Last night, most of the way through my first post on The Constant Sad, I had a wicked headache. I wrapped it up and hit post.
Then I fought for several minutes to figure out how to edit it— I completely forgot about crying.
This morning, I woke up at 4am with the same wicked headache. It didn’t really go away until I could cry a bit. It’s like the post brought up so many feelings that they clogged the drain— I couldn’t feel anything except heat. Too much emotion, and no way to get it out. Physically. (Funny how ‘psychic’ and ‘physics’ are so close yet so far in our linguistic understanding.)
I’m fortunate to have a mother who, despite only rarely shedding a tear, always encouraged me. “Cry. It lets the poison out.” She would look on with love and patience while I wept.
And when I was a kid, I was a complete crybaby. It was awkward. In our culture, crying is a failure. Crying means something is ‘wrong’. All the other kids would halt, like somebody had gotten hit. Some would develop scowls (‘I don’t want to get in trouble for this, she’s ruining the fun, she’s such a baby, god this is lame’) and some would role-play being the good older sibling or gentle parent (crowding around me, asking ‘what’s wrong’ repeatedly… which I found overwhelming— sometimes, nothing was wrong and I didn’t know why I was crying). The extreme divisiveness over my tears made me cry harder. I learned to hide when I needed to cry— but then I was ‘missing’, and that was a problem, too.
Nobody else in my immediate family cried. They got catty, or angry, or withdrawn— I cried enough for everybody else. Even amongst my cousins, nobody cried like me. Everybody else was good-natured and intellectual, or boisterous and sporty. On top of that, my brother and I were the only ones of all the cousins with extremely dark hair— the black sheep. It was very alienating. By the time I was in middle school, I trained myself to stop crying. It gave me allergies, no joke. I had terrible allergies until I started crying again.
Incidentally, it took me getting extremely sick— vomiting for a week straight during my high school senior art show— for the floodgate to let loose. After managing to get to school, finally, and set up my art (all of my friends shocked me by showing up and helping out) I went home and cried for hours. Magically healed. Emotions are powerful.
Despite recognizing that I couldn’t not-cry, it wouldn’t be until my twenties that I felt like I could cry in front of other people again. It made things worse, and when I did cry sometimes I would worry that I was never going to stop. I could feel the emotions of people around me, and some people have very extreme reactions to tears. Trying to process my own feelings at the same time as others blew out my emotional fuses. I still have to be careful about the people I allow to see my tears.
Physiologically, crying is natural. Different tears have different chemical components— proof that it’s the body’s way of clearing out the clutter. If there’s a buildup of emotional byproducts in your brain, they need to get out— the last post took a more psychic approach. But crying is physical.
We know it causes problems when people hold in their farts or their pee. But we ignore the problems created by not crying. One of the first things we teach boys in our culture, once they are old enough for the lesson to stick, is ‘boys don’t cry’. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that heart attacks are a major killer for middle-aged men. You can only hold in so many tears throughout your lifetime before it will kill you. Your heart is supposed to allow the blood to flow. When you clench it, trying to hold back your tears, trying to control your emotions, you’re abusing the muscle. You’re obstructing its work. Stop getting in your own way. Find some people you trust— and cry together. Try.
My maternal grandmother died before my mother even got married. It was a heart attack. It was very sudden. She was only in her fifties. She carried a lot of pain for too long— pain for herself, pain for other people. She lost her parents at a young age, got married at a young age, and had four children. She gave a lot of love, but I don’t know how much nurturing she received. I was named for her. I feel it. She left a hole in the family when she left. I could never fill it.
We point to diet and lifestyle and genetics, but some people live to a ripe old age while ‘doing everything wrong’ and some people die young while ‘doing everything right’. Emotions are powerful, and they live in the body. Sometimes for years. Sometimes they stagnate, and an organ seizes up because of it.
I remember when, for the first time in my teens, I finally felt heartache. I thought it was a poetic term, up until then— it’s not. When you’re deeply sad, or yearning, you feel it in your heart. It hurts. In my case, it could be so strong I would also feel it in my left hand— closest to the heart— which would ache terribly in the ring finger. When we go to the doctor, they are divided on this issue. If you tell them something like this, they will run tests. They won’t write you a prescription to eat a good dinner, watch a sad movie with your best friend, and cry.
Our culture is uncomfortable with sadness, to the extent that we assume everything is fine once you move past it. Everything has to have happy endings, unambiguously, or else it’s pure tragedy— you must smile for photos— you must move past your grief— otherwise, ‘What’s wrong??’ There’s nothing wrong with being sad or crying. It’s just another thing that happens. Sometimes, it’s the only appropriate reaction.
It can kill us when we aren’t allowed to do it. It can confuse us when we are only allowed to cry later, when the trigger is gone. ‘Why am I crying?’ Because it wasn’t safe to cry before. You’re crying for all the times you couldn’t cry. You’re crying for your dead dog, and your burned childhood home, and the girlfriend who never spoke to you again. The movie’s not about that, but you’re crying for all of it anyway.
Understandably, some people hate to cry. This is partly because of what I just described, the cultural resistance and revulsion towards tears, and partly because there are different kinds of crying. I’ve cried every kind of tear. I’ve cried because I was happy, sad, relieved, angry, confused, ashamed, empathetic, you name it. I’ve cried about almost everything. Not all cries are equal. Sometimes you don’t feel better after you’ve cried— you feel worse.
But that’s partly because you’re out-of-practice. Crying is a workout. I’ve cried because I was dehydrated— it makes it worse. You need to drink a big glass of water to cry and flush out toxins, and you need to drink a big glass of water afterwards to replenish your system. You need to identify when you’ve cried as much as you can and move onto something completely different and revitalizing.
Crying empties you out— good, you were cluttered with emotion— but if you don’t replace it with something positive, you’ll feel desolate. Go to the shelter and pet some kittens and puppies. Go out with somebody on a fun date. Get a delicious meal. Take a walk in a beautiful park. Cry, but then do something positive— build up a positive association with crying. Crying means good things. Crying means you get to enjoy life again. Crying means you drop the weight. Crying means you are safe enough to cry.
Because I am a connoisseur of tears, I have preferences.
Love to cry outdoors. Something about nature really purifies the tears. There’s an ancient saying that ‘The only gift we give the Earth is our tears.’ I feel it. Mother Nature never begrudges me a good cry. She even seems like she prefers it. Everything she provides looks even more beautiful through wet eyes— like she was always meant to move me to tears. Animals seem drawn to it, as well. I’ve made friends with a lot of birds because of my tears— they seem to trust me more because I’m honest about my emotions. Animals sense these things. And sometimes, when I cry outside, I am moved to spiritual revelation. I can’t say I understand it, I can only say it works. Try it. Lie on some moss under a tree and tell the tree your sad story. The tree will listen. The tree will protect your tears.
Love to cry while watching Studio Ghibli films. Why?? Because it’s a controlled ride. Miyazaki especially seems to have the ability to take you to the edge, show you the view, and bring you back home safe. Some people like to watch true crime or documentaries on tragedies or extremely depressing films— if that works for you, great. It only makes me feel terrible and clam up. I need to know everything is going to be okay, or why cry? I’d rather just die and be over with it. Studio Ghibli films acknowledge the pain and the beauty of life. When I watch one of those movies, I don’t cry because I feel so terrible— I cry because I feel understood. Life is complicated, and beautiful because of the complication. Life is full of deep feelings. Life is a journey. Sometimes we stop by the road and we cry about it. But then we must go on.
Identify safe people. Some people can create an environment that is accepting of your tears— some people can’t. This isn’t a moral judgment, just the truth. Everybody has their reasons. Maybe your spouse is great when the kids are crying, but gets a little aggressive when you do so. Maybe your best friend is too much of a joker, but your buddies at the bar can hold space. Maybe your siblings feel too guilty when you share your tears, but your elderly neighbor has seen it all. Intimacy isn’t necessarily a measure of security. Some people only cry with their therapist. It’s all fine. Identify your personal needs— but know that crying alone only gets you so far. I prefer to cry alone, a lot of the time, but sometimes it builds a wall between myself and other people. They need to see me cry. It softens them to me, so that they can understand my silence better. They need to know I’m real. You need to know you’re real, too, and that your tears aren’t frightening. Others can handle them, and so can you.
Learn to distinguish between productive and unproductive crying. Sometimes I cry because I have finally identified the emotion and it is ready to release. Sometimes I cry because I’m beating myself up, needlessly. The latter is not productive crying. You shouldn’t be bullied into crying. It’s not the same thing— that’s crying for somebody else. “I’m a terrible daughter, I’m a burden, I can’t do anything right”— you feel bad for other people. Then identify a productive solution. Do something nice for your parents, stand up and get some chores done, improve a skill. Sometimes it’s a blurry line. Sometimes you need to cry about how bad you feel before you can do something about it— I’m a crybaby, I get it. But it’s close to the pity-party thing. It can be manipulative, or exhausting. Crying should be a release, not a burden. “I miss my grandparents; I love them so much.” That’s a good cry, deep feeling. “I’m not a child anymore— I miss the simplicity.” That’s grief, you can’t do much but cry for it. “I should never have been born.” Mean. You can’t do anything about that. You’re here now. “Sometimes I feel like I shouldn’t have been born, and I don’t know why I have to feel like that.” Bring the nuance back into it. Crying is an artform. There are different styles and purposes. Experiment a little— my productive crying might be your unproductive crying, and visa versa. But observe for yourself.
Alright. I’m giving myself a headache again. Remember that crying is dissolution— it can be ungrounding. Consider an aftercare plan if you know you need a good cry, or you could end up very disoriented. Drink water. Be kind. Sometimes the tears aren’t ready to come, and that’s okay. They’ll come when they’re ready. Just try to reward yourself for the hard work so that it’s easier in the future. I cry a little every day when I’m feeling healthy, and it’s not a big deal. It’s a trip to the bathroom. Everybody needs to do it sometimes.
Another article flown by the seat of my pants. Sometimes it comes out all at once.
I struggled with crying for a long time. Now I accept that emotion must exit somehow. I prefer laughter, or writing, or a hug. But sometimes all that helps is tears.
I often will point to my tears say, "I see you Mara," as a way of putting a Buddhist spin on it. Sometimes it helps...:)