In
my never ending quest to provide quality reading material to you,
I am often involved in performing exhaustive research just to make
certain I have all of the facts correct and up to date. This week
I want to discuss pain. As in the difference between the way men
and women endure or tolerate pain. As you may recall, I think I
mentioned that I was in my first car wreck a few weeks ago. Left
me kind of dingy or goofy as my wife says. She says I don’t
connect all the dots, whatever that means.
Anyway, I buy a new car over this past weekend, in the process of
checking it out, I open the trunk, and when I rise up, I manage to
rip open a chunk of my head on the trunk lock. Now, since I still
think I have a full head of hair, I don’t notice any blood or
anything out of the ordinary. Also, because I’m involved in
‘manly’ activity, I am immune to pain. Only when I go into the
house and happen to see what I’ve done do I start to hurt. Now,
the point with this illustration is that men seem to have a
different threshold for pain than women.
Check out any war movie or western, the good guy gets his arm
blown off or shot square in the stomach and he merely shrugs it
off and says something like…”It’s just a flesh wound, let’s go.”
Now, the same thing happens in real life, the male person can be
working on some construction project (manly work) when he saws off
a couple of fingers but he won’t stop until the roof is on and the
doors are locked. This same male will get a paper cut on his
finger while sending out Christmas cards (not a manly project) and
he thinks he is going to die because it hurts so much. He may not
even be able to continue, as the pain is so intense. Men can have
arms, legs and other important body parts blown off in combat and
keep on going for days on end.
However, if a headache comes over them when it comes time to paint
one of the bedrooms, you can bet this headache is almost terminal
and may require a trip to the hospital. Women on the other hand
seem to be able to endure much more pain at any given time. They
can have babies in the morning and cook for 20 people by 6PM.
Pain seems to be natural for women. Not saying they enjoy pain,
but it does appear their ability to tolerate it is a bit higher
than the tolerance level for men. I’ve seen women slice their
hands or fingers to the bone while cooking Thanksgiving dinner and
never miss stuffing the bird. See, it works for them as well when
they are performing a “womanly” task. Let a woman hit her finger
driving a nail into a board and most likely, she’ll have to quit
for the day.
Another reason for this pain differential may be that woman
practice pain endurance. Look at their fashions. I don’t think any
man alive could wear high heel shoes for over 15 minutes without
screaming. The Army missed a bet in the Second World War, they
could have forced captured prisoners to wear stiletto heels and I
bet within a day they would have gotten all of the information
they were looking for. Ever look at a girdle? My grandmother wore
one. I remember seeing her lace that thing up when I was a kid. I
could tell it hurt her, but she wasn’t about to go to church
without it. No man could endure one of those things without
passing out. Women curl and tease their hair, do things with their
eyelashes that men cannot possibly tolerate. All in the name of
beauty.
To finish this story, I have concluded that the reason women can
and do endure pain better than men is simple. They have more
experience in dealing with it. Look at Genesis 3/16. God did it,
in response to that apple eating situation…..As for the men? Well,
we’re charged with the responsibility of working for ever and
ever. We have to pay for those shoes and those babies. Makes me
hate apples
