Why Parents Sometimes Cry

If we're lucky, the things that make parents cry are wonderful things.

Sending our five-year-old off on the school bus for the first time may bring a tear or two. Watching our son make a home-run at Little League can be moving. Watching our beautiful daughter overcome her shyness and perform in a dance recital is enough to make a parent cry, and when children have had any difficulties doing one thing or another and overcome them there is always reason to be moved to tears.

Whether its kindergarten graduation, eighth-grade graduation, highschool graduation or college graduation - watching our child walk up to get his or her diploma or degree can bring tears. Even in those instances when a child was not able to get his diploma with his class and instead receives his or hers in the mail or through a GED program parents may have such a feeling of pride in the accomplishment of their child that tears may come.

Birthday and holiday cards from our children often move us to tears, whether they are the awkwardly spelled words on the card our six-year-old has made for us or the perfectly selected verse on the card our 30-year-old managed to find and chose to give us. The verse that a daughter or son has created may be enough to bring tears every time we think about it.

Sometimes the things that have the power to make a parent cry are the bigger and deeper feelings that parents may have tucked away in the interest of practicality, but every now and then if parents allow themselves to bring out those incredibly powerful memories or experiences with their child tears inevitably arise.

When parents are not so lucky they find themselves crying in loss or sadness over something their child will never have or something they, themselves, will never have. Parents also cry in empathy for other parents who have reason to cry. Some parents for whom being parents has not been a string of nothing but tears of pride and sentiment may, instead, spend a lifetime crying for a child.

I have to say that for all the things in life that have made me cry, the ones involving my children have usually been the tears-of-pride and tears-of-sentiment variety. The things that make parents cry are, a good part of the time, the exact same things that make anyone else cry - except, of course, that an additional set of reasons to cry exists for parents, alone.

With all I've said about things that can make a parent cry, I've neglected to mention a couple of certain, specific, triggers of my own; so I'd like to reflect on what makes parents cry by mentioning that every time I hear young children singing in a group I tend to be moved to tears. Every time I hear the song, "I'm Everything I Am Because You Loved Me" I think of my adopted son and cry. Every time I hear, "You Are So Beautiful To Me" I think of him as well, and cry. Every time I hear, "You Are My Special Angel" I think of my version, "You Are My Special Baby" and think of my youngest son and cry; and when I hear, "You And Me Against The World" I often think of my daughter and cry. I even cry when I hear "Tomorrow" from Annie because that's the song I sang when I had a pregnancy that ended in loss of the baby AND because that was the song that my daughter also danced in her pre-ballet class at three years old (so "Tomorrow" always brings one reason or another to cry).

In moments of crying that are not sentimental and that are, instead, somber, I cry every time I see other mother's children (usually sons) who have been maimed at war and who struggle at rehab hospitals to learn to live without one or more of their limbs. I cry when I see other mothers who have lost their child in war. I cry, too, when I see children who have no mother to cry for them.