Brain Science: Why Do Men Stonewall?

When a woman doesn’t understand the way a male brain works, she risks fostering an extremely destructive male response, something that researchers call stonewalling.

Gary Thomas is right!  I don’t know how many times I’ve pressed and pressed and pressed my husband to talk to me talk to me talk to me… especially if I can tell he is upset by something. Little did I know, I was triggering this stonewalling response from him. I thought that because it’s helpful for me to talk through emotional conflict, that it must also be helpful for him to talk through emotional conflict… BOY WAS I WRONG!

When men stonewall (shut down emotionally and verbally, withdrawing from the conversation and from the other person) women get irritated and hurt… why does it happen like this and how do we work to prevent this scenario?

Tip of the Day:  Talk less

I know, I know… sometimes we feel like we barely get to talk to our man enough! The first thing we need to realize is that our man does not and cannot complete us. Sure, we make great partners, great friends, great lovers, great parents, but we need more than just each other. We need a whole community. Yeadon is happy to give me time to talk on the phone with or hang out with my mom and my girlfriends, because he knows I need people to talk and talk and talk and talk with.

Surprise, surprise, because of the way women’s brains work, talking through emotional issues releases oxytocin into our system and calms us down.  I’m glad to know I’m not just a crazy over-analyzer… We women need to keep in mind though, that talking through emotional issues has the opposite effect on most men. The male cardiovascular system has much more reactive to stress than ours, and is also slower to recover from stress. It literally hurts men to talk through emotional experiences, which explains why they often resort to stonewalling as an act of self-defense. No, it’s not a very healthy response, so maybe we can help our men resist stonewalling by criticizing and complaining less. We can be more gentle in our requests and responses, and more conserve our words a bit more.

As a side note that ties both this post and my last post together… When I first read all of this, I felt rather defeated! "I can’t talk through conflict with my husband right away?! I can’t just let words pour out of me without any filter?! How am I going to survive? That seems like torture!"

While talking with some other women about it, we came up with a twofold response, a way to both give our men the time and verbal rest they need, and to allow us women to vent immediately.

1) Pray. We can talk to God immediately and He certainly won’t be overwhelmed by our verbal barrage of emotions! When I have to give Yeadon time, it’s time for me to connect with God and pour my heart out to Him. I believe he is the only one who truly completes me, not any one person.

2) Call another woman. When I can’t wait, and I need another person to talk to, I call up a close friend, one I can vent everything to and who I know will encourage me in my marriage.

3) After half a day or so has passed, if it's an issue you feel still needs to be discussed with your man, ask him when would be a good time to talk about it and move forward from there.

Coincidentally, I have been pleased to see that when I make an effort to not word vomit all over my husband all of the time, he is more willing to have good long talks about life with me (maybe because he trusts I won’t start criticizing him or keep pressing him to continue the conversation when he needs a break)!

Disclaimer:  I am not attempting to give men a free pass to be jerks. My goal is to help women understand what’s going on in our men’s minds so that we can have reasonable expectations, and move forward from there. In a marriage, both the man and the woman are going to have to realize that we work differently and learn to be compassionate toward one another, step out of our comfort zone a bit, and make a conscious effort to bless the other in a way that is felt by the other to be a blessing. I am simply writing for women, about our part; obviously the man needs to work at the relationship too.