S4E13 The Support Male

00:00:06 - 00:05:01

The Dateable podcast is an insider's look into modern dating that the Huffington post calls one of the top ten podcast about love and sex. On each episode, we'll talk to real daters about. From sex parties to sex droughts, date fails a diaper fetishes and first moves to first loves. I'm your host Yue Xu, former dating coach turned dating sociologists. You also hear from my co host and producer Julie Krafchick as we explored this crazy dateable world.

This episode of dateable is brought to you by five hundred brunches. Five hundred branches connects like minded people with similar interests to meet in real life over brunch. You answer quick questionnaire about your interest and you spend your time and then they'll match you in small groups of six to eight at a brunch spot in san francisco. Get a free entry into our brench now. Up at five hundred branches dot com and using the code date able to everyone. Welcome to another episode of dateable. A show that opens up a can of conversation about dating in today's world called modern dating. I have a guest host of me today. His name is boris boris. He's been as go for six years originally from boston. He's in his early thirties. And he is married happily married and our guest tonight is dawn. Hey don how're you. Good to be here. He sped san was cisco for six years originally from cinema county. So not too far. And you're thirty five years old. Don i know a little bit about what you want to talk about today. But i'm so excited about this topic. Because before the episode with kate he and i had this very intense discussion about gender roles how it plays into dating how alpha and the beta should get along and also like who should pay for dates. Who's responsible for dates etc. I should say that we didn't agree on. We did not agree on a single thing. But it's perfect because it's obviously a topic morrison. I are are very passionate about. But i wanna hear what brings you here today. Don think gender roles. Summarize it pretty well a my dating experience is one thing. But i think in general is okay to have your ambition. Be the success of your partner. Explain what that means. It means you know being an emotional. Being emotional support not necessarily doing Having some vibrant crazy career of your own in your email you say i wonder what these women alpha women be okay with a stay at home dad afoot rubbing laundry doing dinner cooking child rearing garbage man or do these. Do these wonder women need to be need to have another type a entrepreneur by their side. Now what is the basis of this question is a role that you're considering or is that a role that you find appealing. I think that. I both sure sure i could see myself playing music part-time and raising children for sure. I think that would be wonderful. Yeah i'd love to be a dad. I want to bring it back to these gender roles again. Because that's what we're here to talk about my good friend in la doctor and all of her female doctor friends colleagues. All of their husbands are stay at home came and she had a boyfriend for a long time a seven year relationship tattoo. Artists stay at home as well. Now she tells me this. It's not so much as the woman. Okay being with a man who's more beta the stay at home dad. It's at the man has to fully own it and part of the issue with some the relationships that may not have worked that she's seen and her own relationship it didn't work was because a man couldn't fully own that role and i'd say i mean stay at home in beta are two different or two totally separate. Thanks the kind of building off of what you just said it. Almost it almost takes kind of more self-confidence of bigger person especially as a man to just say hey you know what no you pursue your career. i'm comfortable enough in my own skin with who i am to kind of be proud of myself as a as a person without having this career goal ambition. What have you that. Society really expects men to have much more so than women. I feel like a requirement for being a stay at home would be your living for other living for the family. Okay in a way. I think living to support these other people that stuff on one side. But i think there is this conception that women have of the stay at home father.

00:05:01 - 00:10:02

That's just doing nothing all day watching. Tv knocked out shit and that i think maybe that ties to like larger gender roles because that's not necessarily what society's told us on man's role so yes. I agree if their whole point is to stay at home and really own and take care of the family. That's very different than someone that's sitting on the couch to. Yes and also is this man. Okay taking out the garbage making dinner making sure the house is clean. That sounds simple. Some guys are not okay with that are not okay with that so the guy has to be extremely confident like you were saying. Boris in himself extremely confident in his manliness and really own up to that role that he's playing well when you think about that in the day when women were stay at home that was their job like it wasn't like they weren't doing anything all day so it's kind of like to that like if the guy's gonna own essentially be his role i mean also say that that was before dishwashers were thing. How would you feel about being a stay at home. I actually have. It's really interesting to me. Because at this point I have more male friends who are stay at home. Dads than. I have female friends that have that have left. The workforce to take care of kids Both individuals so really large sample size here all to them But no they're they're both stupidly capable had really amazing careers and it just so happened that the person with had some sort of breakaway opportunity or Had to move for their job in. It was a really big change that their partner was really excited about and so they said okay. Hey i'm gonna try this out the difference in how they've made it worked as a really big difference between not employed. And not employable. Yeah yeah right like they're still Passionate powerful I don't know if i would describe either. One of them is really beta individuals And that's kind of where i'm going with this in terms of in some ways i find that female or male it. It almost takes more to stay at home In mind not the kind of the household at least to me. It seems like it's a little more like less. Glamorous a little more boring Maybe more monotonous and certainly it can be super super awarding as the interesting part about it is as i wouldn't say it's like necessarily submissive role and in some ways as a male going into that. Maybe that's the stereotype that people think of your stay at home dad. You're the submissive data. But you may not be completely be an alpha high-power ceo of your household right. I almost think that. That's kind of a requirement i mean. Where do we have this stereotype of the powerful woman running the household right because it's like as a stay at home partner in whatever relationship you're at that's the control you have so what we've seen with a lot of people who've come on the show and previous guests is that a man is when a man is confident in his career. He's confident in his dating life. This is we'll be seen. It's a pattern we've seen right so the the women who've had kind of experiences with didi it's always because a man is going through some sort of crossroads in his career making changing changing industries. Or you know not happy with his job but as soon as a man is confidence career. He's confident in himself and his identity. Because in this society men attach themselves to their professional identity. S who's dating if you're going on a date with a guy and you find out that maybe his not goal but like maybe his professional life is not his priority and he would consider being a stay at home. Dad my only issue is. I don't have kids right now. So there's no. I can't really see the future too much of a hypothetical to too far ahead maybe too far ahead and also i just in my head. I'm like how do i respect you as a and that's interesting contribute. How do i respect you. So i wonder. That's my question can you do. You have to have a robust career to be respected. Can you be an empathetic person. I mean but in your words. How am i going to respect you if you don't have that going right. Yeah and we're also in san francisco which is such an expensive place that it sort of filters people naturally so i would say you're getting their own people. I really think that's really sad.

00:10:02 - 00:15:02

Because i think about like just i. I promise i won't talk about him too much on the show but my boyfriend and i have an interesting dynamic because he's definitely head astrid in his career where he's like happy where he is. He's very stable. Do i think he has ambitions of being sorry his own company or being the ceo. One day absolutely not. And do i ever wanna find someone like that. Fuck no thought of that just does not make me happy. But then the that's me. I know plenty of women who would be attracted to that and they also know the sacrifices that come with being with someone like that. Have you tried yet on that note. Have you tried like just leaving your professional life totally off the table for any dates. No that's a good scientific. That's good idea. I should try that. I should not talking about that. Well our friend josh on the episode you see this company Says a he's a minister or priest to profile reveal. He doesn't put the word seat in the ceo or president. Or you know boss the none of those to be fair San francisco's full of ceo's everybody's legit company. And that's not where he leads with so he obviously will be getting a different type of girl. So so living. In the middle of the castro. I kind of envy your. I really envy gay relationships. We establish a any of this bullshit. It's kind of amazing because every any and all responsibilities or jobs or whatever you wanna call it rolls inside of a relationship. Everything gets discussed and just bullet based off of the personality and totally. Outside of there's there are no generals. What are you so kind of. What would that look like for you in terms of like you get a relationship on your terms like forget kids. So i'm gonna. I'm gonna go go with as questioning like you know like first year or two years of relationships Of a relationship like what's your kind of ideal dream role. I'm a fairly organized guy. So i don't know it's not i've never had issues with to. Okay here's how we should do our finances. What are you comfortable with. Its whatever the other person is comfortable with and makes the most sense from sort of efficiency standpoint. I feel like you're waiting some topics here. I'm trying to get to the crux of why you're here. I wanna talk about like what is it. That's irking you because obviously you're meeting these very entrepreneurial women which by the way is a fucking entrepreneur. And everybody's going to go on a date and be like y'all. I'm sorry my own app. I have my own business. And i do this on do that. Everyone has their own like gazillion. Things working unserviced restaurant hosting. I think that is the crux of my concern. About living. here is the bay area. Made for family man I think action. And i may have wrote it more specifically but i think is it even a place here. Can you even have family. If that's the direction you know what i mean as a barrier women even want that here these ambitious women do they want a family that wants to have kids like nobody wants to have kids. So i'm thirty five. I would love to have kids. I have to move away to have some children love. I love this. Question has before i moved to san francisco. My boyf- my ex boyfriend at the time was very entrepreneurial was all about like tech crunch every day even after we broke up. He sent us tech crunch articles. And i remember. He was showing me magazines before. I moved to san francisco and be like babe. We should be like these people. That's a power couple or he will say. Oh okay. this article about elon. Musk he's amazing. And then it's a you know touting someone who started an amazing company whereas like the recognition four men who are just straight up really good people really good guys who are family men who are responsible who are great husband's like i like to know about cheryl. I would like to know about you. Know i went to talk with lisa. Sugar the founder of pop sugar and she talked about how her husband really supported her in starting a website about like celebrity gossip. You know the guy has like a web background. And he's like yeah. I'll help you with that. Nobody hears about the sky. You hear about lisa sugar. But what about the men behind the scenes so this issue is as silicon valley doesn't give recognition for the men.

00:15:02 - 00:20:04

Supporting these powerful women were for the powerful for the women's supporting powerful men. You never hear about the supporting cast. It's so it it's so vital. It's so vital. And i think once you see and you hear these stories about these people you understand that it's it just wouldn't happen without them and so these integral pieces do we have a diminished value. Or are we looking at them differently. Are we not appreciate him enough. I guess you would say yes. Our values a little fucked up a little little weird. I feel like there's always always complain in the like settled down again area l. of it. This is probably the first. I've heard a guy saying not that other guys don't get back actually express it in the bay area and i wonder if the whirlwind that is the bay area causes people to you get swept up in it get fomo class. Is it possible that the environment is causing you to get a can't have kids now. You know where. You're not settling in to a more natural state then on the flip side. I have many friends including boris over here. That are married. Who wanna start families so. I don't think you can just the bay area. I think there are certain types of people in the bay area that yes kerr focus. Maybe that's just where they are at that specific point of their life. Who knows in two years if that's going to be where they're at but i think that goes back to the whole point of recognition. These people like a boris. You're not being touted as a great husband right here. Here's an award. It's also about what you were saying. Don about growing up seeing your dad in this specific role and how you didn't like him in that role because there's nothing in the media that tout's that kind of man that kind of family man. So it's it's julie. And i talked about this last week and i said you know a lot of people i talk to in the bay area could be anywhere though a asked him. What is your future like. And everyone's people say kids. Not you know people say kids. I picture a married with kids. I have a great family but then when should ask them when you read and how win and how the people forget those are steps because people say i want kids they think about. That's like an acquisition of sorts. I'm going to have a chanel purse and kids but they don't think about. How am i going to be a great parent for these kids. These are values. We never talked about when dating right now. Going to be a great partner. How am i going to be a great family person. What are those values and it goes back to and one of the things here. I feel like this community is very self centric and yes and that's difficult to see all the time where everyone. This is what i'm doing. This disrupting bubba. And like man is every- is everything about you know. The the biggest thing is like take someone who is always mimi. Me me and interrupt for just a second and for someone who's not used to being interrupted. Their entire world has just shifted. I would also argue that people. Who are mimi cannot be interrupted. Because they're on a train to nowhere was certainly one day that trains going to crash and then they wake up and say oh no. I'm ready to have someone in my life. So you're going after the people on this train that's about to crash but he don't want to be there for the problem. No don here could be that interrupt or it's true he could but okay was that very different. There's a high in russia here especially and that's my. I think this is a very interesting place in an interesting time. i think Very focused people here back to this emotional equal though. Like i get that you want someone that you can support but don't you want and it's very netplay. Selfless you want that. Supports you to or yeah. Everybody's got a different definition of that again. If you find your happiness through supporting somebody else you do want reciprocation recognition reciprocal yen respect. So i think people should stop thinking about okay. I the beta or on the alpha. I'm the breadwinner you don't want shit happens in a relationship. The course of a few weeks few months few years you don't know maybe one day you need to step up. We're one day you need to step back and say i need to support my partner.

00:20:04 - 00:25:01

Be a stay home. There's no absolutes in any of this and we have to. Stop thinking and absolutes. Well that's why it's absurd when people do just judge people on their careers and they could lose their job tomorrow. Easily especially here z company that the value at zero dollar. Yeah and it seems like. It's very high flux. Very high flux that also goes back to the point of non je while it's great to be a support not just being the supporter. Because if you're both. Have things going on that. Flux can happen that you just mentioned. Yeah i don't know if you way or julie would mind a man that cooked or cleaned for them okay. I think he also needs to make money out of his own life. I think that's what like his own values like. He needs to contribute financially to the household. Sorry hold on to your your podcast takes off. You're like top of the charts. You've got another company. You still need a man to. Yeah what if you're finding you can support. Let's pretend you. Haven't you make enough money to support both of you. Do you need him to make money. What if he does something else. I wouldn't as long as he wasn't resentful about it. I would be okay with that. I need him to have his own thing. Even if he made ten thousand dollars a year he needs to have his own thing that brings in money. That's what i'm comfortable with. The for me would be of his own thing. I don't care for make some money like as long as it was something that was a passion that it wasn't like i just hate that you're gone all the time and i'm doing this all the stuff so four guy who you know. Julie have a ton of single girlfriends who are always like looking for good family guy who has a good career. Who's just a good guy. You're thirty five years old. You're a bachelors you have a career. You're very self aware. Why are you single. Not for lack of effort. Not for. I think that i dated a lot of women that didn't challenge me. That thought i was great. Just as you are and i really like. I really liked the challenge. So what's your problem though. My problem What is my problem. Maybe i am to open minded with people so even if i don't feel a connection Stick around. Because i'm thinking maybe something will happen. I mean we've all had that scenario where You've spent time with somebody and they grow on you. Do you tend to older younger younger. Honestly i think Older women a red flag for me. Because i'm worried that they are only and not that. I don't want that but only in it for kids and money and completely contradictory. Yeah no. I'm not only in it for kids. That's not the only thing that i want out of life. I'd just i want them to like me. Not necessarily oh he's stable. He makes money. These qualities. That i i don't want just to be the focus right. He's i feel like the bar may drop as people get older and women get the biological clock going on. I do want them to like me for other qualities than just. He's going to be really supportive. Europe i'll take all the advantages. I can get so basically you're screwed because on one hand you want someone with strong family values. Who's a little bit traditional on the other hand you don't want someone settled or stable. Replace you get bored easily and you like chasing the girl who challenges you in which also signals to me that you like unstable girls who possibly challenge you. You're sort of screwed in that way. Because i were single. Our single your values well align with certain women that you wouldn't find attractive to be. I do consider the environment as well. Where if i lived somewhere else. Would i not need the same level of stimulation so if you lived somewhere else at thirty five already have like three kids your grandfather here. I think it's we can't. We can't blame our environment. Because obviously you like san francisco right so that shouldn't kick you out. Yeah so. I think you have to make the best of the situation here. What i'm hearing is this. I think you're you're not targeting the right women your messaging is resonating with probably shoot ton of women who are listening right. Now we're like Yeah this guy.

00:25:02 - 00:30:09

I want to meet him. I want to date him. If there's so many women raising their hand and you haven't met them then there's an issue. There's a disconnect. So what is it. Maybe it's upping your age range a little bit right. Maybe it's you know what people get their eggs frozen all the time right now. So they're biological clock is ticking. That's just my thought. Sorry for a little bit of therapy there. it makes sense. I think there are conflicting desires. Their conflicting desires for sure early twenties. I put a mid twenties. Put a lot of emphasis on. Someone's career a ton of emphasis. Yeah and then. I got in relationships with people. That weren't necessarily that as career driven as i wanted and i realized that that's not the most important thing in relationships of maybe. It's the women that you're going for having hit that stride of knowing that it's beyond just career and it's more partnership and what else someone offer because it's a reflection of where you are in life. I think people this city one attracts people who come and they wanna be professionally successful right. When you're so focused on your career you think your partner be focusing their career to it's a reflection but the product of the city is people come and looking for gold and to. It's a attracts a younger crowd. So you got to weed out those people. That's a huge chunk of people. You should be meeting your time with so. I'm like fascinated here. I want to run an experiment. Have this like go on a bunch of dates with like people demographics. Just you have totally ignored and come back to the hat. Demographics ignore like whatever like yeah like criteria or things that you've been selecting in terms of who you go on dates with. I'm because what you're saying and what you're experiencing to me just almost don't jive with what i've seen exactly because people we know are too so in line with what you want the main takeaway for me is we all need to think about our values more because i think it's something that we forget to think about. You know people ask me. What's your five year plan. What what you've seen the future what you know and everybody always turns that into a career question. It's like a job interview but what is think about. What is your five year plan. And how do you plan on getting their not professionally. But for your personal i have. If you say you want kids okay. How are you going to find someone to have kids with. And what kind of parent are you going to be. You say you're gonna find a partner. How are you going to find that partner. What kind of partner do you want to be. These are the values that will drive. How the rest of our life will be. This is way more important than how much your companies for and where you're going to you know how many times you're going to promote in the next year or two one of my favorite exercises when meeting. New people is seeing how long you can go without asking them with what their careers or what. They've it's just simple mattis implementing kind of your takeaway right into your day to day life. And lastly we should really look out for people who are distracting really attractive versus realistically. Attractive when i mean by that is. This city is full of distractions. They're interesting for sure but that's short-lived but people who realistically attractive have the qualities that you want. In a longterm relationship were partner and those are the qualities we should be looking for and not be so distracted by that person challenged because are always traveling the world. That's not realistic. You're really seriously looking for a partner in life. Forget the distractions and learn how to recognize those distractions. And i think it's easy to blame. Sf and i think there are laws distraction. People that you just mentioned here so maybe interest after weed out more other people that are really looking for something. Stable obviously exist in our french friends circle in our friend significant others bins. Whatever they're out they're out there. People are getting married having children like having a life together so this even though the memphis israel has never never ever land. This is sort of related to her talking about not related but i. It's actually good that we have two guys here to comment about this. We received an email about the episode. We had on egg freezing where connie came on and and took us through the process of her egg freezing experience so we have someone email in and say She says.

00:30:09 - 00:35:03

I have a comment on this episode. I'm not sure if you take comments. But i want to correct some information. She says i actually froze my eggs at age. Thirty eight at ucsf and although most of the information the podcast is written and of course only represents one woman's perspective. I took some serious issue with what i thought was extremely cavalier attitude of the woman telling the story so here are some things she says. First of all the process is very expensive and not covered by insurance. It costs between twelve thousand to fifteen thousand for one round including the medication. So that's financially that's something you wouldn't think about Of course some companies cover for it but you know some companies stone second and more importantly the process is quite arduous. Are juice arduously. Second second and most importantly the process quite arduous. You have to go to the doctor. Nearly every day for ten days for two weeks and there are several appointments that you have to complete before you start the cycle and then at the doctor which i did not know this. They do vaginal ultrasounds almost every day. In order to track how many eggs or growing and how large they're getting so essentially it sort of invasive invasive process and then third the medications themselves take quite a toll on your body. You can become extremely emotional. Nauseated gain weight not to mention the shot edge issue which is fine. What she's referring to is you have to give yourself the hormone shots like a huge wrench in your tummy everyday and fourth. Although the retrieval procedure is quick and you are under major anesthesia have to take the day off from work and have someone get you in the end so kind of a big deal. And they're not. Even sure of the eggs will survive the defrosting. Or if even work if you use them later so even if you freeze your eggs and you harvest your eggs there no success you know. There's no guarantee that they'll actually give you babies. So i'm glad that she wrote in the emails much longer than that but i'm really glad she wrote and thank you so much because we're not doctors here. It was just one woman account of her ex process and it was good to hear multiple sites. 'cause i've had multiple friends who've frozen their eggs but it's it's good to hear this because it just shows you how The the things people are due to take hold of their lives to gain control of their lives in the light of modern dating thinking about the future and for women to freeze their eggs whether you thought the process was easy where you thought the process with very invasive. At least you're taking that control thinking. This is what. I won the future. Which is the option to have kids. So that's why. Would i want to bring back is to you. Don is there. there are women. Maybe that's like your sample group right. They're women who frozen their eggs. Who are in line with the values that you want and what you're looking for in the future and they've thought about it way ahead of you know maybe some their counterparts per proper planning proper planning and proper planning. Okay so i'm going to wrap this up. I wanna think. Boris review my lovely co host again today. Oh you're welcome and dawn for coming on and you know just like bring out this very sensitive topic for some reason. People don't like talking about this. We'd like gender roles in terms of like acceding women exceeding success power couples but people. Don't talk about the real questions. Which are your values and also how you view the value that your partner brings into the relationship. So thank you for bringing that to light. I really appreciate it if you have more thoughts on this. Which i'm sure you do. Because we bring generals or even who pays for dates. We get like a ton of emails. People feel very strongly about this topic. So we want to hear from you if you have sort of the of don's experience hey come on our show. We can anonymous your name and give identities to you know other identities to the people involved in your story okay. Did you want to say something bars in society. We talk a ton about women's roles. Changing what about men exactly you talk about this one eighty equation without ever considering and and so. That's one of the reasons. I really love this topic in love talking thinking to debating it because at a certain point you know done is doing this.

00:35:03 - 00:36:42

Amazing thing of actually recognizing that hey rules are changing and how does that affect men. Yes are changing on both sides and we can't have one without the other we have to think about this holistically when we talk about like international women's day where we talk about like the girls club a hassle include men too 'cause they're half of it their half of it so let's not exclude each other. Let's actually and think about the evolution of males and what what that looks like in the future. And what are kit. What our kids should be experiencing in the future. One hundred percent of that lovely lovely last but not least stay dateable. Your action item for this week is to identify what you bring to a partnership. And how does that compare to what you're looking for in a partner additionally if you know you wanna family in the future think about the qualities that you should be working on in order to create the type of family that you want. The most efficient way to meet. New people is a combination of online. And offline five hundred. Wrenches has your offline covered connect over brunch with new friends. Come alone or bring a buddy. There's always a table of friendly faces mimosas. An eggs benedict sign up at five hundred branches dot com and use the code date evil for free entry to connect with us visit dateable. Podcast dot com. You can also find us on facebook twitter and instagram. All under dateable podcasts.