. This involved having a quarter bottle of whiskey and watching YouTube for inspiration. It would be his end-of-the-week “treat”, but the end of the week started to extend into the week and weekend to include drinking “socially”. Jackson said he hadn’t talked to anyone else before about how he felt conflicted. He loved his wife and children but didn’t know how to change. He said I was the first person he’s told about his excessive drinking.

When Jackson stopped talking, he looked at me worried again and said, “I’m not sure what else to talk about”.

This happens to most men. They don’t know how to talk about the areas of their life that have disturbed them until someone or something happens to jerk them into seeing someone about their problems.

Men often think they can manage their problems with a quick fix. We* try to find an easy solution to most things. When it comes to our mental or physical well-being, we often look for the answers on the outside rather than the inside.

Looking at ourselves and our minds can be scary. And it’s not always an easy fix, especially if the problem has been “hidden” for a while. When it comes to how we think and feel, men are good at avoiding what they really should confront. It feels like a challenge, a fight, “it’s not the way men deal with things”.

In most situations, men have heard that men don’t talk. Women do the talking. This is a misconception about men. Men can talk. They can talk really well about most things. But when it comes to our most profound, darkest problems, we skirt around the edges for a while, and then the problem manifests into something else. Sometimes, something worse. It can affect how we feel. It can bring about anxiety, depression, relationship difficulties, sexual problems, substance dependencies, compulsions that feel out of control, and many more issues that feel they might ease how we feel but become disturbing problems in themselves, causing a whole load of shit for us. Men talk themselves out of problems. “Oh, it’s OK, I can handle this on my own,” “Stop nagging, I’ll go and see someone,” “I’m fine”, and then you go quiet or in a “mood”.

If you are a man, you know why you aren’t talking.  You know why you are frightened of “opening up”. It can be excruciating. But you need to think about why it’s so difficult.  Everyone has their worries, but men don’t talk to men, women, or their partners about what might be going on. The problem is that most men aren’t being honest with themselves.  Whether it’s pride, social conditioning, learned behaviour, peer pressure, fear, humiliation, guilt, anxiety, shame, awkwardness, embarrassment, or any other number of negative associations. We have a personal narrative that suggests we need to keep to what we know, but part of this is unavailable to use when it comes to talking. It’s an unconscious decision that is embedded in the script we have adopted from our family, friends or other influences. Men are more likely to talk to a stranger than to their romantic partner because we have this narrative hidden in us that says there is a personal risk in talking about something personal to the one we love.

“You mentioned your wife was concerned that your childhood is affecting you now. Can you tell me a bit about what she thinks might have gone on in your past that she’s concerned about?”

“She thinks I’m getting stressed more for some reason. She also thinks I’m angrier with our son”. He looked regretful saying this. “Can you tell me what you mean?”

Jackson recalled how his parents interacted with him. When his father returned from work, Jackson would have to do his homework with his father. His father would shout at Jackson and his brother for not doing it right. “Not that way! You’re useless.” Jackson drifted away as he recalled his experiences with his father and how he hated his father being cruel.

“What was your father like?”

Jackson said his father worried about everything. His father would work long hours and work away from home for days, which Jackson recalls as a quiet time he could relax. Jackson’s father now calls Jackson for advice, which his father doesn’t listen to. This frustrates Jackson.

“His father, my grandfather, were the same. When we visited my grandparents, my father and grandfather would argue into the night. I would hear them shouting when I was in bed. It upset me.”

“Are you worried that your relationship with your son is going to turn out the same as theirs or yours with your father?”

“I hope not, but I am worried about it. I snap and tell my son off for the slightest things, especially when we have dinner.” Jackson and his family have dinner together most nights. Jackson sits beside his son and looks at his daughter and wife opposite him, whom he adores, but doesn’t want them to see him act the way his father did to him with his son.

“When I pick on him, I can see myself getting angry. I want to disappear as I know how it feels to be my son. I’m scared of who I become.”

“How would you feel if you sat facing your son at dinner?”

“We all have the same seating position. It would seem strange to change places. Why do you ask?”

“I was wondering what it would be like to face your son, to see yourself in his position. To see how you could be a different father to him, to ask questions that you wished your father would have asked you, to create an opportunity to do something different.”

Jackson shifted in his seat, then said, “I can try. I want to do something different. My father only told me what he wanted. He didn’t ask questions about me. He only criticised what I didn’t do well”.

Jackson drifted away again.

“What do you do with your son that you never did with your father?”

Jackson talked about how he loved to take his son to all the sports games his son liked to play, and Jackson would watch the matches from the sidelines. They watched films together and told each other jokes. They read together and would share what they enjoyed from their reading.

“We do a lot more together than I ever did with my father”.

“What would it be like to do more of these things together with your son, and your daughter and wife? All the things that you enjoy doing together instead of disappearing into yourself and out of the room to drink.”

“I think I would like that. I need to start somewhere.”

“How are you feeling now?”

“I feel a bit lighter, a little more hopeful”.

“Would you like to come back again so we can talk more?”

“Yes, that would be good. But what will we talk about?”

“There’s always something to talk about, even if you think there isn’t”.

“I guess there is. More than I thought.”

*I use “we” to include myself as a man.

Jackson is an amalgam of men I’ve seen over the years with the same issues, scenario and narrative. He is more than one person with the same difficulties. He might be you.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

This post is an extract from the book I am writing about men.