Do you mean that embarrassing moment when you feel something teasing your throat, you are full of emotions, but still no tears come out? Or, sometimes you are ready to cry (separation, movie drama, graduation, etc.) and at other times your eyes are as dry as a desert. To the question "Why can't I cry?" - therapists say that there are often complex reasons and while sometimes they can be physical, they usually have to do with someone's emotional state, past traumas, what they think about crying, etc.

According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology, humans produce about 15 to 30 liters of tears a year, most of which are designed to lubricate our eyes or to disperse harmful substances. The eye needs to be constantly moisturized to work properly, so your tear-producing glands are on full alert at all times. That said, people produce fewer tears as they age and there are various eye surgeries and medical conditions that can block the tear ducts. Inflammation, certain medications like antidepressants and hormonal birth control, eyelid disorders and diabetes have all been shown to inhibit tear production and lead to "dry eyes". However, if none of this is your case and you still can not shed any tears,

But if there is no medical condition in the books and you still can't seem to have shed a tear, experts tell Bustle that there may be psychological reasons for your dry cheeks.

First, you need to understand that crying infrequently does not mean that you are a monster, it means that your emotional record of events "worthy" of crying may differ from other people.

"Why can't I cry"

You are probably wondering why there are some cases where you just can not cry even though you really want to. If physical issues with the tear glands are not the problem, the source of the difficulty lies elsewhere - and it is very common.

"As a therapist, I've heard this statement many times from my patients over the years," psychotherapist Annie Wright tells Bustle. "Depression can be a factor, as it can cause people to experience emotional changes. Clinical depression can come with" a flattened effect that does not allow people to physically feel their feelings (despite a mental conception that they should to feel sad). "It challenges the myth of depression - which simply means feeling sad all the time - when, in fact, some depressed people have nothing to do with their emotions."

A 2002 study in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology found that people who are depressed do not actually cry more often than people who are not, but they may not get the same benefits from crying, such as catharsis or a feeling of clarity. then.

In some cases, even identifying the desire to cry can be a challenge. Psychotherapist Karen R. Koenig says that emotional crying requires you to be in touch with your feelings, and people who suppress or detach from their emotions may not know their inner causes for crying.

"We may not realize we are sad because we are not attuned to our emotions. We may know something unpleasant is happening inside, but we may not be able to label it as sad."

The psychological reason why some people avoid tears

Some people may struggle with crying because of inner shame for tears.

"If we believe that crying is a healthy, helpful, natural, proper relief of emotional tension, we can let tears flow," Koenig tells Bustle. "If we believe that people who cry are 'weak', that it is scary to touch and that it is embarrassing to cry, we are likely to block a response that comes with tears."

People can absorb these notions to "hold back tears" even from parents who may have told you "not to cry that it is a shame" in childhood. Even people who have been through trauma may find it difficult to cry because they remember a time when they "felt ashamed as they cried." Restraints about crying can also be influenced by cultural beliefs, social taboos that "men do not cry" and so on.