Crying More Easily Than You Used To

You are fine. Then someone holds a door, or there is a dog on the television, and your eyes go, and you have to look out of the window until it passes.

It is embarrassing and slightly bewildering, especially if you have never been someone who cries easily. It is also one of the most reliable signals the body gives, and worth reading rather than fighting.

What the easy tears usually mean

Crying at small things is rarely about the small thing. It is a sign that the system is running with no slack in it.

Holding feelings down takes effort, and that effort comes out of the same account as everything else. When the account is low, the lid does not fit properly, and whatever is underneath comes out at the first thing that touches it. Often that is kindness, which is why unexpected gentleness sets people off more than bad news does.

So the tears are information: there is more being carried than there is capacity to carry it. They are not a sign that you are falling apart, and they are not a character change.

What lowers the threshold

Several ordinary things do it, and they stack.

Not enough sleep, for more than a few days. Pain. Being ill, or just getting over something. Hunger, and skipping meals while busy. Alcohol, which lifts the lid a day later rather than at the time.

Longer stretches of strain do it too: caring for someone, a stretch of overwork, a house move, a grief you have not had time to sit in. Hormonal changes across the month, after a birth and around menopause have a clear and unembarrassing effect on this as well.

Look at the last two weeks before you look at yourself. Usually three or four of those are present.

Crying is not the problem to solve

The instinct is to stop it happening. That is the wrong target, for two reasons.

Suppressing it works briefly and raises the pressure, so it arrives later at a worse moment. And the crying itself is doing something useful: it tends to be followed by a drop in tension, which is what people mean when they say they felt better after a good cry.

So where you can, let it happen somewhere you are not performing: in the car, in the shower, with the one person who does not make it a crisis. Ten minutes of actually crying is often worth more than three days of holding it.

What to do when it arrives at work

You still need something for the moments when it is not convenient, and small physical moves work better than trying to think it away.

Breathe out slowly, twice, and let your shoulders drop. Press your feet into the floor. Hold something cold, or run your wrists under cold water. Look at something far away rather than at the person in front of you.

If you need a minute, take one. I need two minutes, I will be back is a complete sentence in almost any workplace.

And if it happens in front of someone, a short line prevents the whole thing becoming a conversation: sorry, I am running on about four hours sleep, I am alright. Then carry on.

Refill what is empty

This is the part that actually changes it, and it is less about managing feelings than about capacity.

Sleep first, because nothing else works while sleep is short. Then food at regular times, then some movement, then a genuine gap in the week with nothing scheduled in it.

Then look at what is being carried and whether any of it can be put down for a while, handed over, or postponed. People in this state usually say no to nothing and that is where the load comes from.

And give the real thing somewhere to go: a conversation with someone who listens, twenty minutes with a pen, a walk where you think about it on purpose. Feelings that have a time and a place turn up less often uninvited.

If you cannot cry at all

The opposite version is just as common and gets even less attention.

Feeling flat, blank, and unable to cry even when something sad happens is also a sign of an overloaded system rather than a cold one. It often comes after a long stretch of coping, and it tends to thaw slowly once there is some rest and some safety.

It is worth mentioning to someone rather than waiting for it to pass on its own, particularly if nothing has felt like much of anything for several weeks.

When to take it to someone

Please talk to a doctor if this has gone on for more than a couple of weeks, if it arrived with a low mood, broken sleep or a change in appetite, or if you are exhausted in a way that rest is not touching.

There are physical reasons for a sudden change in how easily you cry, including thyroid trouble, iron levels, pregnancy, and the start or change of a medication, and those are quick to check and worth ruling out.

A therapist is the right place for the other half of it: the load you are carrying, and what might come off it. Crying easily is one of the most common reasons people finally book an appointment, and it is a sensible one.

And if the tears are coming with a feeling that you do not want to be here, please tell a doctor or someone you trust today. In the US you can call or text 988 at any time.