it happens to me when really bad things happen. i can stress myself out to the point of tears deciding what to eat, but when something legitimately bad happens to me i just have a mini panic attack then shut down emotionally.

it's a defense mechanism, at least for me. i will myself to go numb so that i don't get hurt again.

**TRIGGER**

Oh man it could be so many things. If an abuser tells us not to cry or else. If we were raised not to show emotions. If we didn't want anyone to know for whatever our own personal reasons were. We may be afraid to start for fear of letting all that emotion out we've been holding in. Could be denial or hiding, I don't know? There are soooo many reasons. Maybe you could think about it and come up with something so you could ask your new therapist. Your other one was a dork telling you it was unnatural...:-P

i was that way for a really long time. i couldnt cry couldnt scream couldnt smile. i coulndt show any emotion. i didnt talk much to people. i was beat everytime i showed emotion so my brain was taught not to. and after so much was built up after so many years one day it all came out and my god when it did it wasnt pretty. i must have cried for weeks. i hid in my room and never came out. ididnt know how to act. i was scared of what people were goin to do to me. but that was my problem. just to share with you.

i have been there. i know what its like.

I learned to control my crying, so if I feel semi-safe somewhere I may be able to cry a bit but not really release anything. If I don't feel safe or accepted, no matter how bad things are, I can't cry. I'm hoping I can feel safe enough to really cry and release it all soon.
Maybe you're like me - you just don't feel safe enough to show your emotions. Be patient with yourself, and don't pressure yourself. No matter what your reason for not crying, I doubt pressure will help anything.

I can't cry in front of people. I can't cry when I feel bad, or when I should be sad. Everyone always says I am heartless and disconnected, and maybe they are right. I don't know who I am anymore. I want to cry, I want to show that I am feeling emotion, but I am pretty dead. My mind will be telling me this is a sad situation or things like that, but I don't react appropriately. I don't feel all emotions. I feel saddness and anger and hopelessness, but I don't remember ever feeling a pleasant emotion. I know when I should be experiencing happiness and enjoyment and everything like that, but I don't. I want to feel love more than anything. I want to be able to feel a connection to another person. Will I ever be able to feel? Sorry to ramble on your post.

I've been struggling with this myself. I have so many deep painful memories associated with crying that it's so triggering to cry. I actually feel physical pain when I do. I used to get into trouble for crying so I learned how not to do it.

It seems like there's an emotional short in my brain. The cry wire is attached to the laugh buzzer and the laugh is connected to the pissed off one and usually, the rest is connected to cry. I'm all out of wack. My emotional response to things is pretty messed up.

So, no you're not alone. I have trouble with this too. hugs..

I learned not to cry so no-one could see how vulnerable or fragile i am..so its a defence mechanism i think, its not unnatural, everyone copes differently and you shouldnt be made to feel abnormal for what's normal to you x

When I have alot going on and need to cry I can only allow myself to cry a little bit and then just go numb as I'm afraid that if I let it all out I would completely loose it.Also I have been taught that I need to be strong and take care of others not have feelings myself.

I can relate to showing no emotion. I was working with one therapist who called me the 'bare wall' because she said she could never tell what I was thinking or feeling. When I spent 6 weeks at a facility for survivors they said I was a very angry man - but if you met me you would think just the opposite. I am not a screamer, don't throw chairs or anything like that - I don't even cuss.

Working through and expressing those feelings is just part of the process.

I go back and forth between not being able to cry at all and not being able to stop crying...when I was growing up, I'd get yelled at for crying, so I learned quickly that it wasn't okay.

I still cry, I am very emotional when I'm feeling alone in this battle. My crying is best done before bedtime because it seems to get me to sleep. I hope to someday be free of all the emotional baggage.

This was one of the first issues my therapist addressed with me. She says it is perfectly normal. What a horribe thing for your other therapist to say!

For me, I was always told that showing emotions made me weak and I needed to toughen up. It was an embarassment to show any emotions in my house as a child.

This left me feeling NOTHING.... no happiness or sadness or anger.

With the help of therapy, I am learning to feel!! I came to the conclusion one day that there had to be more to life than what I was feeling. I had an ah-ha moment that I started crying and screaming... I did not stop crying for days! It was acutally liberating!

Hope and Love

I can identify with how you couldn't cry or show emotion that how I was more so in highschool kept to myself and cry only in private not showing my vulverable side when others saw me. Its something not Im now not afraid to do. I remeber once when i had a breakdown emotional I cried to point where I almost lost my breath. It just showed me how as a person its important for balance . Your not alone in this type of feeling or behavior

i can cry, but if I m talkng about anthing or thinking about anything or dealing with anything that has to do with the sexual abuse I had to put up with, I cant cry, in fact i find it hard to show any emotion when i dal with that stuff. But i do cry at other times, usually totlly inapropriate times too.

I go through phases. I can go ages with no tears at all, then I can sit and they will come for no apparent reason.