Crying
When I turned 50, I started to cry at the littlest things. To be honest and to hear my others tell it I cried a lot for a man before I turned 50. But this was different. Any standing ovation, whether in person or watching on an award show, would find me welling up, tears sometimes falling down my cheek. I cry at sitcoms. Seriously, I cannot watch the last episode of Big Bang theory. It’s supposed to be funny and touching except I skip the funny and go right to tears.
Since my DBS, though, it has gotten worse. Now I go right to sobbing out loud and skip the eyes welling with teardrops. This leads to awkward situations such as cheering for a home run by standing, clapping and sobbing! Or sobbing as a favorite band is inducted to the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame.
I used to think it was age-related but when it changed with the DBS, I thought maybe it was connected to Parkinson’s. Pseudobulbar affect (PBA) is it condition where, in its most extreme form, causes sudden and uncontrollable outburst of crying or laughing. It tends to affect people who have neurological conditions such as Parkinson’s. The website pakinsonsdisease.net reports that PBA is prevalent during levodopa off periods and can be triggered by DBS (Article on PBA and PD)
The above cited article names six characteristics that may be indicative of DBA. Let’s see how I fit in:
1. Emotional responses is inappropriate for the situation. I’m sure Manny Machado and the rest of his San Diego Padre teammates don’t want the entire crowd crying when the hit a home run.
2. The individual’s feelings do not match the outburst. At the end of the day, I’m a Red Sox fan that goes to many San Diego Padre games so I’m usually happy to see Manny Machado hit homers, but I respond like “good *sob* swing *sob* way *sob* to *sob* go *sob*.” When the Red Sox came to San Diego I did not know which team to cry for.
3. The duration and severity of the emotional response cannot be controlled by the person. Like I want to be sobbing in a stadium with 40,000 people in it.
4. The expression of emotion does not promote a feeling of relief. In fact, it makes me wonder what the hell is wrong with me?
5. The emotional responses is not dependent on a stimulus or it is an exaggerated response to a stimulus. I need a stimulus, but I think we can all agree, there’s no crying in baseball.
6. The emotional outbursts cause significant distress or impact the persons social life. I try not to take it personally when I go out with friends and they laugh at my crying in a corner with a box of tissues!
So it fits and it has gotten better with calibrations of my DBS. My neurologist says it may not continue to get better. I felt like crying when she told me this. Instead I laughed, because all of this is funny until it isn’t.
Red Sox v Padres @ San Diego, 2023 - Makes me want to cry!