Rabbi Simcha Cohen
Another aspect of women’s tendency toward emotional connection is evident in how difficult they find it to part from people.
Imagine a couple attending an event. The wife points out to her husband that it is already late and they need to go home. Her husband agrees, and they decide to leave immediately. Before long, the husband is standing alone by the door, waiting for his wife. But she lingers. She says goodbye to her friends again and again, shaking one friend’s hand, saying a few friendly words to another, waving to a third… When she finally reaches the door, her husband greets her with a question: “You were the one who said it was already late! Why did you take so long?” She answers, “I had to say goodbye to my friends!” He shrugs and concludes, “Why say goodbye? You just leave, that’s all!”
A woman’s disposition toward partnership, and its absence in a man, are already evident in adolescence.
Anyone with sons and daughters can observe that when a son’s friend says goodbye to him, the son at most walks him to the door. But when a daughter’s friend leaves, the daughter tells her mother that she is going to walk her out. “Don’t come back too late!” her mother asks. And indeed, the daughter walks her friend to the corner, and the friend, in turn, walks her back toward the house, and so on.
These differences in behavior between husband and wife stem from the fact that a woman, with her disposition toward partnership, finds it difficult to part from her friends, making the process of parting slow and prolonged. A man does not have this quality and can leave the hall with almost no goodbyes, or not walk out a friend who has come to visit him.
We can also see in other situations that the processes of forming bonds and parting work differently for a woman.
For example, a young man and a young woman are dating with a serious purpose: to find out whether they are suited to each other for marriage. A woman is assumed to be more interested in marriage than a man, but when it comes to making a decision, young women generally deliberate longer than young men. This does not necessarily stem from indecisiveness; most likely, it is due to the particular structure of a woman’s psyche: she has an ingrained sense that marriage means forming an absolute bond and placing herself within a framework of obligations. Taking on this framework requires considerable inner strength.
Clearly, the young man thinks the same way, but a woman understands her obligations more deeply and intensely, so making the decision is more difficult for her.
We can also see something similar in the emotional bond between husband and wife.
A husband finds it easy to establish friendship and a bond within marriage, and he usually takes the initiative, while his wife follows his lead. But he can also quickly detach himself from his wife after the bond has formed. Parting is much easier for him than for his wife.
The reason is that, because a husband’s approach to marriage is based more on “volunteering” and less on obligations, he does not feel a need for absolute attachment, so forming a bond comes easily to him. A wife, however, whose approach is based on connection, finds it difficult to engage in the relationship as long as she does not feel an absolute bond with her fiancé or husband.
Even hurtful words he said to her long ago can interfere with her emotional attachment. This is less pronounced in a man.