The recent blog discussion on on misogynism and misandry has set me thinking. Is it really that men and women are so different they cannot fully understand each other? Or simply that for any close couple, the things that initially attract us to one another will, over time, become the things that cause most discord?

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My close women friends and I are all in hetrosexual relationships. So when this kind of discussion comes up, we usually come to the conclusion that relationship problems are down to men and women have a completely different make-up and outlook on life. (This is the easy, non-thinking, answer after all!)However, when I come to consider what my friends are actually complaining about - tidiness, financial meanness, laziness etc - sometimes I feel myself to share the women's point of view and other times my habits/characteristics are more like their husband's.

The more I think about it, the more I wonder if the issue is actually nothing to do with gender, more to do with being attracted to people with some opposite chracteristics to our own. So, someone who is disorganised may be attracted to someone who is organsed and will organise things for them. Similarly, someone weighed down by control freak tendencies may be attracted to the carefree nature of someone who gets less stressed about things. However, at some point, living in close emotional and physical proximities these positive points may become negative ones. The disorganised person gets fed up with having their life organised for them. The control freak gets more stressed out by having to take control of not only their responsibilities but their other half's too!

Of course, I'm not an expert and I don't really know what I'm talking about. But this would certainly explain a few things in my own life!