The Man Flue

This article posted today on MSNBC states that the "man flue" is a myth.

"While the stereotype that men moan and groan more loudly about their symptoms than women persists, at least one recent survey, however, exposes “man flu” as a myth. In a 2008 poll of more than 2,000 British adults, 85 percent of female respondents admitted they exaggerated their flu symptoms to gain extra compassion compared to just 76 percent of the men surveyed. About one third of the women also acknowledged feeling “more emotional” when battling winter sniffles as compared to just one in 10 men."

Having just suffered through a stomach bug only to have my husband catch it two days later can I beg to differ here? They asked the question wrong. Actually asking the question at all is useless.

Men don't think they are exaggerating. In my experience men truly believe their cough or cold or fever or stomach ache is that bad. Bad enough to where if I was feeling as bad as they claimed I'd be in a hospital or unconscious. Is that enough to get them to take a Tylenol when they have a headache? No, its apparently not that bad.

Men just seem to have no concept of pain. As a woman who has gone through labor (yay! I can use that now... yes I was drugged, but that still puts me ahead of any man on the pain scale) I can honestly say I have never complained or felt "as bad" as my husband when he gets a headache.

He was in fact shocked that labor didn't seem "that bad." (This earns him a glare, because while it wasn't as bad as I though it would be, it was easily the most difficult and painful thing I have ever done. I just handled it well.)

The frustrating thing, if he was to answer this survey he would say "Ah, I don't get sick much, but when I do it's no big deal." And answer no to the do you ever exaggerate question. I love how he is exponentially sicker depending on who is in the room.

He had pneumonia last year while attending school and fraternity events out of town. No one even knew he was sick. Later while home for vacation, he had a standard cold, no fever, just the sniffles and a headache, not even a cough and spent the whole time telling me he felt like death. If his mother happens to be up for a visit, heaven help us all, because he won't just feel like death, he will be having death throws.

If I mention it to him later, "ah, I wasn't that sick, what are you talking about."

Let me be clear, my husband is not exaggerating, or trying to get attention that he knows of on a conscious level. He really thinks its that bad. And later he really believes it wasn't. This is why the survey failed.

Are your husbands the same way