Actually, I'm not fine… blog

Part 7: Understanding Men, Even When I Wanted to Hate Them

or most of my life, I was taught to hate men. My mother’s words echoed in my ears from childhood, warning me of their lies, their cheating, their unpredictability. Growing up in that environment, I absorbed the lessons without question. Men were dangerous, untrustworthy, and best kept at arm’s length. And for a long time, I lived by that belief.

But life has a way of complicating even the most rigid lessons. I found myself drawn to men—not romantically at first, but intellectually and emotionally. I was told I “thought like a guy” or “wasn’t like other girls,” and that explanation, as strange as it seemed, made sense. I understood the way they processed the world, the way they spoke, the logic they applied. It fascinated me. I hung around men not to seek validation, but to observe, understand, and sometimes even defend their perspectives.

It was a strange tension: on one hand, I carried the deep distrust ingrained by my upbringing; on the other hand, I was developing empathy and awareness of the struggles men face; struggles society rarely acknowledges. Mental health is stigmatized for men. Vulnerability is mocked. The phrase “man up” looms like a shadow, dismissing feelings, fears, and needs. And yet, despite my upbringing, I began to see that their humanity was undeniable.

Understanding men didn’t mean excusing harm or erasing my experiences. It meant noticing patterns, seeing where trauma shaped behavior, and recognizing that just as I had been hurt by men, some men were hurt too. Their struggles weren’t excuses, they were context, a lens to view the world from a broader perspective.

This understanding also reshaped how I viewed my own relationships. I realized that love and connection require listening: not just hearing words, but understanding the emotion behind them. Women and men communicate differently, and for so long, I had approached partnerships with the survival patterns of my childhood: control, caution, and fear. But learning to understand men, even when I had been taught to hate them, opened the door to empathy, compromise, and deeper connection.

It’s not about saying women or men are right or wrong. It’s about seeing the shared humanity in each other. It’s about acknowledging pain without judgment. And it’s about creating space for growth, healing, and communication, something I didn’t always have as a child, and something I want to model for my child.

Closing Reflection:

How often do we allow the lessons of trauma to prevent us from understanding each other?

What would happen if, instead of standing in opposition, we chose to see the shared struggles that shape us all?