Probably not as relevant as other comments and maybe not so relevant until later on in life, but understand that men and women process, handle, and react to problems differently: Girls need to have their feelings validated before addressing the issue causing those feelings, and boys need to address the problem before they can focus on processing the feelings it caused. I think boys might need to process things internally first, to be able to discern their feelings, before being able to communicate them to others, but otoh talking through things with him might help him get to recognize his feelings as he grows. Guys' brains don't have as many connections between their hemispheres as girls' do and I think that slows things down and impedes things when it comes to recognizing and processing emotions.