Crying

What is crying?

Crying is a common and normal reaction that often involves tears from your eyes. You might cry when something irritates your eyes because of strong feelings and emotions or as a symptom of medical conditions. Crying can involve one or more of the following:

• Tears from your eyes
• Sounds you make with your vocal cords
• Facial muscle movements and facial expressions
• Changes in your breathing, body language and more

Tearful crying starts with your lacrimal (tear) glands in your tear system. When you cry, your tear glands make tear fluid faster than older fluid can drain through your tear duct system. The extra fluid builds up until there’s too much for your eyelids to contain. Like water overflowing a riverbank, the extra fluid flows over the rim of your eyelids and down onto your face.

But crying doesn’t have to include tears. You can still cry even if you have one of the many medical conditions that keep you from producing tears properly.

There are many synonyms for crying. They include weeping, sobbing, bawling, sniveling, wailing and welling or tearing up, to name a few. But crying doesn’t always mean the same thing, depending on how and why it happens.

What are the most common causes of crying?

Tearful crying can be perfectly normal and healthy. There are two main reasons why normal tearful crying happens.

• Reflex tears. When something irritates your eye surface, reflex tears protect the surface of your eye by washing away the irritant. Examples include tearing up while cutting onions or because you have a grain of sand in your eye. Eye irritation and injuries commonly cause reflex tears. Pain in your face (like bumping your nose or pulling a nose hair) can also cause reflexive eye watering.
• Strong emotions. Tearful emotional crying is something that researchers don’t fully understand. There’s evidence that many emotions can activate your sympathetic nervous system and trigger extra tear production. People commonly cry because of sadness or happiness. But you can also cry because of intense laughter, deep frustration, sudden anger or extreme fear. Emotional events and memories can also trigger emotional crying. Examples include when you see a loved one after time apart or listen to a favorite song.

Other factors that play a role in crying

Other factors can affect how and why people cry. Some of them include:

• Culture and upbringing. You may be less likely to cry if your culture or upbringing treats crying as unacceptable. That can vary depending on age, gender, location (home vs. work) and more.
• Significant events. Cultures that treat crying as unacceptable may make exceptions for certain significant events. Examples include crying at funerals, weddings or the birth of a child.
• Fatigue and sleep deprivation. Managing emotions can be harder when you’re tired.
• Hormones. Certain hormones, including sex-linked hormones, may affect whether or not you feel like crying. Examples include testosterone, which may block crying, and prolactin, which may contribute to it.
• Relationships. You may feel more comfortable crying in front of people you trust.
• Mental health conditions. These may cause crying or affect your emotional control, making crying happen more easily. Emotional dysregulation is an example.
• Neurological conditions. Brain and nerve-related conditions can sometimes trigger tear production or full-on crying. Examples range from migraines and cluster headaches to multiple sclerosis. It can also happen with dangerous conditions like traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) or stroke.

Why do babies cry?

Babies usually cry to communicate when something is happening that they don’t like. Your baby might cry because they’re hungry, sleepy or need a diaper change. Babies also commonly cry because they don’t like feeling separated from people caring for them. And babies can cry uncontrollably when they have conditions like colic.

Early on, babies cry without tears and use their voices and facial expressions only. Tearful crying doesn’t usually start until your baby is somewhere between 4 weeks and 8 weeks old. And over time, you’ll learn your baby’s different cries and what they mean.

When does crying need medical care?

Whether or not crying needs medical care depends on a few main factors. The cause is one of the first to consider. Uncontrollable tearful crying needs medical attention when it happens with any of the following:

• A possible eye or face injury
• A possible head injury
• Something in your eye, especially irritating chemicals or substances
• Stroke warning signs

If crying episodes disrupt your life, it’s a good idea to make an appointment with a primary care provider or eye care specialist. Treatment generally involves managing the underlying cause. That can vary widely, so your eye specialist or healthcare provider is the best person to tell you more about treatment options.

Is it possible to cry on command?

Yes, it’s possible to teach yourself to cry on command. Actors and performers commonly learn how to do it. But unless you’re trying to land a stage or screen role yourself, you probably don’t want to do this. Research shows that if someone perceives your tears as fake, it could negatively affect how they think of you.

Why can’t I cry?

There are many reasons why you might not be able to produce tears when you cry. You might have dry eye or another related condition. And because your eyes need tear fluid, dry eye can become a more serious concern.

If you’re worried about not being able to cry — especially with symptoms related to dry eye — talk to an eye care specialist or healthcare provider. They can help determine if this is an issue that needs treating.

Is crying good for you?

There’s more than one answer to this question. It partly depends on the type of tears.

Reflex crying is usually good for you because it protects your eyes from harm. But too much of this good thing can turn into epiphora (watery eyes), which can be disruptive or harmful. If it’s disruptive, it’s best to treat it sooner rather than later.

Is emotional crying good for you? Maybe. Researchers don’t completely agree on whether or not emotional crying is good for you. One key study found that crying actually made participants feel worse immediately afterward. But that same study also found that 90 minutes after crying, people felt better than they did before crying.

The bottom line — at least until researchers find otherwise — is that if having a good cry helps you, don’t hold back.

Does crying help pain?

Crying doesn’t seem to help pain, according to a pair of studies published in 2022. In fact, those studies found crying may lower your pain threshold and/or make pain feel more intense.

Why do onions make you cry?

Onions make you cry because cutting them releases a gas that reacts with your tear fluid and irritates your eyes. Your eyes make extra tear fluid to flush the affected tear fluid away.

To avoid this, you can use a fan to push air away from your face so the gas doesn’t reach your eyes. The gas reacts easily with water (which is how it affects your eyes). That means you can keep it out of your eyes if you give it somewhere else to go. Try giving it another, closer water source (like an open cup of water) to react with. You can also try chilling onions in a refrigerator or freezer before chopping.

Why do I get a headache from crying?

There may be a few reasons why you get a headache from or after crying. One of the reasons is that crying when your emotions are high could increase your risk of having a tension headache. But crying can be a symptom of certain headache disorders like migraines or cluster headaches, too.

Why do I cry so easily?

There’s no rulebook that says when it’s OK to cry. And your reasons for crying can be as unique as you are. You might cry for everyday reasons, like hearing a sad story or a song that reminds you of how things used to be. Or maybe you’ve just reconciled with a family member you haven’t spoken to in years. Or perhaps you’ve just lost a pet. 

If you feel like you cry more than you’d like, it might be time to talk to a mental health professional. Emotional tears aren’t a sign of weakness, nor is seeing a mental health professional. It could be just what you need if you want to find ways to not cry or cry less.

If you frequently have reflex tears or watery eyes, you might need to see an eye care specialist. If you frequently have emotional tears and they’re disrupting your life, you may want to talk to a primary care specialist.

How to not cry

If you find yourself about to cry and want to stop it from happening, there are several things you can try that may help. And these are things you can do without it being evident to others.

• Breathwork. Many breathing techniques help calm your autonomic nervous system. Breathwork can also give you something else to focus on. Deep, slow breathing techniques like 4-7-8 breathing or box breathing are easy to do without it being obvious to others.
• Grounding exercises. Grounding exercises have you use all of your senses to focus on your surroundings. That kind of focusing may help you get out of your own head so you can steer your thoughts and feelings.

Some other actions you can do regularly that may help you manage your emotions include:

• Meditation or mindfulness exercises. These are like regular exercises for your mental control. Regular practice at these may help you manage your emotions better.
• Get enough sleep. It’s harder to manage your emotions when you’re tired.

If you’re thinking these tips sound a lot like stress-management techniques, that’s because they are. Anxiety and heightened emotions often involve more activity in your sympathetic nervous system. (That’s the one that runs your “fight-or-flight” response.) The techniques work because they tell your fight-or-flight response to stand down and let your parasympathetic nervous system take over. Other stress- and anxiety-managing approaches may help, too.