Men can dish it out but they can’t take it

Women have a lower pain tolerance than men. That is the finding of a scientific study by the Pain Management Unit of the hallowed institution, Bath University. With a finding like this, passed off as science, this unit must lay claim to being the greatest collection of buffoons since the Three Stooges left the stage. Britain’s Bath University? Only a university with the likely mascot name of the Rubber Duckies could err so completely.

How did said professors come up with this conclusion? They would take the nondominant arm of each test subject and dunk it in warm water for a few minutes, then immediately plunge that arm into swirling, ice-filled water. Reactions were measured, and they found women cried foul sooner than men. Men can handle pain better? Based on a test that proves men are more tolerant of pain when reaching into the bottom of a beer cooler?

I think the researchers needed to reverse the direction of their test. Put the men’s arms into a basin full of warm water and dish soap and see how long they can stand it. I’ve done some research into this area. My new bride often asked for a dishwasher, something I, ruling from the couch, considered extravagant. New stitches in her hand (that she never complained about) put her on the dishes injured list and forced me into the dishpan. After one night, and an emergency check on our finances, a new dishwasher found its way into our home.

I’m a man, and I readily concede the point that women handle pain better. I’m not just talking childbirth pain here either. I’ve seen my 10-pound children being born and I know how tough it looks from the bedside. She knows how tough it looks from watching her hubby pacing the floor, reading Golf magazine, and seeing me drop her keepsake watch – shattering it – while I’m supposedly timing contractions.

There’s further medical evidence. My daughter-in-law, who works in a doctor’s office, reports men pass out far more than women during a blood draw. Her employer, a 25-year doctor, strongly believes women handle pain better than men.

There’s comedy in the scientific findings from the Monty Python-like troupe from Bath. But there’s real tragedy in that such findings belittle not-so-funny truths.

Women do handle pain better than men. We men should know. We’ve been dishing it out to women for centuries, and it’s humbling for me to think of what my gender inflicts on women.

We men are masters of pain all right – giving it, not taking it. We make them our punching bags, so much so that society has to build shelters to protect women. We even push them from cars. Such physical pain is not even our “specialty.” We are also good at inflicting a wide variety of other pain.

How many women are sitting in Spokane right now, with a room full of kids, working two jobs, while we men deem that woman, who bore our children, not worthy of a rightful child support check. I’m not a teenager anymore, but shamefully too many of us still think we are, shirking our responsibility.

Test the pain tolerance of a woman, dead tired, grabbing a few winks between jobs, then dragging herself up to work for minimum wages to feed and house her kids. How long would a man last in that spot?

When men leave their wives– the stereotype goes – it’s for a younger, prettier showroom model waiting in the wings. The crazy part is, we sometimes twist it so the woman feels it’s her fault.

My daughter, now almost 20, shocked me the other day. The subject was divorce, and even though she was 3 at the time, she told me exactly where I was standing and what I was wearing when I told her I was leaving our home. She’s handled that pain and loss of trust for almost 17 years.

She told me a few months ago. Ever since, I’ve had a hard time handling the pain.