[mesmark]

Sue - yeah, it was a student's essay and I corrected it, but I knew she would ask 'why?'

Actually, she already did ask why and I gave her the explanation above as a tenative 'this is the best I can come up with for now, but I'll ask around' answer.

As for meaning, I think she meant 'tolerate', but that leads me to a new question, would you use 'bear with ...' to mean 'tolerate' in BE? Or is that what you meant by 'wait patiently'?

In AE the following are Ok:
'My company can bear with the current economic situation.'
'I'm bearing with the pain, but if it gets worse, I'll go see a doctor.'

The first is OK without 'with' but the second one sounds awkward without 'with'.
'My company can bear the current economic situation.'
?'I'm bearing the pain, but if it gets worse, I'll go see a doctor.'