Are Filipino men mama’s boys?

DEAR EPPY,?

I am a 43-year-old woman married to a 44-year-old man.  I have three children.  My issue is my husband.  Nothing big.  But I’d like to understand why he is that way.  Although I have three children, I feel like I am taking care of four.  I also work in the office like he does.  Yet, when I get home, I am expected to prepare his food and make sure his side of the table is set the way he wants it.? I know it shouldn’t be a problem, but there are other instances that make me resent that I should do everything.  For example, he doesn’t like talking to the househelp.  He would tell me his concerns about a particular help and then he would tell me to tell the help that she shouldn’t do it again.?

Eppy, I don’t need to be told what to do.  I just need to understand so I can stop feeling this resentment towards him.                                     MOTHER WIFE

DEAR MOTHER WIFE,

I guess all your experiences with your husband point to one thing.  That is, he wants you to pamper him.  Or should I say, you pampered him in the beginning because you were so much in love with him.  But now that the passion of a young wife has died down, you might be thinking that you didn’t have to be that way with him even from the start.

I remember when I first studied psychology,  I couldn’t understand what my professor meant when he said Filipino men were mama’s boys.  I thought it was because this professor was a woman and had an issue with men.  Apparently, the other psychologists and psychiatrists I met said the same thing about Filipino men.

Hearing Filipino women tell their stories about Filipino men, I realized that there must be some truth to what these women are saying.  These women tell me that they prefer to be with foreign men because they are much more mature, attentive, and confident.  They are supposedly real men, compared to the whiny Filipino men who feel their wives don’t take enough care of them.

What is my opinion about this?  It is true that there are some Filipino men who are like little boys needing to be taken care of like a child.  I think every country has this kind of men.  Not all Filipino men are like that.  Unfortunately, you would have to search for these mature Filipino men the same way you would be searching for a needle in a hay stack.

Why?  Our culture teaches men to decide and think like little boys.  Some examples are: Little girls are told by Mommy to set the table for men while little boys are allowed to play with their toy guns and toy trucks or watch TV while their sisters work in the kitchen.  Little girls are taught to take care of all their siblings while little boys are “boys will be boys,” so let them be.  They teach little boys that men provide for their family.  In the end, boys become men providing for their families but will play with women who have poor values, or expect their partners to cook for them and wash their clothes while they play with their newest video games.  Little boys should be given as much responsibilities as little girls so they would be responsible men one day.

I know you said you didn’t need to be told what to do.  But I can’t help myself.  Talk to your husband like an adult instead of rolling your eyes and talking with a higher pitch than normal just like his mom does (just in case you do these things).  Let him be aware about the type of interaction you have with him and let him know that this will change.  Let him be aware that you are starting to act like a mother to him and he is starting to act like a child to you. 

You don’t have to be alone in understanding someone.  The two of you have to understand each other.  By trying to understand him only, you are being like a mother to him again.  Mothers always try to understand their children, right?  Talk to him as an adult to another adult.  Don’t talk to him like a parent to a child.   EPPY

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Email eppygochangco@gmail.com.