How does a person feel who needs to cry and who has his virility, his manhood, questioned for the simple fact of showing his tears in public?
Did you ever, as a very young child, when you were beginning to realize things, probably be told this phrase after you hurt yourself: boys don’t cry, it’s girls who cry!? Later, when you were a preteen and adolescence, did they say it to you again when you suffered some pain, whether physical or emotional, but changing the word “boy” to “man”?
The truth is that for a long time and, even today, in various contexts and in many societies, it seems like the most normalized and innocent phrase.
They are ideas used with the objective of form strong and unbreakable men, capable of controlling pain, who face destiny head-on, without fear of anything and, on the other hand, distinguish them from women, mistakenly considered the “weaker sex.” But taking a step further, what is really behind that phrase that, as I said, even today sounds very normal in the male world? What is really hidden behind those four words?
At first glance, and without going too deep, two points can be distinguished related to the idea that men do not cry:
Unsafety
The insecurity of not really fulfilling the prototypical masculine role insecurity about allowing oneself to gain ground for the feminine role, because if, like a scale, what one gains, the other loses, and vice versa.
How many times have we people who have been told this (myself included) really come to wonder if we are really less masculine, therefore, more feminine for crying?
Fear
The fear would be going one step further than the previous point, what comes after insecurity. It is a fear of not being accepted in the peer group, for being considered the “soft” or “soft” one in the class within a school context, of being considered as people belonging to the opposite sex for the simple fact of showing the crying; fear that others, as well as oneself, will doubt one’s own sexuality. This rejection among peers can result in bullying
These two points represent the damage that is caused to the person receiving this phrase that learns, from childhood, to repress the manifestation of feelings related to sadness and pain through crying This learning becomes “tumorized” inside them, affecting their way of being and relating, their self-esteem, their internal dialogue, their self-concept, and their way of dealing with conflicts.
Likewise, The repression of crying also affects the biological system For example, with a decrease in the immune system, which could lead to different psychosomatic disorders or even fatally, cancers, as demonstrated by various studies of people with alexithymia.
A personal experience
A personal experience serves as an example, something very recent that happened to me just a few weeks ago. On a Saturday night, I lost my father, after a long illness and no less long agony.
That same night I went home with my wife and my daughter, my body asked me to cry, because at the moment of my father’s departure I couldn’t do it because I hadn’t finished assimilating it, which is known as a state of shock. . So I decided to watch the video of my communion and that of my brother. From the beginning of the first video I began to cry and cry, surprised by the intensity of the crying, I calmed down and cried again, repeatedly, when I saw my father younger and stronger, when I heard his vigorous speech and not labile and agonizing.
I stayed like that until it was five, almost six in the morning.
The next day, the day of the funeral, I woke up at eleven in the morning, and although I was still very hurt, I saw and noticed that the level of my pain was not so extreme, although it was still high. Just minutes later, a relative called me and I told him what he had done, and the first thing he said to me was: and why are you doing that? Don’t you know that you have to be and look strong this day?
It was at that moment that I remembered the four-word phrase: “children don’t cry.” I really realized how much damage some beliefs, some rituals do and everything related to the same: the non-expression of feelings, emotional repression, appearing to be strong in adverse moments, not admitting that one needs and wants to cry without fear of being classified or classified as “soft”.
Crying is a need of the body
Crying is an outlet for the body, a biological need, and even a right that one has as a human being Allowing yourself to feel the pain at the moment you need it or feel it (different from dwelling on the pain), allowing yourself to cry, is giving yourself the opportunity to pamper yourself, to take care of your biological and psychological health, it is to love yourself.
I am going to allow myself to give an example, although it may seem a bit bizarre at first, sex or male masturbation. If this occurs, for example, once every four or five days, nothing has to happen, but if the days go by and you do not have the opportunity to ejaculate, what is known as “nocturnal pollution” occurs, that is, ejaculating while sleeping, usually accompanied by an erotic dream.
If we extrapolate this example, saving the distance, to the topic of crying, If we continually repress that biological need, there will come a time when it will come out somewhere either in the form of an emotional tsunami in the face of the slightest setback that comes our way or in the form of a psychological and/or biological disorder.
Signs, symptoms and recommendations
There are various signs in the form of signs (objective and visible part of an illness such as the manifestation of crying or some other emotion such as anger, for example) and symptoms (subjective part and, therefore, not visible for the most part). others, since it is a personal experience of each person, such as the level of pain or sadness), which may indicate that This repression of emotions related to sadness and pain can be a problem
Although each person can experience sadness in a very idiosyncratic way, the vast majority usually present shyness, (shyness can often be the cause of not showing feelings in public for fear of criticism, which has no major drawback. if we give ourselves the opportunity to face that pain and do not avoid it when we feel more comfortable to cry and feel) when relating to people, a defensive attitude, communication problems (with friends, family… ), emotional dullness, emotional lability, emotional incontinence, emotional flattening, difficulties swallowing bad news (hysterical ballooning), feeling that the world is coming down on you, lack of energy, constant tiredness without having made a significant use of energy, and a long etc.
Given this, I recommend seeking professional help if you feel that you cannot handle this type of sensations and experiences alone, or if it begins to significantly affect some area of your life.
Conclusion
As a conclusion to this article, I would like to encourage making love to yourself in the form of allow yourself to cry and give yourself the opportunity to feel that suffering that is avoided either out of fear, insecurity, or even laziness.
Paraphrasing a little from the psychiatrist and logotherapist Viktor E. Frankl: “Pain gives us the opportunity to know ourselves better and is one of the means to discover meaning in our lives.”
For this reason, I encourage you that when you hear the four-word phrase “men don’t cry,” think that men really do cry.
Only people who let themselves be carried away by insecurity and fear try to hide these feelings, because they overlook both the benefits that this can bring them in the short term, and the long-term prophylactic effect that it can bring them. Focusing only on “what they will say”, “what they will tell me”, “what they will think of me”, “if I cry I am like a woman…” is counterproductive; They are nothing more than criticisms towards us, which come from ignorance, insecurity and fear of others or oneself.
