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Anxiety Disorders
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Different. Am I not acting properly?

Cry
Cry

So I have been going to therapy and we're now getting into the heavy topics and she told me it's okay to cry. But when I try, I....can't. I was raised in a household where it's just easier to control your emotions than to let them out. Hell the last time I cried was when my girlfriend killed herself but even then I shed a few years, yelled at the world and then pick myself up. Her death was 7 years ago. And if you can't control your emotions then you try to control the situation (this especially with just me and my mom) which gives me the leader trait. So when my therapist told me it's okay to cry I just stared at her. And she said it's completely normal to cry over something as silly as someone being mean to you on a day but again if someone was being a jerk to you, you fight back. That's how I got out of a lot of situation (it's saved my ass many-a-times) heck apparently it's taken a toll on me according to my best friend. He told me I had the prettiest coloured eyes and my eyes were so open. But now my eyes are like a blue-Green-grey. And my eyes are more gloomy which I guess I've accepted that. Obviously I'm not the same person, never will be but it just shocks me to hear that. Anyone else have the same kinda thing? I just don't want to feel so alone.

Gladdmatt
Gladdmatt
As people get older, they often find it harder to cry. You are not alone, and if you are 16 rest assured you will indeed have situations ahead of you that make you cry. Therapy is not about being obedient to whatever the therapist suggests, I'm sure the therapist was just trying to be helpful. Be yourself, be honest. That's the way to get the most out of therapy. May God bless your day.
jewells1
jewells1
Crying actually has a biological purpose when done because of highly emotional reasons. It triggers your brains to release calming enzymes and endorphins. Your own biological medicine cabinet. But smiling and laughing have their own bottles in that cabinet.
I try to think of negative emotions now as syrup of ipecac, too much and you hurt worse afterwards, but a small amount done in a positive creative way helps relive the belly ache.
My idea of retribution lead more to letting the air out of someones tire a couple days in a row. Just enough to make them think.

I cry, but at beautiful things, as well as nightmares and emotional upheaval. Trying to find the reasons for the first, more than the second is the challenge.

Support, J.
Cry
Cry
J,
The thing is it's like I no longer have the crying medicine cabinet. I've cried over what happened to me enough that I just sit there and don't really have a reaction. I don't cry I just sit there. I try to cry it just doesn't work
jewells1
jewells1
I have seen so much that crying is usually when I see someone go through any part of what I did. On a scale of what hurts enough to cry about, well losing John to cancer set that bar pretty high, I cried myself dry. So dry, I though nothing would ever move me as much as that ever again. But when I look around? Then tears may fall, tears of compassion, sympathy and other emotions I thought would never touch me again that way.
It takes time and it will take the time it takes, your therapist knows this, but is putting the seed in the ground of your thoughts, that there is no shame in it, regardless of what we were taught by others.

J.
enfieldguy
enfieldguy
I can't cry in therapy, I am very guarded. Alone at home I can cry but I have to think about the loss of my dogs or something like that and I usually end up crying because I failed them or someone else. Sort of a "I'm sorry I'm such a failure" cry.
arfie
arfie
I have no memory of crying easily, even as a child. I feel the pain vividly, but crying just doesn't seem to be in my repertoire. I have been told by med pros that not all tear ducts are created equal. There are even people who are born with no tear ducts, whatsoever. It is not physically possible for them to shed tears. It doesn't seem worth the time or expense to find out if there is a physical reason for my inability to shed buckets of tears.

And then we get to the mechanical, dissociated way I tell my trauma tales. I fall into a desperate state later when I am alone, but I tell my trauma tales with far less emotion than a meteorologist uses in giving a weather forecast.

Insert theory of preference here. For me, ^it^ is what ^it^ is, whether I understand it or knot.
Cry
Cry
Arfie that's exactly how I am. I'm someone who tells the story with less emotion and other people get emotional and ask why I'm not crying. I just can't. That's how I feel
patti22
patti22
War, famine, who wins a flipping football game...those are issues worth being concerned about.

You don't cry...I think you'll be okay.

Now I understand the therapist saying what she did. IF you were holding back, and fighting it, then letting go can be cleansing. (I have times when I cry, and times when I don't. Mostly I don't anymore...but...there are times. And then when I blow my nose really hard...a bit of tears come out my eyes... Weird...maybe. I've never bothered to ask anyone, and I'm still walking around. )

Are you "not acting properly"?....

You're fine.

Just my 2 cents, Patti
Rouik
Rouik
I wouldn't worry about it as much, some people just don't cry much at all. I think as some others on here have mentioned that the therapist just wanted you to know you could be open and honest with them and not hold back anything. If you wanted to cry it would have been a safe place to do that, Figure out what way you release emotion and go with it, just don't bottle stuff in forever. Keep going to therapy and don't be so hard on your self. Best wishes and good luck.
extraterrestrialone
extraterrestrialone
i didnt realize you were seeing a therapist when i left another comment. i'm glad you are. my suggestion for crying is: my therapist suggested something to me called tappping. for me, this has been kind of amazing. she had me tap the side of my left hand (or vv) with my right saying something like "this is my left hand. i accept my left hand back into my body" in seconds at times i began crying. like i had opened a door to a room holding an ocean and it all spilled out. i can't explain this, but therapist can. i'm not good at remembering terminology because i don't pay attention when my mind is so full of other things, but this is somatic. There is also a great book i am reading. It is called The Body Keeps The Score. by Bessel Van Der Kolk, MD. it is about trauma and ptsd and related disorders. its worth taking a look at it. i believe it is important to cry. i hope you can get in touch with that part of you. crying did not cure me but i felt better after. more importantly, i felt as if i had touched a part of me that was sealed off that needed to be liberated.
arfie
arfie
Be it nature or nurture, I seem to have a delayed response to my emotional reactions. That is an actual advantage in a crisis. It keeps my logical functions on-line while everyone around me is stumbling around in shock.

I pay the emotional price later, after the crisis is past. The emotional build-ups can be horrendous and highly explosive. This is where my therapy tools come in. If I don't process and channel those compressed emotions, they become downright random and dangerous.
LillyPotter
LillyPotter
i do that too, while everything is happening, the crisis or the event - i am strong or fine - to the point of ridiculous. i trained myself to be fine, to look fine, to act fine or to leave while i was a kid - we had to. it was the rule. even when nothing was ok, we had to act ok.

i still do it. i have gone most of my life unable to cry. it took so long but the key to it was feeling safe enough for long enough. not judged, accepted to be whatever whoever i was. that was after i came here to this group. i was finally able to fall apart then. to cry. it took a long time.

i still can't cry in therapy. i haven't known myself long enough yet - or a counselor long enough. not anyone in real life but especially not me.

it takes time. it is ok. you are behaving absolutely just right. they want to let you know it is ok to cry - it is good to cry in therapy if it happens. it is also ok if you don't.

it is very 'normal' for us, for people with PTSD to recite without emotion what happened to us. i do it that way. i can't feel the emotions while i am telling what happened - i am still separate from most of the things that happened. i need to be for now. that has to be ok - according to me. your counselor will know this.
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