Don’t Save Your Tears

By Anna Hall

All my life, I have been extremely emotional. Whether too excited about One Direction at 14 or too hurt at something my big brother said at 19, I have never been one to just “like” or “dislike” something–it is always love or hate, most often love. Nothing is a small deal, and this also goes for things like stress, anger, and especially, sadness. I take things hard, especially when other people are involved. I know making fun of empaths is a thing right now, but I genuinely have spent my entire life soaking up the feelings of others, typically going straight to my extremes, even when I might not be remotely involved in any way. 

Side note: I hate the idea that using the word ‘love’ “too much” makes it lose its meaning. I completely disagree–how dare someone limit the amount of passion and care I have to give to the world? 

Since getting my diagnosis of ADHD at age 22 (I am now 23), a lot of things have started to make sense, especially my sensitivity. Many neurodivergent people struggle with emotional dysregulation and rejection sensitivity dysphoria, which makes nearly every negative thing an enormous deal, even if it was tiny to begin with. My diagnosis also explained my extremes on the opposite end: hyper-fixations. Now, when I remember something that was an obsession for a few weeks or months, I can identify that as a hyper-fixation. For example, my love for One Direction.

With those extremes as part of my everyday life growing up and making my way into adulthood, I am no stranger to the accusation of being too sensitive. Many people grow tired of it, and to that, I reference Rose McGowan’s “Imagine how tired [I am].” It is exhausting to be constantly feeling things at 110%, never getting a moment to calm down about literally anything. 

I grew up in pre-professional, classical ballet, and this environment forced me to have a thick skin. I learned at a young age that crying was unacceptable. Tears were a reason to be dismissed, physically and emotionally, by those around you. I once had a ballet teacher say to me, “I know I can be hard on you, because I know you won’t cry.” I was 11. 

It’s funny, because tears can prompt several responses. While attempting to explain physical pain to a doctor so that I could get treatment, tears were expected, otherwise it wasn’t bad enough and it would work itself out (I now have a step deformity in the middle of my spine). On the contrary, if that physical pain manifested in tears while at my ballet studio, I was considered weak. While this specific situation may be more of a critique on ballet culture to ignore injuries for whatever reason, and although these two situations might seem to be opposing, both get a point across: tears were seen as a weakness and an inability to handle myself.

Until somewhere between 20 and 22 years of age, I was conditioned to not allow tears. It took massive amounts of pain or sorrow for me to produce even a single tear, and even then, it was strained. For someone that feels emotions as deeply as I do, it has been incredibly frustrating to not have the ability to release when I desperately want and need to.

It has taken me years to dismantle the idea that my tears are a sign of weakness. It took a deeper understanding of gender stereotypes, a workplace that bullied me, and an unbelievably patient partner who, when I finally was able to experience the waterworks, helped me process and navigate my path through them.

Around October of 2021, I had an epiphany: my tears were not a weakness, but simply a sign that I am an individual with deep feelings. Nothing more. I had this revelation after a long, painful situation I had with my boss (who was, to be frank, a sh*thead) and because I saw a coworker of mine be brushed off and not taken seriously because she would cry when talking to a higher supervisor. I had my own emotional meetings with said supervisor and I regret apologizing for crying. I shouldn’t have felt the need to apologize for being angry or frustrated and having those feelings show in the form of tears. I was more than entitled to my anger and feeling and expressing it in any way I needed to. 

It was soon after I had this meeting that I had my epiphany, because I knew that I was not weak. I knew that I was not in the wrong, and I knew that I was being horribly treated. I knew that the words I said had weight, even if they weren’t listened to. I knew that despite my tears, I was not backing down, giving up, or showing any sort of defeat. I was simply allowing myself to express the deep feelings that I could not contain any longer. I felt different than I had ever felt while sobbing in the bathroom. In a way, I felt strong.

As soon as I was able to put my thoughts into words, I sent the following text to my best friend:

“BIG advocate for tears because they literally mean nothing more than passion, no matter what emotion that passion is invested in, including sadness, hurt, pain, grief, happiness, excitement, anger, literally anything. THEY ARE NOTTTTTTT A WEAKNESSSSSSS they just mean you’re a FEELING INDIVIDUALLLLL”

It was freeing! While my frustrating situation at work was not yet resolved, and wouldn’t be until the end of January of this year, I no longer felt like I was rolling over just because I was showing that I was upset, and I knew that my emotions were not an overreaction or a symptom of oversensitivity.*

*Disclaimer: my “oversensitivity” and “overreactions” are part of my feeling process, and they are not negative words to me. They are simply part of who I am, and I’m not ashamed of that. How I receive and process emotion is valid.

Like I said, it has taken me years to get to this point, and there are still moments that I apologize for crying and times that I hold back tears because I don’t want to seem like I’m “too much.” Like most things in life, this process is not linear, but I am very proud of myself for the progress that I have made. The world has begun to come around to the idea that vulnerability is a sign of strength, and I am ready to take it one step further. Ditch the idea that your tears do not belong with you. Ditch the idea that you have to make it through your challenges without crying. Regardless of who you are, your tears are nothing more than an expression of your passion, and it is my belief that we should feel stronger for allowing them to flow, especially in front of others.

Let yourself cry. Let yourself sob. Breathe through it, drink lots of water, and allow yourself to feel what you need to feel, including the endorphins(!!!!) that crying helps your brain to release.

You are not weak, and crying does not change that. 

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