Male check
On that post below on International Women’s Day and the United Nations Commission studying women’s issues these past two weeks, Carmen sent in a note wondering why there’s no International Men’s Day. He may be only half joking, and it does touch something I’ve said on the air and in print. Men are getting bashed in our culture quite a bit, and we should be paying more attention to the male role as well as the female, in bringing ourselves into some sort of right order.
After all, remember “male and female He made them”?
Newsweek magazine devoted its cover story last week to men and depression, which is a much larger problem than people generally think. The article notes that the common impression is that women are more prone to depression, and we’re only now learning how devastating depression is among the population of college students. But as the article states, several times over, men are loathe to talk about their feelings, especially if they’re feeling bad.
Six million American men will be diagnosed with depression this year. But millions more suffer silently, unaware that their problem has a name or unwilling to seek treatment. In a confessional culture in which Americans are increasingly obsessed with their health, it may seem clichéd—men are from Mars, women from Venus, and all that—to say that men tend not to take care of themselves and are reluctant to own up to mental illness. But the facts suggest that, well, men tend not to take care of themselves and are reluctant to own up to mental illness. Although depression is emotionally crippling and has numerous medical implications—some of them deadly—many men fail to recognize the symptoms. Instead of talking about their feelings, men may mask them with alcohol, drug abuse, gambling, anger or by becoming workaholics. And even when they do realize they have a problem, men often view asking for help as an admission of weakness, a betrayal of their male identities.
The result is a hidden epidemic of despair that is destroying marriages, disrupting careers, filling jail cells, clogging emergency rooms and costing society billions of dollars in lost productivity and medical bills. It is also creating a cohort of children who carry the burden of their fathers’ pain for the rest of their lives. The Gary Cooper model of manhood—what Tony Soprano called “the strong, silent type” to his psychiatrist, Dr. Melfi—is so deeply embedded in our social psyche that some men would rather kill themselves than confront the fact that they feel despondent, inadequate or helpless. “Our definition of a successful man in this culture does not include being depressed, down or sad,” says Michael Addis, chair of psychology at Clark University in Massachusetts.
Time to change these expectations, because they hurt all of us. News coverage like this helps, but what helps most is the great honesty and witness of sufferers who share their experiences. It tells countless others the earth-shaking news that they’re not suffering alone, and it gives hope and dignity to literally everyone from the sufferer to the person who benefits from hearing how they overcame or treated it.
As awareness of the problem grows—among the public and medical professionals alike—the stigma surrounding male depression is beginning to lift. New tools for diagnosing the disease—which ranges from the chronic inability to feel good, to major depression, to bipolar disorder—and new approaches to treating it, offer hope for millions. And as scientists gain insight into how depression occurs in the brain, their findings are spurring research into an array of new treatments including faster-acting, more-effective drugs that could benefit those who struggle with what Winston Churchill called his “black dog.”
Accompanying this story, Newsweek ran a box across the bottom of two pages with the heading “A Common Condition” that named famous men who have battled depression. It included Abraham Lincoln, Ernest Hemingway, VP Candidate Thomas Eagleton, NFL player and commentator Terry Bradshaw, media star Mike Wallace, and comedian Drew Carey, among others. There shouldn’t be a stigma to add to what someone is already suffering. But as more people speak out, we’re realizing how common the suffering is, and that it doesn’t need to be.
Social attitudes toward depression are changing, thanks in part to men themselves. John Aberle is a sales and marketing consultant, retired Air Force security specialist, part-time radio talk-show host, devoted husband, active father and a 6-foot-4, 250-pound body-builder who twice faced a depression so deep, he cried on his knees. He readily tells other men it’s their duty to get better. “There’s no crime in having a disorder, whatever it is,” says Aberle, 38. “The crime is not dealing with it. It’s your responsibility to be at the top of your game.” Taking care of yourself physically, mentally and emotionally—maybe that’s the real definition of what it means to be a man.
That’s a big part of the definition. Here’s much more. Our boys and young men will develop healthy identities and strength of character with the influence of male role models who are champions of those values.