I am not alone in this. Sorry dudes, women are the stronger sex.
“It’s confirmed,” my friend stated. “Men are weaker than women.”
We gave a little guffaw at this revealing bit of information. According to some bold and official news piece she read, men have a weaker response to illness.
We call this the Man Flu. I sent a you-tube video of “man stroke women-man cold” to my husband, as it made me nearly pee myself with its spot on observations.
“I didn’t think it was very funny,” he said.
As did my friends husband.
“Don’t see what’s so funny, “He said, concurring.
They didn’t see the humour in a man calling 911 because he felt sick, when the woman had the same cold??
As mothers, we know that as we have approximately 38.5 things we have to do in a day, people to call, laundry to fold, etc, and that we need to take some drugs and just get on with it. I use all methods at my disposal. I’ve used that horrible lemony crap you drink, two years expired. I swallow homeopathics and tinctures and pills and whatever. And then I pull my sorry ass out of bed and…get on with it.
Why can’t the men folk do this? Why must they lay about in piles, surrounded by tissues, waffling in their own snot-filled self pity?
“I feel Horribblleee,” my husband will say. I swear he rubs his eyes ten times before I walk in the room, for added effect.
At this point you are laughing, because your husband does the same thing. We can’t really blame them, because when you feel rotten, who doesn’t want to just lay on the couch and have someone bring you soup and blankets, rub your shoulders, and take the phone off the hook?
Just for the record, this does not happen in my house. Due to the longevity of our marriage, I just don’t give a crap anymore. I know this is unfair and admit it freely. But all the pity cards have been used up.I am now using them as a door jam in the laundry room.
“Just a little bit of added niceness, please,” my husband moans, as I throw a box of drugs at his head.
I capitulate, a bit. I’ll make his favorite ‘I am so sick” food. If I am in a really good mood he gets bonus perks, like ginger ale at the bedside and five different flavors of Halls. But often, I just have to say,
“I’m sorry honey, I know it sucks. After all, I still have it! Now, off to do 38.5 things before the day ends!”
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Erin,
Here’s what my husband had to say about Man Flu:
“Everything we do is just, by definition, more badass – and that includes the viruses we get. They have to be badass to get into our thick man skin. Therefore, when we get sick, we get badass sick.”
Ahhhh, yes, that explains it!
Shannon H.
that is AWESOME. I had not thought of that, but it does explain a few things. Like, when my husband doesn’t see things in the fridge, he REALLY doesn’t see them, because they are right there, front and center….