Why do I cry when I hear other babies crying?

Question from Amina S., 34, Scotland. Mama to 7-month-old baby boy Noah

Amina is navigating postpartum depression after her first baby. She thought she’d feel more stable by now, but her nervous system still feels raw. She’s quietly carrying guilt, exhaustion, and the invisible weight of emotional triggers — especially around crying.

Mama,

It’s not just sound. It’s something deeper.

I remember the first time it happened.
I was in the checkout line.
The woman ahead of me had a baby in her cart — maybe six months old — and when that baby started crying, something in my chest cracked open.

My vision blurred. My hands shook. Tears came out of nowhere.

It wasn’t even my baby.
But it felt like my body remembered everything I hadn’t processed.

The cluster feeds.
The witching hours.
The nights I bounced and rocked and begged the crying to stop — not because I was annoyed, but because I was unraveling.

Because I had nothing left to give.
Because I was scared I wasn’t enough.

No one talks about how triggering baby cries can be when you’re already living on the edge. No one told me that postpartum emotional overwhelm sometimes waits until the quiet months — when the world thinks you should be fine again.

That sound — that high-pitched, helpless wail —somehow reopened a door I thought I had shut.

And it made me realize:
I’d been holding too much. Too quietly. For too long.

Sometimes I think our bodies remember what our minds try to forget.
And crying at another baby’s cry?
It doesn’t make you weak. It makes you real.

Real moms get triggered.
Real moms get flooded.
Real moms carry more than anyone sees.

For me, the healing started slowly — in pieces.

Like giving myself permission to wear softness.
No wires, no digging seams — just one bra that made me feel held, too.
I started breathing deeper.
Letting the feelings come, even when I didn’t understand them.
Figuring out how to feel like myself again after my babies has taken time.

But I’ve learned this:
You’re not broken for feeling this way.
You’re not too sensitive.
You’re a mother.

And you deserve to be comforted, too.

Love,
Lina P.