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Do you think there is a difference between how males and females handle breakups?


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I was reading something a while ago and it talked about how men generally handle breakups worse than women. Women tend to feel heartbreak intensely in the initial weeks but then come out of it much quicker than a man does.

 

I don't know how much truth there is to that, but it does seem possible that there are some gender/evolutionary differences between how the sexes respond to breaking up.

 

My theory is women, especially attractive ones, have much more opportunity to find a new partner very quickly after a breakup. Men, even attractive ones, don't have those options in quite the same way. A lot of men after a brutal breakup will start at ground zero and have to build themselves back up so they can even just approach women again.

 

I think it's universal knowledge that women also tend to lean towards the emotional, and men tend to lean towards the visual. From my experience women have an uncanny ability to switch off their emotions and direct it to someone new very quickly. It's like a laser beam. I don't think men have that in their emotional toolkit. So for women it's somewhat easier to step into the next relationship where they are getting those emotions from. For men though, I think not only are we poor regulators of our emotion, but we're also not built in a way to shift our emotions onto someone else. Our ability to emotionally detach is poor, especially if we consider the girl to very visually attractive. It's not easy to replace attractive women that we also connect with. I think this also explains why you see many somewhat attractive women with just average looking guys - they're just providing the right emotions that the woman values so highly.

 

btw, I'm not suggesting that men have it worse than women, just how each sex might react to the breakup.

 

So, do you think there is any gender difference to how a breakup is handled or is this just all nonsense?

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That is interesting. I would have thought the exact opposite but it's opened my eyes.

 

I would think most men would get over it sooner because the guys I knew seemed to act so cool about a break up. They would just got out with their buddies, get drunk, and chase women. (not my type of social circle anymore by the way) Now I see it was likely just a way to avoid their feelings.

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'Statistically'...7 times out of 10 it is the female that ends a relationship.

 

They are able to 'vacate' the relationship over a course of months by slowly coming to terms with the fact that you and her and no longer 'compatible'. They can therefore begin to accept the situation. Sex starts to happen 'less often', random arguments flare up over nothing...until the inevitable 'we need to talk' line comes out (unless you're like my ex and you just decide to leave without a word and never speak again, haha).

 

So, by the time the breakup happens, the lady in your life has already 'left' (emotionally). This is why they can appear so unbelievably cold, calculated and emotionally vacant. Men are left 'wondering' what the hell happened. And because of this, it takes A LONG time for the guy to 'catch up' to where his (now 'ex') partner is 'at'.

 

I'm talking 'statistics' here, so don't shoot me down, ladies. Haha. Guy A gets ditched on Christmas day and spends two months trying to get Girl A back into his life. Guy A fails. Guy A begins to try and 'heal' in February. Girl A (who ditched his as*) started to 'leave' the relationship (emotionally) in October. The 'we need to talk' chat is the 'end game' for Girl A. She's weighed up her options. She's spoke with friends and family. She's made her decision. She's done. She can begin to look at you as a 'friend' the moment she has decided 'it's not working as 'lovers''.

 

I am 'involved' in this situation right now. I went out with friends on Saturday. A friend of friend was drunk and 'confided' in me (I wish she hadn't). Girl 'A' is done. She's been with my friend for six years. They looked happy enough on Saturday. I'm now just waiting for the Facebook updates to start (because apparently she's giving him 'the talk' this week). I feel awful for him. Last time we spoke he was considering popping the question... It's going to hit him like a freight train. But she's doing what's best for her and coming to terms with it first. It sucks, but we're all human. I want to 'tip him off' but it's none of my business. He'll be crying into his beer next weekend and I will have to pretend I didn't know (I truly wish I didn't).

 

That's my take. 70% of the time the female ends the relationship. And when she does, it was over a long time before the guy even realised there was a relationship-ending-problem. So even if it takes exactly the same amount of time to 'heal', 70% of the time, the gal gets a massive 'head start'...

 

Peace

Edited by A_New_Earth
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If you happen to find where you read it, it would be nice if you can send a link for everyone to read.

 

I find it interesting, but I think it's a little too generalising to divide everyone by gender.

 

I had a discussion yesterday with one of my male friends (I'm female) about break ups. My ex broke up with me two days ago and I moved out yesterday. I told my friend that I have never felt this heartbroken before, and it may sound like something everyone would say, but I have been in six relationships before and two of them has been more than 3 years long. I have never felt this with the previous ones, a little sad ofc but not to the extent that it feels like I'm dying and having panic attacks. He said he had the same. He has also been in several relationships and there were one who he truly deeply loved, unlike the other which he felt love for, but not like this. He said he spend a week off from work crying and another one crying at work. He had anxiety and felt physically ill, the exact same as I do. Overall he told me that after a month he finally stopped crying at a daily base. But would continue on to be sad for an additional 3 months with anxiety.

 

My ex told me, when he broke up, that he had lost love interest in me already a couple of months ago. I did notice that something was off, but was in denial. There were lack of sex, cuddle and he would be out partying more. I though he was a little too stressed about work (which he also have as a reason to not have sex) and so, but I was wrong. He had already started to move on before he ended it.

 

So I would say that it's very individual, but statistically there might be that women move on quicker, it's just not true for everyone.

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My theory is women, especially attractive ones, have much more opportunity to find a new partner very quickly after a breakup. Men, even attractive ones, don't have those options in quite the same way. A lot of men after a brutal breakup will start at ground zero and have to build themselves back up so they can even just approach women again.

 

A woman doesn't move on faster because she is pretty, she moves on faster because her brain works differently. Pretty or not women are emotionally stronger than men.

 

Men take break-ups harder because they can't be alone. That's why they usually have girlfriends much faster after a break up. You will see men just out of 25 year marriage with a gf 2 weeks later. The women are different, they will move on emotionally much faster but at the same time they will remain single much longer after separation.

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A woman doesn't move on faster because she is pretty, she moves on faster because her brain works differently. Pretty or not women are emotionally stronger than men.

 

Men take break-ups harder because they can't be alone. That's why they usually have girlfriends much faster after a break up. You will see men just out of 25 year marriage with a gf 2 weeks later. The women are different, they will move on emotionally much faster but at the same time they will remain single much longer after separation.

Interesting. My observations have been the complete opposite. I know many women within my circle who have new boyfriends almost immediately after their old ones are gone. The men within my circle tend to go for a lot of casual relationships after a breakup before deciding to pursue something long term. Perhaps this is the different age groups at play.
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Even if we forget 'gender' for a moment and focus on a relationship of over six months (because otherwise that's still the 'dating' period)...

 

The 'dumper' will always be at a more advanced stage of 'healing' by the time they pull the trigger (providing they have spent some time thinking about it and it wasn't due to abuse/cheating and a spur of the moment decision).

 

Throw the 'but I want you back!!!' into the mix, and the 'dumped' one is going to take two or three times longer to 'heal'. It's two sides of the same coin, but heads stings way worse than tails.

 

How a person handles a breakup depends more on whether they 'wanted' it or not, rather than gender. But the stats show that women end relationships 70% of the time. So men are (7 times out of 10) going to take longer to recover...

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An article summarizing the findings: Men may never truly get over a relationship break-up, says study | The Independent

 

The actual publication of the research: Quantitative Sex Differences in Response to the Dissolution of a Romantic Relationship | Craig E Morris - Academia.edu

 

I think it is very interesting and makes sense from an evolutionary POV. Obviously, we are not slaves to biology but cannot discount biological tendencies either.

 

The main theory is, although women are hit harder emotionally by the loss of a relationship, they are much better at gathering support of others and processing their negative emotions. Also, women have more to lose from staying in a bad relationship and are much better at ending it despite the ensuing grief.

 

Men tend to more competitive in their approach to dating and are less likely to enlist the help of others to help emotionally process the loss. Also, men stay in less-than-fulfilling relationships more often because, again from an evolutionary POV, they have more to lose by having to start over.

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The main theory is, although women are hit harder emotionally by the loss of a relationship, they are much better at gathering support of others and processing their negative emotions. Also, women have more to lose from staying in a bad relationship and are much better at ending it despite the ensuing grief.

 

Maybe that's the same phenomenon that explains why men will commit suicide after a break up and women rarely do. We reach out, they don't and end up in massive depression and resort to the unthinkable like suicide or murdering their ex-wive.

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somanymistakes

Time to read the study and see how much the article leaves out!

 

So, this one "study" was just an internet survey asking people their opinions (and those can notoriously be flavored by people writing down what they think they SHOULD report, or by their current feelings flavoring their past ones)

 

Reading the results, the sex differences are statistically significant but actually very small.

 

Men reported more anger and depression after breakups, but women reported a lot more fear.

 

The study comments that the distribution of responses is remarkably similar for both men and women - I'm not quite sure what they mean by that. I think they're saying that the proportions of men who take it really badly vs not badly at all are similar to the proportions of women who do so?

 

They also suggest that they expected male infidelity to be a leading cause of breakups, but actually it was "lack of communication" taht was most commonly blamed.

 

I actually don't see anything in the study at all talking about men having a harder time getting over it in the long run. The study data claims that women reported both more emotional pain and more physical symptoms in the wake of breakups. But I see nothing relating to pain over time.

 

Also, far more women than men completed the survey. At the end of the study, AFTER the actual data, they throw around some vague theories for why that might be so (do men suffer more so they don't want to talk about it? do men pretend to suffer less in order to look more appealing?) but there is NO actual data behind these ideas.

 

Unless there's a second study somewhere, or I'm missing something somewhere, everything said in the article about men recovering slowly was complete hot air with no backing for it.

 

If you want to read the study data yourself let me know if you see something I missed.

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Sorry for any misunderstanding, I can see how my post caused confusion. The "main theory" I referred to was based off of previous work, specifically the "men compete/women choose" model. This study was limited in its scope to determine the immediate PRG after the dissolution of a relationship.

 

"As a result, the women among the 5,705 participants in the study – surveyed across 96 countries – reported higher levels of emotional investment and pain when a relationship came to an end than men did."

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Time to read the study and see how much the article leaves out!

 

So, this one "study" was just an internet survey asking people their opinions (and those can notoriously be flavored by people writing down what they think they SHOULD report, or by their current feelings flavoring their past ones)

 

Reading the results, the sex differences are statistically significant but actually very small.

 

Men reported more anger and depression after breakups, but women reported a lot more fear.

 

The study comments that the distribution of responses is remarkably similar for both men and women - I'm not quite sure what they mean by that. I think they're saying that the proportions of men who take it really badly vs not badly at all are similar to the proportions of women who do so?

 

They also suggest that they expected male infidelity to be a leading cause of breakups, but actually it was "lack of communication" taht was most commonly blamed.

 

I actually don't see anything in the study at all talking about men having a harder time getting over it in the long run. The study data claims that women reported both more emotional pain and more physical symptoms in the wake of breakups. But I see nothing relating to pain over time.

 

Also, far more women than men completed the survey. At the end of the study, AFTER the actual data, they throw around some vague theories for why that might be so (do men suffer more so they don't want to talk about it? do men pretend to suffer less in order to look more appealing?) but there is NO actual data behind these ideas.

 

Unless there's a second study somewhere, or I'm missing something somewhere, everything said in the article about men recovering slowly was complete hot air with no backing for it.

 

If you want to read the study data yourself let me know if you see something I missed.

 

Good spot. I read through the study and you're right, it mentions nothing about the long term recovery of men from a breakup. The article is deeply misleading and not helpful to any men out there going through a rough breakup.

 

The only thing that might suggest that men might be suffering more is a tentative suggestion of a low response rate to the survey in the conclusion. Again that doesn't suggest anything about men not being ever to get over a loss.

 

The conclusion is pretty interesting though and I think worth quoting:

 

"We suggest that men who recover quickly from a breakup while experiencing low levels of PRG may be those who possess sufficient resources so that future mates will readily choose them. Males who have low resources and are unlikely to be selected by “choosey women” should experience severe and long-lasting PRG. However, by expressing a strong negative response to a breakup, a man may besignaling to rivals and potential future part-ners that he expects to have a difficult time acquiring a new mate—a behavior that is,evolutionarily, harmful to reproductive suc-cess. Therefore, the most adaptive behavior for men who have experienced a recent breakup may be to behave as if the breakup has not affected them—men who are “winners” would not care about the breakup be-cause they would have the ability to quickly move on to another relationship. Conversely, or perhaps for this very reason, is it possible that a portion of the male population suffers PRG so severely that they are unable even to consider participation in any such study that addresses a past romantic failure?"

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I have to disagree. I value your opinion and it’s an interesting perspective but it’s taken me a long time (years) (btw I’m female) to get over a break up. To lose a partner you had for so long, a best friend too, I find it hard to connect to just anybody again. It takes years to find. It also takes months, if not years to fully understand what happened and be ok with it, and move on.

 

My exes of the past, have seemed so ok with the breakup. Which to me, feels like they had the ability to move on/ find someone new quicker.

 

I think honestly it just comes down to the person. It’s hard to generalize these things. Some women may choose whoever for their next partner, but me, I choose a partner that I truly connect with and am physically atttacted to. They don’t have to be the most drop dead gorgeous man on the planet but a man I can imagine wanting to have sex with and want to touch all the time. I’d rather be single than be with someone I’m just not physically attracted to.

 

So that’s my two cents

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Too many variables. Why did the break up happen - just did - or was their an affair or something else. Was there money, home, kids, or other losses at the time of the breakup?

 

But as someone mentioned - its been my limited experience that a girl -weather dumped or dumping - often gets laid very quickly afterwards - often with more than one new guy - or at a minimum is very secure she wont be without companionship. That helps - getting laid -touch - or the ability to get dates. Hey I am hot ***** ! look at all my options. Self esteem, loneliness and other issues hit some guys harder than women after a breakup if they are the ones dumped. Also women are more supportive to their GF's after a breakup - guys tend to be very limited in their comforting to their buddies :)

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A woman doesn't move on faster because she is pretty, she moves on faster because her brain works differently. Pretty or not women are emotionally stronger than men.

 

Men take break-ups harder because they can't be alone. That's why they usually have girlfriends much faster after a break up. You will see men just out of 25 year marriage with a gf 2 weeks later. The women are different, they will move on emotionally much faster but at the same time they will remain single much longer after separation.

 

Going to disagree, but maybe it's just my age. It seems like older divorced guys are definitely quick to get back into something, often leading to remarriage.

 

But for people in their twenties and maybe even thirties, I have noticed a lot of women break up and are at least casually dating someone within a few weeks. I know a couple of women who are in their late twenties and I don't think they've been single for more than a couple weeks at a time since I've known them despite having had a lot of long-term relationships.

 

Reason usually being, we men are dogs, and the moment we find out an attractive/desirable woman is available, it's off to the races and into those DMs!

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But for people in their twenties and maybe even thirties, I have noticed a lot of women break up and are at least casually dating someone within a few weeks. I know a couple of women who are in their late twenties and I don't think they've been single for more than a couple weeks at a time since I've known them despite having had a lot of long-term relationships.

 

Reason usually being, we men are dogs, and the moment we find out an attractive/desirable woman is available, it's off to the races and into those DMs!

 

How come they can find someone so quickly? do they have a big social circle or use OLD? they are not picky?

 

and how do the men find out the woman is available? so you just available all the time and waiting?

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somanymistakes

I hear plenty of stories of men immediately having dates after breakups too. I think some of them had lined up the date BEFORE the breakup and others are using online hookup tools?

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Cookiesandough

If the male is the dumpee((real dumpee, no 'force dump' like they were cheating or had lost interest in the relationship etc), I think it hits him harder IN GENERAL. Men usually have less of an emotional support net. Theyre usually less inclined to discuss their emotions/vent. They usually get super comfy in relationships because women do a lot for them, even excluding the regular sex. They also tend to invest a lot as well once they are committed. They usually have bigger and more fragile egos ....harder for them to "get back in the game". While most women feel like they only have options they don't really like after being dumped, most men have fewer if any. Just from a biological standpoint - men lose a lot of testosterone in long term relationships xD

 

Depends on the person, though. And how fast a person starts dating again doesn't necessarily say what they are feeling.

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How come they can find someone so quickly? do they have a big social circle or use OLD? they are not picky?

 

and how do the men find out the woman is available? so you just available all the time and waiting?

 

There's not a one-size-fits-all answer. Some people aren't picky, so they have no trouble getting into relationships. Some just have a bigger social circle/field to choose from. And some are just more proactive.

 

Here are some real examples:

 

1) Girl I knew from high school added me on Facebook a few years ago. I've since deleted her, but in the year or so that I had her on there, she had two or three "FB official" relationships and one engagement. This girl basically got "serious" with any guy who came her way.

 

2) Girl I met a couple years ago is pretty sociable, is pretty, and has a lot of interests that she shares with guys. Subsequently, she's got tons of guy "friends" on FB, and while a lot of them are platonic, there's definitely a queue waiting for her latest relationship to fizzle out.

 

She has also had three relationships in the time I've known her, though they've all seemed like quality guys. Makes sense, since again, she's very pretty and has a large field to choose from. But she's almost never been single in the time I've known her, and a fellow friend who's known her way longer told me that this isn't a new trend. She actually just broke up last week, and I'd put money on her being coupled up before the year is over.

 

3) My ex is a lot like the girl above, though her relationships have lasted two to three years. When one ends, she will start "hanging out" with someone almost immediately and keep that going until she's found someone she deems worthy of a LTR. From personal experience and from what she's told me, her relationships always started with her being the one to make the first move, even though she's pretty enough that she regularly has guys making passes at her.

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I hear plenty of stories of men immediately having dates after breakups too. I think some of them had lined up the date BEFORE the breakup and others are using online hookup tools?

 

So here's my observation:

 

Guys, especially younger guys, will be quick to hook up with someone after the relationship, assuming they aren't sitting in the corner of their room devastated over the breakup. But these aren't necessarily leading to new long-term relationships.

 

Women, especially younger women, will be quick to get into an exclusive relationship after the last one ends.

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