The Stress Gap: Why Women Are More Stressed Out Than Men

There’s consistent discussion and rhetoric on the supposed gender pay gap, but we rarely delve into other disparities between the two. There is, in fact, a gap that’s affecting women more than men, but it’s not one that you’d think. This imbalance in actuality is a stress gap, and it’s responsible for why women are more stressed out than men.

Expectation vs Reality

If we’re single and career-oriented, we might expect our lives to be like Carrie Bradshaw’s. If we’re married and a homemaker with children, we might think our day-to-day life will look like June Cleaver or Samantha Stephens, vacuuming in pearls and an apron or hosting dinner parties for our husband’s boss. TV may be entertaining, but it’s rarely accurate, and what’s worse is that these false portrayals are only reinforced by both the gloss of social media and strict societal messaging exclusively focused on women (you can be a mom or an employee but never both).

Even as we’re targeted by these outside influences, especially the friends and celebrities we follow on social media who seem to have it all and do it gracefully, we might be struggling with our own internal battles. If we’re fortunate enough to stay home with our kids, we might feel guilty for wanting a pursuit outside our domestic life. If we work outside the home and have to outsource our childcare or don’t even have children, we might feel guilty for not being able to devote time and energy to our family. Women work exclusively or stay home exclusively for many reasons specific to their individual needs, but it’s extremely hard not to feel caught in the weeds in either situation. 

It’s difficult to care for ourselves and our families and be the employee we need to be without feeling stretched thin.

Our reality rarely matches up to our expectations. It’s overwhelming and difficult to care both for ourselves and our families and be the mom or employee we need to be without feeling stretched thin. It’s those daily responsibilities – physical, mental, and emotional – that lay the basic foundation for the stress gap. 

The Toll Our Strengths Take On Us

Women are more likely to have anxiety disorders and more likely to be stressed than men. This conclusion comes from a study published in The Journal of Brain & Behavior in 2016. Women consistently divulge higher stress levels than men year after year, and the two most common theories behind this prevalence are mainly the tolls of domestic work and emotional labor. To many, this will sound insincere or even ludicrous. How can keeping a house clean and being emotionally intuitive stress us out? 

We’re hesitant to think of homemaking as a “job” in the traditional sense, even though if we didn’t keep our houses neat and tidy or take care of our children, we’d have to pay someone else to. It’s estimated that women do three times more unpaid domestic work than men. This includes cooking, cleaning, raising children, and all of the finer details those tasks encompass. And many women do all of these things while also maintaining jobs away from the home.

We can look at domestic work as a concrete example of actual labor, but what is emotional labor? It’s a relatively new term to be sure, even if the concept dates back ages, but essentially this refers to what one writer describes as “the duties that are expected of you, but go unnoticed.” Let’s be honest with ourselves for a second. The majority of the time in our households, who buys the groceries, schedules doctor and dentist appointments, drives kids to soccer practice, responds to work or social events, plans vacations, schedules extended family time or trips out of town? Who plans weekly meals or for holiday gatherings and coordinates with friends and family? Women do.

This is not to say that men can’t and shouldn’t do these things, but most of the time, women take these tasks upon themselves. Emotional labor also includes something called surface acting. To give an example, let’s say that you and your husband are on your way to an important dinner or event, but you have an argument in the car. When you get there, you put on a happy and cheerful face for others, even though you’re still bruised and upset from the argument. This is what’s known as surface acting.

As women, motherhood, homemaking, and child-rearing come instinctively or naturally to many of us. It’s written in our DNA to manage things, to organize, to plan, and to care for others. But when we fall behind or fail to do these things, we feel guilty, or like a bad mother and a failure as a wife and as a woman. Emotional labor and domestic work may be hard to define for some, but you’re sure to notice those things if they go undone. Our need to be on top of these things is what leads us to stress, anxiety, depression, guilt, and feeling overwhelmed.

How We Can Cope 

Keeping stress at bay or at least trying to mitigate its effects is paramount. Constant stress repeatedly triggers our brain’s command center, the hypothalamus. This system sends messages to our sympathetic nervous system to release epinephrine, which causes blood pressure, pulse rate, and lung expansion to skyrocket. Our body was designed to elicit these responses in stressful situations, but this takes a toll physically and mentally when these switches are flipped day after day. Chronic stress contributes to a buildup of fat in addition to weight gain, injures our arteries and blood vessels, and can interfere with our reproductive hormones. 

Physical activity helps regulate our blood pressure and ameliorate tension in the muscles.

Anyone who knows stress and anxiety knows that real self-care doesn’t amount to taking a bubble bath or having a glass of wine once a week. Self-care, whatever that may look like to us, is imperative in countering stress but we might not even know where to begin.

According to one stress expert and director emeritus for Massachusetts General Hospital’s Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine, scientifically there are three ideal solutions to countering stress. The first is a relaxation response, or a series of steps we can take to lower our heart rate. These steps include practices like repetitive praying, meditation or visualization, taking deeper abdominal breaths, and doing yoga, or tai chi.

Physical activity is also crucial. This can include things like running, lifting weights, or even just taking a walk after a stressful situation. Physical activity helps regulate our blood pressure and ameliorate tension in the muscles. Support from family and friends is also helpful, as evidence suggests that a strong social network and support system can decrease stress and anxiety.

Closing Thoughts

Women may be more stressed than men, but we’re also more likely to address our condition sooner rather than later. Some amount of stress in our lives is natural, especially if we have a family or a career which takes up our time. We can also help by educating ourselves and the men in our lives about the stress gap and why it exists. It’s admirable to want to be the best mom and the best wife that we can be, but we only hurt ourselves more in the long run if we let that pressure exacerbate our stress to an overwhelming degree.

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