# Tough chicks: Have you become a giant crybaby with age? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 6, 2010, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844 "2010-09-06T22:08:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![HazelNutCoffee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@HazelNutCoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HazelNutCoffee)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/21 "2010-09-07T04:36:39Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > But as an adult, I worry more. Maybe it’s because as adults, we have this idea that kids are innocent and know nothing about death and we want to have that illusion? But kids don’t need that illusion? I think kids are both more resilient and less introspective than we remember. And by “less introspective” I mean that kids don’t have a lifetime of experiences and memories that would be necessary to fully appreciate the darkness in some works of fiction. Like in Alice in Wonderland, there’s a line about how Alice should have stopped growing older at some point. To kids, it would probably come across as nonsense. But to adults the implication that in order to stay young you have to die young is more likely to come across. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/22 "2010-09-07T14:15:05Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > I used to be a bit of a stoic, honestly, and I never would have cried from anything except huge sadness. > > Now I cry when I’m happy, for Pete’s sake. I’m happy! WHY AM I CRYING!!! > > Gah. I’m probably a wedding crier now. I never wanted to be a wedding crier. GAAAH! Too much funny. Like I said in my OP, when I was watching that cursed TV show, I didn’t even cry at the cruelty. I wanted to cry when people did the _right_ thing. And damn that little deaf baby! When it began to cry, I was all, “I am so… \ happy for that family!” Wtf? If I ever start crying at weddings, I won’t even be myself anymore. I’ll be… I dunno, some big, whiny person I don’t even recognize anymore. [QUOTE=Manda JO] ETA: This was actually very awkward for me at work when a co-worker died and they announced it to a bunch of us at once. Everyone else broke into tears, and I felt like an ogre when I didn’t. I liked the woman fine, but I didn’t know her–we’d said hi-how-are-you-how-was-your-weekend for ten years, but never talked. Tears, to me, seemed almost disrespectful to the pain her family had to be feeling–the people for whom this was a life-changing tragedy. I felt terrible for them. But it seemed almost ego-centric and a little too precious to act like it changed my life. And I KNOW that’s not why people were crying–they were genuinely overwhelmed with the tragedy of her death, truly they were–but while I was upset and knocked off balance, certainly, that level of emotion doesn’t move me to tears. [/QUOTE] Yes, this. This is me. I kind of feel like an ass for crying, but then I’d feel like an ass if I didn’t cry. I don’t make sense to myself anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/23 "2010-09-07T14:34:55Z")
> [@NinetyWt](#): > > It’s the knowledge about what pain and grief really are that makes one cry more as you get older. I think you nailed it, and like **torie** , I associate my increased emotionalism with the birth of my kids. Before that, nothing could hurt me. Now I cry when I tell the story about the guy who won Who Wants to Be a Millionaire that time. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/24 "2010-09-07T15:42:42Z")
> [@HazelNutCoffee](#): > > I think kids are both more resilient and less introspective than we remember. And by “less introspective” I mean that kids don’t have a lifetime of experiences and memories that would be necessary to fully appreciate the darkness in some works of fiction. Like in Alice in Wonderland, there’s a line about how Alice should have stopped growing older at some point. To kids, it would probably come across as nonsense. But to adults the implication that in order to stay young you have to die young is more likely to come across. Yeah. I was a pretty intense little kid, but in some ways, I think I was pretty cold about death. If a character died, sometimes it was sad, but mostly it was just time to jump to the next book. I never really thought about the ramifications, and I never thought of it as something that could happen to me because on some level, I thought I was invulnerable to death. Or like, studying the Holocaust in 8th grade. Yeah, I was old enough to realize how serious it was, but emotionally, this was stuff happening to other people. Of course, those people who it happened to were real. They existed. It’s not just a history lesson. Cliched, sure, but for some reason, it never registered for me then. ---
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/25 "2010-09-07T16:32:06Z")
Remember those two guys who raised the lion cub, and then had to release it to the wild? Remember when, all those years later, they went to visit the lion (Christian?) in the wild? Remember the lion’s reaction? Me watching on YouTube: Ohhhh, \ that’s \ just, ummm … waaaaaaa!!! Hrmm. Cough, cough. How about those Bears? ---
**Author:** ![shiftless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9c0ed/32.png) [@shiftless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shiftless)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/26 "2010-09-07T17:43:26Z")
Not a chick, so I didn’t vote, but yeah. I do get something in my eye more often these days. Probably pollen. ---
**Author:** ![zweisamkeit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zweisamkeit/32/4360_2.png) [@zweisamkeit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zweisamkeit)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2010, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/27 "2010-09-07T23:51:49Z")
I’m not a tough chick when it comes to crying (everything ELSE, well, it goes without saying I could kick anyone’s ass here! :D). My problem is that crying, for me, is not linked specifically to sadness or negative emotions. Crying is linked to _any_ strong emotion. I will cry (or tear up) when I feel really happy, really sad, pissed off, frustrated, overjoyed, vicarious joy (like what you mentioned in the OP), etc. I’m an extremely empathetic person\* so I tear up quite often, comparatively. And it really pisses me off when non-criers think that any public tears are for manipulation. Sorry, but no. I’m less likely to cry in public because it’s friggin’ embarrassing and if I’m doing it, it means I literally am incapable of stopping. I think, **MoL** , that with life experience comes more empathy and that’s why you’re crying more. - Too empathetic, honestly. But it’s not something I know how to change, or if I want to. “I’m trying to stop emotionally identifying with other sentient creatures” doesn’t sound that great, y’know? ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/28 "2010-09-08T00:01:39Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Is she right about turning into a weeping, sappy vagina too? Ew. That is all. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/29 "2010-09-08T01:33:49Z")
> [@zweisamkeit](#): > > - Too empathetic, honestly. But it’s not something I know how to change, or if I want to. “I’m trying to stop emotionally identifying with other sentient creatures” doesn’t sound that great, y’know? Hmm. I’ve never viewed crying as feeling more emotion; I’ve viewed it as inability to control those emotions. It’s true that things are tugging more at my heartstrings than they used to, but what’s distressing is I’m having an increasingly hard time fighting back tears when something moves me, and not that more things are moving me. I still don’t cry very often, and I would sooner die than cry in public, but still. Can’t you control your shit when watching YouTube videos of deaf babies, woman?! ---
**Author:** ![chela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chela/32/21582_2.png) [@chela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chela)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/30 "2010-09-08T12:10:33Z")
I can get moved to tears by music, especially if I am in an introspective moody mood the music seems to open a wound or window and then the tears flow. So I let it flow and I find it cathartic or purifying in some way. Or I can be in a joyful mood and get moved to tears by any number of things. The closing ceremony at my daughters camp, when all the girls came in singing sweetly and holding hands, there were about 25 of us in the audience sniffling and wiping eyes. Or when a live performance starts something will strike a chord in me and I will be consumed by the beauty of it all and start to get all wet eyed and smiley. THough I am somewhat impervous to obvious ploys that pull at the heartstrings, that’s the cynic or MOL in me. I think I am more comfortable with my emotions as I get older, the anger is more clarified, focused,and unapologetic, the joy is more freely expressed. My fears otoh I try to channel into some sort of action rather than whine about it. ---
**Author:** ![NinetyWt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/cc9497/32.png) [@NinetyWt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinetyWt)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/31 "2010-09-08T13:21:28Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > I’ve viewed it as inability to control those emotions. Wasn’t there a thread about this last year? Some people can’t just turn their tears on and off. Some can. I don’t think it makes you better or worse of a person, either way. Cut yourself some slack; go ahead and cry. It isn’t a character flaw. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![gallows\_fodder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8c91f0/32.png) [@gallows\_fodder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gallows_fodder)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/32 "2010-09-08T14:13:32Z")
> [@zweisamkeit](#): > > I’m not a tough chick when it comes to crying (everything ELSE, well, it goes without saying I could kick anyone’s ass here! :D). My problem is that crying, for me, is not linked specifically to sadness or negative emotions. Crying is linked to _any_ strong emotion. I will cry (or tear up) when I feel really happy, really sad, pissed off, frustrated, overjoyed, vicarious joy (like what you mentioned in the OP), etc. > > I’m an extremely empathetic person\* so I tear up quite often, comparatively. And it really pisses me off when non-criers think that any public tears are for manipulation. Sorry, but no. I’m less likely to cry in public because it’s friggin’ embarrassing and if I’m doing it, it means I literally am incapable of stopping. > > I think, **MoL** , that with life experience comes more empathy and that’s why you’re crying more. > > - Too empathetic, honestly. But it’s not something I know how to change, or if I want to. “I’m trying to stop emotionally identifying with other sentient creatures” doesn’t sound that great, y’know? I could have written this whole post word for word, except maybe that first parenthetical. 🙂 I didn’t use to cry this much, either, but as I get older, crying is like laughing to me – it’s simply an instinctive response to an emotional stimulus. I can’t control it, and I certainly don’t do it on purpose to manipulate people or to get attention or sympathy. That accusation makes me so angry (anger also makes me cry :smack:). It has nothing to do with you, and I cry this much or more when I’m alone – in public I find it mortifying and do my best to hide my response or even leave the situation if I can. I can’t even watch the news without crying. Either I’m crying because someone’s been murdered or I’m crying because someone did something kind for someone else. (I should note that crying here means tearing up, not full-on sobbing.) ---
**Author:** ![gurujulp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@gurujulp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gurujulp)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/33 "2010-09-08T17:07:03Z")
> [@HazelNutCoffee](#): > > > [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > > > But as an adult, I worry more. Maybe it’s because as adults, we have this idea that kids are innocent and know nothing about death and we want to have that illusion? But kids don’t need that illusion? > > I think kids are both more resilient and less introspective than we remember. And by “less introspective” I mean that kids don’t have a lifetime of experiences and memories that would be necessary to fully appreciate the darkness in some works of fiction. Like in Alice in Wonderland, there’s a line about how Alice should have stopped growing older at some point. To kids, it would probably come across as nonsense. But to adults the implication that in order to stay young you have to die young is more likely to come across. I agree. I just understood the ‘stay young means die young’ two days ago, and it was explicitly pointed out to me… I don’t know how I miss everything, but when I get all the beauty, I cry. It is fatherhood, and the resultant empathy, I think. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/34 "2010-09-08T18:09:46Z")
> [@NinetyWt](#): > > > [@MeanOldLady](#): > > > > I’ve viewed it as inability to control those emotions. > > Wasn’t there a thread about this last year? Some people can’t just turn their tears on and off. Some can. I don’t think it makes you better or worse of a person, either way. > > Cut yourself some slack; go ahead and cry. It isn’t a character flaw. 🙂 We have indeed. There were a few threads about crying at work in which some women adamantly claimed that their tears were uncontrollable. I don’t find crying to be a character flaw, but I did find it strange that so many people claimed to be _completely incapable_ of restraining their tears, much like laughter or boners. But hey, here I am baffled by my fighting back tears watching that stupid John Quinones show, so I don’t know what I think or know anymore. I can’t turn tears on, but I can keep them from turning on to begin with, which is different from and much easier than stopping them once they’ve started. Once I’ve started crying, hoh boy, bring some tissue and patience. ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2010, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/35 "2010-09-08T20:27:57Z")
I’m about to turn 39, and am the same empathetic sap that I’ve always been (but stuff that’s trying too hard doesn’t work: e.g., I was the only one of my friends who didn’t cry at _Titanic_). However, what also hasn’t changed is that I still don’t cry about _me_ – it’s always about other people. So I’d never cry at work because I’m having a bad day or because someone was mean to me, at funerals it’s almost never my own grief that makes me tear up, etc. When my grandfather died and I’d had a really long, emotional day of talking to family and getting ready for the trip up to NJ for his funeral, that night my then-boyfriend kept encouraging me to cry while we were lying in bed. I couldn’t get him to understand that just being quiet and with him was all I needed, and that I simply wasn’t going to get weepy. Heck, I broke up with that same boyfriend and moved out of his house last summer and never cried about that: I did cry three months before then when we broke up for 24 hours, because I think _that_’s when the relationship actually ended/when my heart broke, but the “real” breakup and the moving out – though very, very hard – never moved me to tears. I was a little surprised by that, actually. When I _do_ cry for myself, I stop almost immediately – often without realizing that I’m making myself stop. And, like **MeanOldLady** , it has nothing to do with whether anyone else is around. But show me a good Maxwell House commercial, any reality medical show, the international arrivals gate where people are being reunited (especially children and parents), or a story about a complete stranger’s miscarriage, and I need a box of tissues. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![NinetyWt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/cc9497/32.png) [@NinetyWt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinetyWt)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2010, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/36 "2010-09-09T00:47:13Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > But hey, here I am baffled by my fighting back tears watching that stupid John Quinones show, so I don’t know what I think or know anymore. Something that’s mildly amusing is that I am changing from my regular sweet self into an actual mean old lady. I heard that menopause will do that to you. I find myself saying what I really think instead of keeping it to myself. Perhaps we’re swapping roles. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![missred](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/missred/32/14096_2.png) [@missred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/missred)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2010, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/37 "2010-09-09T04:00:24Z")
[quote=“MeanOldLady, post:22, topic:552844”] \ Like I said in my OP, when I was watching that cursed TV show, I didn’t even cry at the cruelty. I wanted to cry when people did the _right_ thing. And damn that little deaf baby! When it began to cry, I was all, “I am so… \ happy for that family!” Wtf? If I ever start crying at weddings, I won’t even be myself anymore. I’ll be… I dunno, some big, whiny person I don’t even recognize anymore. [QUOTE] \ \*\*_Nice Old Lady_? 😛 I started to get all boo-hooey on a regular basis about 10-11 years ago. Where once I only cried out of extreme grief, anger or frustration, now little things like watching the kids show livestock at the county fair will put a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye. Don’t get me started with the ads for the humane shelter or starving children! The waterworks can go on for hours…well, maybe not quite that long. missred (mid-forties) ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2010, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/38 "2010-09-09T12:57:13Z")
Am I ever going to stop feeling a need to reply in these female-only threads? Geesh. Anyways, I’ve only found as I’ve gotten older that there are times where crying makes you feel better. The reason I always avoided crying when I was younger was just that it made me feel worse. Do any of you women who used to not cry feel this way? ---
**Author:** ![Tequila\_Mockingbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/41988e/32.png) [@Tequila\_Mockingbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tequila_Mockingbird)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2010, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/39 "2010-09-09T13:04:23Z")
When I was a kid, I decided I wasn’t gonna cry anymore. It was something I had control over in my crappy childhood. That lead to me feeling unable to cry into my twenties. Then when I had my son at age 26, and I could cry again. I even cried when I was pregnant with him - like over Susan Smith’s little boys. It was almost a relief, a gift to be able to cry again. I cried at movies, I cried on 9/11. Now I’m in my early forties…and I’m tearing up at coffee and cell phone commercials. WTH is wrong with me? I know my emotions are being manipulated but that doesn’t stop it. GAH ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2010, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844/40 "2010-09-09T15:03:09Z")
> [@NinetyWt](#): > > Something that’s mildly amusing is that I am changing from my regular sweet self into an actual mean old lady. \ Excellent. > [@missred](#): > > \*\*_Nice Old Lady_? 😛 Never! > [@BigT](#): > > Am I ever going to stop feeling a need to reply in these female-only threads? Geesh. Get _out_ of my thread. No no, I kid with you. Stay and have a sandwich. I’m interested if people in general are crying more as they get older, and more specifically people who don’t cry a lot, but most specifically women who don’t cry a lot. > [@Tequila\_Mockingbird](#): > > When I was a kid, I decided I wasn’t gonna cry anymore. I did too, but for different reasons entirely. The biggest reason probably was that I was the youngest of five children, and didn’t want to be the crybaby. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tough-chicks-have-you-become-a-giant-crybaby-with-age/552844.md?page=3)