Why have one personality when you can have five?
I’m not a polygamist, but I’m pretty sure I’m married to five women.
At least it feels that way sometimes.
When I married my wife, I was thrilled at the prospect of spending the next eternity with her. She was, and still is, the girl of my dreams. One of the first things that attracted me to her, besides her being beautiful, was her exciting personality. I’m not sure what defines a personality or her personality in particular, but all I knew was I completely attracted to her and knew our marriage was going to be perfect.
And it was, until our friend, Ms. Hormone, stepped in.
The baby-stopper pills my wife was taking started to do weird things to her. Those pills are riddled with more hormones than Barry Bond’s steroids. Which I didn’t think was that big of a deal. Hormones are supposed to be normal right? They worked fairly well for me in the past and helped transform my girlish alto voice into a weak baritone. I still squeak on occasion.
No, these hormones are evil, or at least the effects of them are. After a month I started to notice a change in my wife. It was like watching Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde come to life in front of my eyes.
One moment my wife would be her typical sweet, bubbly self, and the next moment she would turn into an emotional basket case who wouldn’t be satisfied until my head was securely mounted on a plaque above her Sleeping Beauty doll in the corner of the room. I feared for my life.
She would get upset and emotional about me not washing the dishes that day, even though I had done them every day for the past month. Somewhere deep down inside me I kept hoping this was some sick joke, but I was wrong. The hormones had taken over her to the point where she couldn’t see she was no longer the same person.
Trying to tell her that was definitely not the right choice. If I tried, she would make another hormonal transition, this time into a female version of Mike Tyson, running around swinging without much effect and trying to bite my ear off.
My best choice for survival at this point was to jump behind the sandbag fort I had erected in our living room and barricade myself down low to wait for the storm to blow over. Or I could feed her ice cream. For some reason, ice cream seems to overcome the effects of dangerous female hormones. I don’t pretend to know why, but I know it works. Chocolate is the key.
When these changes first started to happen on a regular basis, I thought my wife had gone off the deep end. But after talking to my father and other married men, I’ve come to discover that my wife isn’t crazy at all – she is a normal woman.
“Normal?” you’re thinking. Yes. Let me explain.
It turns out women are affected differently by hormones than men are. As near as I can tell, men are controlled by just two hormones that form the base of our existence: one to eat, and the other to, well, you know.
As long as at least one of these urges is satisfied, men are content with life. When both are met, men are insanely happy with life. My wife has found when I’m cranky, she merely has to shove a cookie in my mouth and I’m back to my normal self.
Women, on the other hand, are controlled by seemingly thousands of hormones that result in mood swings, some on an hourly basis. Some make them happy, some make them giddy, and some make them jump up and down waving their arms faster than a hummingbird when they haven’t seen a friend for more than 10 minutes.
Others make them sad, depressed, angry, or confused to the point that they don’t know what’s exactly wrong but are confident something is and will destroy you if you even make so much as an attempt at guessing what’s wrong.
Once I understood that women are controlled by hormones, things made a lot more sense. I realize now that it’s not their fault they have these mood swings. It’s just nature’s way of saying to men, “Haha. I’m in charge. I’m going to give you this urge to want to be around women all the time but make them so confusing that you’ll never be able to understand them. Good luck.”
I think it’s the good luck part that really gets to me.
So while I’ve come to grips on the whole hormone deal, I’m still working – futile though it may be – on understanding women. I haven’t come up with much, but I do know that women would not be nearly as exciting without these mood swings. Think about it. Men can hang out with their guy friends every day for a week and do nothing but play video games. Talking is reduced to only the most essential topics such as where the bathroom is or how many sodas are left in the fridge. After a week of that, you’ve figured your friend out and you’re satisfied with life. You now need a new challenge.
But with women, after a week together, you’re just as confused as you were at the beginning, so in a way it’s like experiencing the Groundhog Day effect all the time. Which in my mind is fun. I like the excitement the mood swings bring, even if they are difficult at times.
But I know many men are still on the early stages of understanding these hormonal mood swings, so I have five bits of advice.
1. Stock up on ice cream. If possible, find a way to create an IV ice cream feed from the freezer into her arm.
2. Give her $20 and tell her to not come back until she has spent it all. Trust me, it will be the best investment you’ve ever made. Spending money releases hormonal pressure somehow.
3. Come to grips that you blew it. Even if you didn’t, admit that you are wrong. Remember, a woman might not always be right, but she is never wrong, especially in her own mind.
4. Learn to accept that moods can change at any moment, and prepare for this by not preparing. This means don’t worry about what mood she’ll switch too. Just be aware that she will and be supportive by following the tips listed above.
5. If all the above fail, try pretending like you’re having a mood swing every now and then. It might not help the situation, but it would be funny to see two people on mood swings interacting.
Maybe my advice isn’t fool proof, but at least you can feel confident in uncertainty.
Seth Hawkins is a junior majoring in public relations. He will soon compile all his extensive observations on women into a book called “Discovering the XX Chromosome.” Comments and questions can be sent to him at seth.h@aggiemail.usu.edu.