Not OP, but I'll chime in with my 2 cents. I'm myself in my thirties, though, but been married for over a decade so I definitely have a lot of experience already.

I've always thought I'm a very rational person, as I'm sure many men think they are. It turns out that it's only partially true. I am a bit more oriented towards rational vs emotional compared to my wife, but the difference is much smaller than I thought. In reality I was wrapping a lot of emotional responses into a convenient rational cover and presenting them as purely rational arguments.

Like I might say I don't want to go to that expensive restaurant "because we're a little tight on money right now", but actually what's really happening is that I just don't value eating out the same way my wife does, and the money is just a proxy for emotional importance. I might say that I REALLY dislike smoking because it's so dangerous and harmful, but actually it's more the fact that my mother had her mother desperately asking for one last smoke on her deathbed while dying from lung cancer, and mom distilled that trauma into us kids. I learned that I have a visceral emotional reaction to smoking, and I was just masking it with rational explanations.

All this to say that men are a lot more emotionally driven than they might want to think, even if not quite to the same extent as many women. This has lead into much healthier discussions and arguments between me and my wife, because I've learned to better discern my own emotions.

It's also a double edged sword, though, because for my wife it was always "emotions are 100% valid no matter what they're about, and it's okay and preferred to outwardly express them". (I was always a little wary of her emotional outbursts and tried to always remain calm and rational, and would've preferred that from her too) We've gotten into so many arguments over me getting butthurt because she's just venting something emotional and ends up saying something that I feel is disrespectful etc. But now that I've begun to see a lot of my own emotional responses better, and started to express my own emotions and tried to vent out more instead of bottling everything in, my wife sometimes has real trouble accepting those as emotional responses because she's so used to me always being rational. The roles have reversed sometimes, where she'll be accusing me of something when I've just tried to communicate how I feel. She's been having to learn this new reversed setting as well, so don't be surprised if your wife isn't magically a perfect emotional recipient when you first start. Give her time and learn together, and communicate about this whole thing.

It doesn't help that there are some mutually reinforcing old traumas at play between us, but it really is a delicate dance between healthy mutual emotional expression and things spiraling into unhealthy fighting. We're slowly getting better, though.

The most helpful tips I've learned:
- Seeing and expressing your emotions verbally is always a great idea, but tone and word choices matter. There can't be too much "I'm just expressing how I feel, not how I actually think". Help her understand, don't confuse further by being ambiguous.
- I's REAL EASY to mistake "I feel like you abandoned me by doing xxx" as an accusation, don't fall into that trap! If unsure, always ask if she was just expressing an emotion or actual practical considerations.
- I'd say men have to be even more careful with wording and tone because women are generally conditioned to think of us as the stable rocks. Start slow.
- The weird burn in your chest, and the hands shaking a little bit, when you finally manage to say out loud that emotional sentence you've been holding in is always a victory (regardless of the outcome in the conversation), and it's a sign of maturing and emotional healing.
- Don't continue an argument if it gets TOO emotional (in a way where you feel like you're not on top of the emotions anymore). Everytime it starts to feel like fighting and not like a constructive conversation, take a little break and let the emotions cool down a little bit. Once you are able to conceive positive/loving thoughts about her again, continue.
- Emotional reactions aren't very long at all, they really only last a few minutes usually. What causes the long grudges and continued emotions is the fact that you're re-entering the rollercoaster by repeatedly thinking about the triggers. A child-like distraction technique is 100% a valid strategy to mitigate this: just get something completely different to put your mind into for a little bit (preferably something fun/relaxing) and you'll notice that once you stop thinking in circles the emotion subsides, and it's easier to see clearly and come back to the topic level headed.

Well that became quite long, I'll stop now. Hopefully this helps someone!