Tag: wellbeing

For Crying Out Loud!

I don’t know who to give credit to for this image.
I found it on a simple Google search, and it just resonates some days!

Have you ever had “just one of those days” where everything seems to be going wrong and you just want to cry?

I have those days every once in a while, and I am pretty accepting of them. As I mentioned in an earlier post, feelings are visitors that come and go. Darkness gives way to light eventually, always.

On those “down” days, I’m trying to be more open to a new stress-reduction tactic: CRYING.

I hate crying. My face gets all red and puffy. My nose gets stuffy, and there is always so many boogers and snot. When I really let the tears flow, I can even give myself a headache. Yet, I recently learned of some interesting benefits to crying.

Emotional tears have special health benefits. Biochemist and “tear expert” Dr. William Frey, at the Ramsey Medical Center in Minneapolis, discovered that reflex tears are 98% water, whereas emotional tears also contain stress hormones that get excreted from the body through crying. After studying the composition of tears, Dr. Frey found that emotional tears shed these hormones and other toxins that accumulate during stress. Additional studies also suggest that crying stimulates the production of endorphins, our body’s natural pain killer and “feel-good” hormones.”

psychologytoday.com

Crying is actually really good for you! I had no idea. You literally “get it all out of your system” when you cry, both literally and figuratively.

When you do a simple Google search on the “benefits of crying,” there are so many results—one news story even claims that crying can help you lose weight!

This article from CNN from July 2020 addresses how many of us are hesitant to cry, especially in public; the effect of pent-up emotions on our minds and bodies; why we cry; and how important it is to do so, especially during the current pandemic.

So if you’re having “one of those days,” I hope you know it’s OK, and maybe you can have a good cry to help you make it through.

(If you’re having any trouble whipping up tears of your own, I highly recommend the 1989 movie Steel Magnolias. I could cry for Shelby right now!)

Feelings are like House Guests

Image is from the website of Dr. Amanda Gale-Bando

I had a rollercoaster day today. My feelings have been up-and-down, I’m trying out a new medicine, and anxiety (which I have struggled with my whole life) has been creeping up in an intense way recently. It’s a little overwhelming.

I woke up feeling awful, but I tried lots of positive self-talk and cuddled on the couch with the dog for a while. Then, I was feeling better, and I turned some fun music up loud, took a long shower, put on my favorite comfy clothes, and danced in the bathroom mirror. Unfortunately, tonight I’m back to feeling crummy.

Experiencing a rollercoaster of emotions is not new to me, but being more calm and accepting of it is something I struggle with. Sometimes when I’m feeling anxious or unwell, I get so pessimistic and I think it’s going to last forever.

A few months ago, I pulled my back out for the first time. I had never experienced that type of pain before; it was excruciating. My husband has hurt his back a couple of times, and he was very supportive and helpful when I felt completely immobilized in pain. At one point, through some very dramatic tears, I told him “I can’t live like this!” He immediately laughed, hugged me, and told me that I wouldn’t have to live like this. I was going to rest and heal and feel better.

That’s an important point that I try to remind myself. In life, pain is often transient. Even with chronic conditions, there are good days and bad days. Dark times don’t last forever. Even the long, cold winter nights lead to beautiful spring days. Little seeds in the ground need the dark winter to build up their energy, to grow and blossom when the sun returns. We humans are like that, too.

I love the saying that “feelings are like house guests.” Sometimes you enjoy their company, and sometimes you can’t wait for them to leave. But they always do just that — they leave.