Don’t. Cry. Mom.
Those words were uttered by my sleepy five year-old about an hour past his bedtime (we are late to everything, even to sleep.)
I jumped fell into his bed after spending entirely too long trying to get my Chloe/Zoe to sleep (that’s a whole other post.)
…If you’re wondering, she wasn’t asleep. I gave up and yelled for her father to try again. Mostly because I had promised Landry I would put him to sleep and partly because I was exhausted with trying to get her to sleep.
My head hit this big brown bear laying in the middle of his bed. A familiar smell hit my nose and went straight to my heart.
This bear, it was my grandma’s. She kept it in her room (you know how old women do?) As suddenly as my heart recognized that smell, the tears began to fall.
Isn’t it funny how a smell can unravel us?
Isn’t grief weird? I wasn’t even thinking about her. It just hits you like a rogue wave. Moments after you were completely fine, you can be smack dab in the middle of complete heart ache.
When my sweet sweet boy noticed my tears he said, “Don’t cry, mom.”
Why do we say that? Why are we so uncomfortable with feelings we all have?
Sadness and grief are universal feelings. Every person on this earth will have experienced both feelings at least once before they die.
Yet, we dismiss them as quickly as they surface.
So, I asked him why he didn’t want me to cry. He said he “didn’t want me to be sad.” To which I replied, “But I am, Landry. And I’m going to be for a long time. I loved and knew my grandma for thirty years– my whole life.”
He said, “Wow, mom. That’s a long time.”
I said, “It is. And wouldn’t it be weird if I was only sad for a day? And I knew her my whole life? Does that sound right? Should I only miss her a day?”
He said, “Well no. You will miss her for a long time.”
I said, “Yeah, probably for the rest of my life. But you know what? That’s okay. She was so special to me. So sometimes I’m going to cry. When I do cry, I feel better. Do you feel better when you cry?”
He said, “Yeah, I do.”
I said, “Do you ever feel better when someone tells you not to be sad or not to cry?”
He said, “No.”
I said, “Or, do you feel better if someone says, oh wow. That makes me so sad too. I’m sorry you’re feeling so sad.”
He said, (rather enthusiastically) “Yeah, that!!”
I went on to explain that being sad is something that is normal. We need to let ourselves feel it when it comes up. Ultimately, that’s the only thing to help us to feel better.
I ended the conversation by explaining that it’s okay for boys to cry and it doesn’t mean he’s weak, it means he’s strong.
I truly believe that we do our sons, husbands, fathers, nephews, and friends a disservice when we enforce the false narrative that men shouldn’t cry. That men shouldn’t feel emotions.
Because, they DO have feelings.
They DO have emotions.
They should feel free to express those emotions without fear of being teased or called a “baby” or a “girl.”
Emotions are not “girl” things.
Emotions are “human” things.
In my house, I saw my dad cry.
I saw him do laundry, change diapers, clean the house, take care of my mom, buy tampons at the store, and anything and everything else because he was my mom’s partner and he was our other parent. He was/is strong because he was able to be both masculine and also emotionally available.
In this house, my children have seen my husband cry. They watch him do laundry, clean the house, take the trash out, take care of all of us, kiss boo boos, change diapers, take Chloe to gymnastics, and any other “girly” thing that needs to be done. My husband is strong because he is able to be both masculine and emotionally available.
We need to do better for our sons. We need them to understand that it’s healthy and normal for them to cry and to feel emotions. If we allowed for them to be who they are, we might just be so surprised at the society we could live in.
One day he will be able to say, “It’s okay to cry, mom. Just cry.”
Hot Mess Mom 