Lesson 3 of 7 - grow a pro-grief family The Health Benefits of Tears by Judith Orloff MD



The Huffington Post,

via Yahoo News - 7/21/10 site intro > course outline > Lesson 3 study guide or links , site search , chat , or prior page > here The Web address of this article is http://sfhelp.org/grief/news/tears.htm Updated 02-05-2015 Clicking underlined links below will open a new window. Other links will open an informational popup, so please turn off your browser's popup blocker or allow popups from this nonprofit Web site. If your playback device doesn't support Javascript, the popups may not display. Follow underlined links after finishing this article to avoid getting lost. See my comments after the article. The links and hilights below are mine. - Peter Gerlach, MSW + + + For over 20 years as physician, I've witnessed time and again the healing power of tears. Tears are your body's release valve for stress, sadness, grief, anxiety and frustration. Also, you can have tears of joy, say when a child is born or tears of relief when a difficult time has passed. In my own life, I am grateful when I can cry. It feels cleansing, a way to purge pent up emotions so they don't lodge in my body as stress symptoms such as fatigue or pain. To stay healthy and release stress, I encourage my patients to cry. For both men and women, tears are a sign of courage, strength and authenticity.



In Emotional Freedom , I discuss the numerous health benefits of tears. Like the ocean, tears are salt water. They lubricate your eyes, remove irritants, reduce stress hormones and contain antibodies that fight pathogenic microbes. Our bodies produce three kinds of tears: reflex, continuous and emotional. Each kind has different healing roles. For instance, reflex tears allow your eyes to clear out noxious particles when they're irritated by smoke or exhaust. The second kind, continuous tears, are produced regularly to keep our eyes lubricated. These contain a chemical called "lysozyme" which functions as an anti-bacterial and protects our eyes from infection. Tears also travel to the nose through the tear duct to keep the nose moist and bacteria free. Typically, after crying, our breathing and heart rate decrease, and we enter into a calmer biological and emotional state.



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 percent water, whereas emotional tears also contain stress hormones which 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 which accumulate during stress. Additional studies also suggest that crying stimulates the production of endorphins, our body's natural pain killer and "feel-good" hormones." Interestingly, humans are the only creatures known to shed emotional tears, though it's possible that that elephants and gorillas do too. Other mammals and also salt-water crocodiles produce reflex tears which are protective and lubricating.



Crying makes us feel better, even when a problem persists. In addition to physical detoxification, emotional tears heal the heart. You don't want to hold tears back. Patients sometimes say, "Please excuse me for crying. I was trying hard not to. It makes me feel weak."



My heart goes out to them when I hear this. I know where that sentiment comes from: parents who were uncomfortable around tears, a society that tells us we're weak for crying -- in particular, that "powerful men don't cry." I reject these notions. The new enlightened paradigm of what constitutes a powerful man and woman is someone who has the strength and self awareness to cry. These are the people who impress me, not those who put up some macho front of faux-bravado.



Try to let go of outmoded, untrue conceptions about crying. It is good to cry. It is healthy to cry. This helps to emotionally clear sadness and stress. Crying is also essential to resolve grief, when waves of tears periodically come over us after we experience a Tears help us process the loss so we can keep living with open hearts. Otherwise, we are a set up for depression if we suppress these potent feelings. When a friend apologized for curling up in the fetal position on my floor, weeping, depressed over a failing romance, I told her, "Your tears blessed my floor. There is no-thing to apologize for."



I've been this enthusiastic about crying for years. In fact, during my psychiatric residency at UCLA when supervisors and I watched videos of me with patients, they'd point out that I'd smile when a patient cried. "That's inappropriate," they'd say. I disagreed then; I still do. I wasn't smiling because my patients were depressed or grieving. I was smiling because they were courageously healing depression or other difficult emotions with tears. I was happy for their breakthrough. In my life, too, I love to cry. I cry whenever I can. Wish I could more. Thank God our bodies have this capacity. I hope you too can appreciate the experience. Let your tears flow to purify stress and negativity. Comments I agree with Dr. Orloff's view about the benefit of crying. Accepting this benefit is part of the larger goal of valuing all our emotions - even the unpleasant ("negative") ones. Typical of traumatic childhoods are often taught directly or indirectly not to feel much or anything, because their psychologically-wounded caregivers were too upset by emotional behavior. This suppression hinders the healthy reflex of grieving significant losses, which promotes physical, emotional, and relationship stresses. Recovery from psychological wounds here) includes letting go of misguided inhibitions and learning to feel, accept, and express all emotions without guilt or shame. A corollary is learning to value and learn from all emotions, and to distinguish feeling them from expressing them. in this non-profit Website focuses on bonding, loss, healthy grief, and how psychological can hinder mourning progress. Peter Gerlach , MSW Pause, breathe, and reflect - why did you read this article? Did you get what you needed? If not, what you need? Who's these questions - your or This article was very helpful somewhat helpful not helpful Lesson 3 / Prior page / Print page site intro / course outline / site search / definitions / chat / contact