Women Share The Female Experiences Men Never Have To Think About Or Deal With

The idea that men are from Mars and women are from Venus is older than dirt, and while there are many ways in which the genders intersect, there are still some experiences that differ wildly. There are some things women have to deal with and experiences that we have that men just never do. Over on Reddit’s TwoXChromosomes sub, they discussed some of those things in detail, and to be honest, the list is kind of depressing.

1. The “I’m home! text As u/pafdoot pointed out, many men just can’t conceive of the idea of reaching out to their friends when they get home after a night out to say they got in okay. Sadly, that’s something women have to deal with all the time. “I told my husband that me and my girlfriends always text each other that we’ve arrived home safely after a night out and he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why,” she wrote. Ugh, so sad but true.
2. Being publicly identified While male employees wouldn’t necessarily care about wearing a nametag, many women dislike it due to “creepy” men learning who they are. “I was on an unpopular opinion post recently about a retail worker not liking when strangers called them by name. The men on the post couldn’t understand why wearing a name tag could be uncomfortable. But lots of women said men would pick up their name and then be creepy or weird about it,” wrote u/RoRoRoYourGoat. It was a popular answer with more than 2,000 upvotes. Another user, wackyDELYyeah, shared her experience with this exact scenario, saying: “I once got a friend request on FB from the pharmacy tech at my pharmacy. He got my name from my birth control prescription. Did not accept that one.”
3. Constantly being asked about kids The assumption that all women have kids or want them is everywhere, and it’s annoying as hell. U/1706 laments that men never have to deal with “when in a job interview, being asked if you have someone who takes care of your children.” How obnoxious is that?
4. Joining in on online video games While many men like to gatekeep the gaming community against women for some (sexist) reason, there are plenty of female gamers out there. Sadly, many feel like they can’t get as involved as they’d like due to the attitudes of the male players. U/EmphasisKnown5696 admits she hesitates when “deciding whether I have the mental fortitude to use voice chat in a video game and risk being screamed at by random boys.”
5. Sucking up just isn’t the same Another thing men never have to deal with that women do is changing up their mode of getting ahead at work. While being a brown-noser isn’t great, women really have to choose their methods carefully. “Men can kiss the ass of their bosses to their heart content, and not to worry about sending the wrong signals,” points out u/spa22lurk. So true!
6. The difference in attitudes towards parenting We know there’s a major disconnect between men and women in this regard, but men are praised for the same things women are looked down when doing. “My husband doesn’t understand that having our baby on our work zoom calls makes him look like a good dad and me look like a bad employee,” says u/meowmeow_now. Why is that?! It’s so infuriating. U/hollygb adds: “Or taking our daughter makes him look like a hero and makes me look like… a mom.”
7. Having to give out false details Most men don’t have to deal with the scary thought of giving out their contact details to the wrong person, but u/wanderingstorm admits that many women end up “giving fake information in general because men don’t take ‘no’ as a complete sentence.” She adds that we often make up “fake boyfriend, fake friend you have to meet up with or fake plans you can’t miss, fake address to avoid the creeper, etc. I’ve never met a man with a fake girlfriend he created because the chick at the bar won’t leave him alone.”

1. Being thought of as incapable Men never have to deal with being talked down to at Lowe’s the way women do. One of the most annoying things to u/Conscious-Antelope90 (and to many women) is “having to explain to the salesman repeatedly at the hardware store that I am the (very skilled) handy person and they should address me, not my husband who isn’t skilled in this area at all.”
2. Strategically planning our wardrobe We’ve all switched up what we planned to wear thanks to an appearance from our monthly friends. U/Psychological_Sail80 laments “not being able to wear certain colors of pants on certain days of the month in case of a leak.” I heard that!
3. Not being believed over a man How many times have you had a bad experience with a guy, only for it to be written off? U/ForeverSeekingShade hates that women deal with “not being believed when you tell a man that another man has made me uncomfortable/acted like a creep. Being questioned, doubted, or worse, blown off because ‘he’s harmless’ [or] ‘he’s a nice guy.’ Ughhh.” Ughhh indeed!
4. Constantly worrying about being a victim This is probably the most serious and most devastating discrepancy between what men and women deal with on a daily basis. “The constant worry in the back of your mind that you’re going to be raped and/or murdered and end up as a victim on a true crime podcast” is a real concern for u/scorpiorising29 as well as women across the world, and it’s a terrible problem.
5. Pregnancy scares Men never have to worry that they forgot to take their pill or that their method of birth control failed, but u/Darkdreams28 knows that worry well, just like many women do. “I remember as a young teen worrying that I had somehow gotten pregnant even though I hadn’t had sex,” she recalled.
6. Being a woman or someone who identifies as female online This is a biggie. U/CaptainBunnie points out the myriad awful things that we all deal with just by logging on to the internet on a daily basis. “Constant misogyny for simply existing online. Been sent unsolicited D pics, been sent gore and threats about ‘you know what happens when da woman starts talking too much?’ Simply for talking about squishmallows in a server,” she shares. “You see copious amounts of incel ideology criticizing every single thing about women existing. The constant confusing contradictory statements of how women are supposed to act and behave. It’s not an easy thing to grow up with seeing or dealing with tbh.”
7. Not having our pain taken seriously Because women are seen as more “emotional” than men, we often deal with medical professionals who write off our very real (and sometimes even serious) concerns. “I’ve never heard a man say that a doctor told him that he was just exaggerating or faking pain and that it was ‘all in his head.’ They’re never hypochondriacs- they’re just ‘cautious,'” writes u/riverrocks452. “Allowances made for differences in cis anatomy, but they get drugs for medical exams of their prostates and colons. Why don’t we get the same for pelvics?”
8. Not being allowed to have emotions Men never deal with being perceived differently just because they experience a legitimate feeling, but women do. “Being called hysterical” is especially obnoxious, u/AshEliseB points out. “Also being called a total bitch if you show anger, call out bad behavior, or stand up for yourself.”