Warning: Lupus Can Induce Lupus Crying

Today I started to cry.  I don’t know the reason why.  Nothing provoked me.  No specific lupus thoughts or events preceded my weeping.  My lupus crying commenced when I was alone.  Sometimes I prefer sniveling in seclusion.  Nobody there needing an explanation for my tears.  No judgements.  No words necessary.

Don’t get me wrong.  Having someone with me to partake in a crying episode is truly cherished and never taken for granted.  Being cocooned in arms full of empathy and love can be more helpful then a therapy session, and easier on the wallet.

What the Heck is Lupus Crying? 

Sometimes lupus life overwhelms me and all the fear, anxiety, frustration, anger, pain and sadness flood my cheeks.  It wells up from an undisclosed depth inside the soul.  Surfacing without provocation.  Simply an unexplained sadness of everything lupus.  A life that’s too often physically and emotionally taxing and despairing.  Thus, tears emerge willfully and bold, never asking permission to leave their ducts.  I’m content not knowing why I cried.  Maybe my body felt too much and it decided to weep on my behalf.

Perhaps the reality I work so hard to portray (an emotionally stable person perfectly handling her chaotic, challenging life) collided with the truth of what I hide and hold inside, and tears are the fallout.  Then again, it’s highly likely that my body reached its physical limit and tears escaped.  Tears serving as an alarm to let me know I need something:  help, slow down, get some help, honor my lupus limitations, ask for help.  (There’s an underlying theme running through there, but I’ve yet to figure it out.)  Yes, I’m guilty of using too much of my scant energy attempting to portray a happy, strong persona.  All the while, I’m veiling a poignant assortment of emotions and physical pains.  Consequently, it’s truly a wasteful use of precious energy.

Let’s All Cry

Maybe I cried from the collective consciousness of our pain.  My tears may not always be my own, but those of my fellow lupus community.  By an oddity of fate, I may have cried for you because you cannot.  A quirky hypothesis to fill the absence of my lupus crying motive.

While this disease is isolating, at the same time it is strangely uniting.  Without words, each of us with lupus empathize, sympathize, and identify with one another.  Likewise, this extends beyond the lupus-inflicted to include everyone with a chronic disease:  multiple sclerosis, arthritis, epilepsy, etc.  We understand through an unspoken knowing.

It is believed that Fibromyalgia may be caused by overactive nerves.  If emotions are connected to the nervous system, then maybe unprovoked feelings and unexplainable tears are the result of heightened nerves drawing from within, as well as the world around us.  More hypothesizing.

Today I cried solo.  I’m not recommending it or fishing for sympathy.  Simply sharing too much of myself with perfect strangers.  Cathartic double-duty, lupus crying and sharing.  Perhaps it would seem I didn’t want to cry alone after all.