Crying, Cortisol, and Cognitive Comebacks: How Tears Build Brains
Let’s set the scene.
You’re a newborn baby. You’ve got zero responsibilities, no job, and somehow people still cheer when you poop yourself. But you’ve also got one serious problem: you can’t speak, you don’t know what anything means, and your brain is basically a sponge trying to soak up a firehose of sensory input.
So what do you do? You cry.
And while your parents might interpret that as “wah, my diaper’s wet” or “wah, I’m hungry,” what’s really happening is a neurochemical symphony playing inside your tiny head. Cortisol’s spiking. The HPA (hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal) axis is lit up like Christmas. Your little nervous system is preparing for a world of risk, response, and reward.
Basically, crying isn’t weakness. It’s your first emotional CrossFit session.
Plastic Brains and Emotional Weightlifting
Your brain is born with what scientists call “experience-expectant plasticity.” That’s a fancy way of saying it expects to be molded by life — like Play-Doh, only stickier and less colorful.
In infancy, every tear is a learning opportunity. Each cry is the body’s version of throwing a tantrum to get a better Wi-Fi signal: “Hello, I’m trying to connect to the world here, and it’s glitching!”
But that connection is exactly the point.
When a baby cries and a parent responds consistently with comfort, food, warmth, or just that weird high-pitched voice adults use around babies (“Who’s a happy little future taxpayer? You are!”), it wires the brain to trust, to regulate, and most importantly, to adapt.
If they don’t get that response?
Well, the brain learns too — just not in the Hallmark card kind of way. It learns the world is unpredictable. Comfort might not come. Problems might not get solved. And so the infant starts developing alternative strategies: some adaptive, some… let’s say “therapist-fueling.”
Quote Break: “Tears are words the heart can’t express.” – Unknown
That’s not just poetic. It’s neuroscience. Crying is the body’s first non-verbal signal to seek safety and resolution. It’s the prequel to “using your words,” and it’s how the brain starts learning cause and effect.
Crying leads to comfort → comfort reinforces trust → trust builds security → security allows the brain to calm the sympathetic nervous system, the part that screams “DANGER!” when a car backfires or your boss sends a 5:59 PM email.
As comedian Louis C.K. once said, “Crying is good. It’s how your body says ‘I’ve had enough of this nonsense.’” Except he said it with more profanity and fewer child development references.
Sympathy for the Nervous System
Let’s talk about the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) — the Red Bull-chugging, always-alert branch of your body’s fight-or-flight department.
In evolutionary terms, this thing was super handy. See a tiger? Run. Hear rustling in the bushes? Fight, freeze, or play dead like you just got hit with a tranquilizer dart. Unfortunately, in modern life, tigers have been replaced by traffic, job interviews, and group texts with your in-laws.
The Prefrontal Cortex (PFC) — the grown-up part of your brain — is supposed to regulate this. Like a tired kindergarten teacher, it gently shushes the amygdala (the brain’s drama queen), saying, “No, Karen, we don’t need to scream. It’s just an Amazon delivery.”
But here’s the catch: the prefrontal cortex takes years — decades — to fully develop. Until then, the brain relies heavily on plasticity, meaning it has to constantly reshape itself based on feedback, stress, and repetition.
This is why teenagers are basically walking chaos engines. Their PFC is still loading, and their SNS is dialed to “overreact.” If you’ve ever seen a 15-year-old panic because they can’t find their AirPods, you’ve witnessed this delicate imbalance in action.
How Crying Becomes Strategy
Back in infancy, crying is instinct. By the time you hit adulthood, crying becomes… well, either a cathartic release or something you try to hide in a locked car while listening to a sad playlist called “emotional damage.”
But emotionally? It’s doing the same thing.
Whether you’re a baby wailing for your bottle or a grown adult crying over a breakup, your brain is entering a heightened state of plasticity. It’s assessing risk, sorting memory files, and asking the most human question ever:
“How do I make sure I never feel this way again?”
That’s the real magic. Emotional stress, especially when it’s tied to vulnerability, loss, or failure, creates a window where the brain is ready to change. That moment of sadness? That’s not weakness. That’s neuroplasticity knocking at the door with a toolbox and saying, “Let’s renovate.”
This is why emotional breakdowns often lead to breakthroughs. It’s why rock bottom is often the trampoline that launches us upward.
Evolution’s Drama Class
From an evolutionary psychology standpoint, this process is textbook brilliance.
Humans didn’t evolve to be stoic robots. We evolved to be deeply emotional, communicative, and community-oriented. Emotional pain had to trigger behavioral change, because in prehistoric times, getting rejected by the tribe could literally get you killed.
(And you thought being left on “read” was bad.)
Emotional stress was a learning mechanism. If crying didn’t lead to resolution, or if sadness wasn’t followed by adaptation, you were less likely to survive.
Think of the caveman version of heartbreak:
Caveman: “Ugh. Ugga leave me. Me cry.”
Caveman’s Brain: “Maybe next time, don’t bring dead squirrel to date.”
Pain → reflection → change → growth.
Even at the most primitive level, emotional distress activated problem-solving and adaptation.
When Plasticity Gets Stuck
But not everyone gets the luxury of adaptive learning. If crying was punished, ignored, or unresolved in early life, the brain doesn’t get the message: “I can change to feel better.” Instead, it might learn:
- “Crying doesn’t work.”
- “Problems don’t get solved.”
- “I am the problem.”
This is where defeatist thinking sets in.
Rather than viewing emotional pain as an invitation to change, people with trauma or poor emotional models interpret distress as permanence. Their brains, instead of engaging plasticity, default to self-protection and stagnation.
“Why bother?” becomes a mantra. “It always ends the same.”
But here’s the secret: plasticity doesn’t go away. It just gets harder to access. The older you get, the more effort and intention it takes to create that plastic state — to let the emotional walls crack open enough for light (and growth) to get in.
Quote Break: “The wound is the place where the light enters you.” – Rumi
Translation: your brain doesn’t grow unless it’s a little uncomfortable.
We don’t evolve from comfort. We evolve from discomfort, failure, and yes, even ugly crying while eating takeout in bed. These are the growing pains of adulthood. The problem is, many people confuse pain with proof that they’re broken, when really it’s proof that something wants to change.
Rewiring Through Emotional CPR
Here’s the good news. Even if your early crying experiences were ignored or invalidated, you can still rewire your brain through intentional exposure to emotional stress.
That’s why therapy works. That’s why journaling helps. That’s why talking to friends, grieving losses, or crying during sad movies — yes, even that Pixar one with the balloon house — are all valid forms of self-repair.
You’re inviting plasticity back to the table. You’re saying, “Okay brain, it’s safe now. Let’s update the software.”
But not everyone gets the luxury of adaptive learning. If crying was punished, ignored, or unresolved in early life, the brain doesn’t get the message: “I can change to feel better.” Instead, it might learn:
- “Crying doesn’t work.”
- “Problems don’t get solved.”
- “I am the problem.”
This is where defeatist thinking sets in.
Rather than viewing emotional pain as an invitation to change, people with trauma or poor emotional models interpret distress as permanence. Their brains, instead of engaging plasticity, default to self-protection and stagnation.
“Why bother?” becomes a mantra. “It always ends the same.”
But here’s the secret: plasticity doesn’t go away. It just gets harder to access. The older you get, the more effort and intention it takes to create that plastic state — to let the emotional walls crack open enough for light (and growth) to get in.
Interestingly, science is now catching up to something indigenous cultures have known for centuries: certain psychedelics may actually enhance neuroplasticity. Substances like psilocybin (magic mushrooms), LSD, ayahuasca, and MDMA (especially in clinical therapeutic settings) have shown the ability to reopen the brain’s windows of adaptability. Research from institutions like Johns Hopkins and MAPS (Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies) indicates that these compounds promote the growth of new dendritic spines — the very structures that form neural connections. This means they may assist in breaking down rigid trauma loops, creating emotional breakthroughs, and fostering the kind of mental rewiring that typically requires years of talk therapy or spontaneous crying jags in the Trader Joe’s parking lot. It’s as if these substances hand the brain a renovation blueprint and say, “Hey, maybe we don’t need to keep living in this same broken house.”
Humor Time: Why Crying Is the Realest Self-Care
Let’s take a break from the science and give you the raw truth:
- Crying is your body’s version of a software update.
- Emotional stress is the browser pop-up: “You are not okay. Would you like to install new coping skills?”
- The sympathetic nervous system is like that one friend who always thinks everything’s an emergency. (“We’re out of almond milk?! Panic!!”)
And the prefrontal cortex? It’s the group chat moderator, muting the chaos and saying, “Okay everyone, let’s take a breath.”
Final Thought: The Comeback Circuit
Your brain is not a static organ. It’s a biological improv artist, constantly adapting to whatever emotional stage you throw it on. Crying, sadness, and emotional breakdowns aren’t signs of failure — they’re signs that your internal wiring is ready for a renovation.
So next time you cry? Don’t apologize. Instead, say:
“I’m installing emotional intelligence. Please wait…”
Because the truth is, emotional stress creates the exact conditions the brain needs to grow. It’s not about avoiding sadness. It’s about learning to mine it for insight.
And the most powerful, resilient people? They’re not the ones who never cry.
They’re the ones who cried, learned, changed, and came back stronger.
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