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Losing It With Jillian: The Man Of The House Needs To Stand Up
Commentary by RTVC Staff Writer Jennifer Wielgus
July 21, 2010
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Jillian Michaels
Eight episodes of "Losing It With Jillian," zero strong men.
Well, there was that Vivio guy who acted tough, telling his son to quit crying because only women showed emotion. But that was clearly just a facade, because when we met his wife, we recognized true toughness.
For the most part, the first season of Jillian Michaels' fix-a-family series spotlighted a bunch of struggling families with weak, emotionally deficient dads. In many cases, the dad was absent altogether.
I don't know if this was intentional. Jillian is a strong woman -- understatement? -- and maybe she wanted to empower other women to take control of their bodies, minds and lives. Maybe she wanted to prove you don't need a man to keep a family on a healthy, productive path. From the looks of it, she succeeded. The moms were the driving force behind most, if not all, the end-of-episode transformations.
It's hard for me to know exactly what a man, let alone a father, would take out of watching Jillian's show. But it sure looks like the fellas out there need to get a hold of themselves and stop sitting around, expecting their wives to quietly slap a band-aid on all the family's problems.
Maybe it's a communication issue. I know from experience with my own dad and husband that the gender stereotype is true. Guys really aren't good at opening up and talking about feelings. Bottled-up feelings were a huge problem for the families on "Losing It," and once Jillian stepped in and allowed the moms to let their feelings out, good things started happening. The moms, feeling more confident, managed to pry thoughts and feelings out of the dads. And that broke the logjam.
A perfect example was Tuesday night's season finale, in which Carmen Alvarez was afraid to speak up about her husband David's bad habits. Every time she did, he got on her case for nagging him. But Jillian took Carmen aside in a one-on-one workout session and helped her find her voice, by literally encouraging her to yell. Then, Jillian opened up a dialogue between Carmen and David. She helped David understand that what he saw as nagging was really Carmen pleading with him to get his crap together because he was setting a bad example and dragging the entire family down with him.
Bingo. The family eventually got on the right track -- or so we were led to believe; we only saw them after a six-week period in which they were planning to end up on camera.
Do families with healthy, well-adjusted, communicative dads have a better chance of being healthy as a whole and not ending up in the middle of a Jillian intervention? We can't really draw dramatic conclusions from an eight-episode reality show. But after watching the entire season of "Losing It," I'd say that when the man of the house stands up and takes responsibility for himself, his mistakes and his behavior, it seems to have a pretty amazing trickle-down effect.
Jennifer Wielgus is a content editor/blogger at phillyBurbs.com, a popular news and opinion website in the suburbs of Philadelphia. Originally from Chicago, she's a big sports fan (Cubs, Bears, Bulls, Blackhawks and Northwestern), a competitive athlete, and attempts to balance a seemingly contradictory passion for fitness and TV.
You can read Jennifer Wielgus' recap of this episode on phillyBurbs by clicking here.
You can contact Jennifer at jwielgus17@gmail.com.
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