MEN’S
Is heartbreak harder for
men?
D
o you think it's only women who feel that awful
pit in their stomach seeing their ex with someone
else? Even the toughest of men can turn into 'wet
noodles'. Whoever said that women were the only ones
to bereave a failed romance did not know that men too
are vulnerable to heartbreaks. Have you forgotten about
the famous Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's Devdas
who left his family and took to alcohol, grieving over his
lost love? Well, characters like these are just not born
out of imagination. Research proves that men are prone
to hit the hardest when they fail in their love life.A recent
study by Professor Robin Simon at Wake Forest University, North Carolina revealed that men benefit more
than women from the good aspects of a relationship
and hence when they are dumped or the relationship
does not work out it tends to affect them more. A classic
example would be of the retired boxer Mike Tyson who
revealed in a US chat show that he was devastated 20
years back when he saw his ex-wife Robin Givens get
out of a car, arm-in-arm with actor Brad Pitt. He said, "I
went from a hard stallion to a wet noodle."
It hurts their ego
Relationship experts say that men are more affected
when a relation does not work out in their favour. Says
Dr Rajan Bhonsle, relationship expert, "Men are very
calculative when they are in a relationship. They look
at both the sides good and the bad. So when the relationship fails and the girl moves on, it makes them feel
defeated and lost."
Guarded about their emotions
Researchers explain that when a relation tends to fall
apart it has greater impact on a man's own sense of
self-worth. Unlike women, men find it difficult to vent out
their feelings to their friends or family. Says relationship
expert, Seema Hingorrany, "It is a myth that only women
suffer more from heartbreak. Men are more prone to
heartbreaks since their ego and self-worth is often questioned when his relationship does not work out."She explains that a man is very secretive about his feelings. He
tends to keep it within himself till the time he cannot get
over it completely. She says, "Men hardly cry over failed
romances. But they show various types of withdrawal
symptoms like not eating well, getting aggressive, immersing themselves in extra work, not sleeping, "Once a
man suffers a heartbreak, he tends to judge every other
girl or relationship. After a bad experience the next time
he does not fall in love with his heart but his head. This
is one of the reasons why he keeps comparing and calculating between each relationship."
Strong attachments
A man takes a longer time to get emotionally attached to
his partner but when he does, he gets deeply involved.
When he falls in love with a girl, he tends to become too
protected about her and cannot bear it if she falls out of
love with him. To top it, if the girl starts seeing an attractive guy, the man takes it too personally. Says Bhonsle,
"It's almost like a personal failure to him. This makes it
all the more difficult for them to move on."
44 | BOOM