Crying Is Healthy

Dont hesitate to open the floodgates just because of a recent study published in Science magazine suggesting that womens tears reduce mens testosterone, dampening their libido. Boo Hoo. Sounds like a lot of senseless blubbering to me.

I think Aristotle nailed it when he observed over 2,000 years ago that dramas that caused the audience to cry produced a catharsis a restorative emotional climax. If thats not stimulating I dont know what is. Whether you weep from frustration, grief, pain, passion, or joy, crying is healthy. So dont stop just because some people are whimpering about men losing their libido. Anything that tempers mens aggression is worth a tear or two.

In Crying: The Natural and Cultural History of Tears, author Tom Lutz refers to work by William Frey, a biochemist who collected tears shed by subjects watching sad movies and tears produced while cutting onions, which he found contained different chemicals. The emotionally induced tears contained leucine-enkephalin (an endorphin or natural opiate-like pain reliever), prolactin (released from the pituitary in response to emotional stress), and high concentrations of various proteins and hormones. Frey characterized crying as an exocrine process, like exhaling, urinating, and sweating, all of which release toxic substances from the body. Like Aristotle, he concluded that crying is a natural way of restoring balance to the body.