The value of the primal scream, before I'm too tired to post it. (Work was murder today. Poor Boss, he's supposed to be on vacation and we talked on the phone like four times by 3 p.m., managing the crisis du jour.)

I am amused by the idea of "primal scream therapy," because if there is one thing you can't schedule, it's a good healthy primal screamfest. It just happens. Check the entry below, read Bess's description of her own, if you haven't. I've had only a couple of good primal screamfests in the past decade. One was the night I came home from the hospital after about 12 hours and consultations with too many doctors, each one giving me the grim prognosis for my husband. I came home, got drunk, and screamed and cried and punched pillows for about an hour, until I was exhausted. I was able to get up the next day and put my game face on, which I had to maintain 24/7 for the next two years.

I didn't cry when he died. The end was so hideous and I was so drained and so zombie-like and so relieved it was over, I just did what had to be done and moved on. It's curious and probably very significant that almost a year after his death and almost three years to the day since the last primal screamfest, the bad haircut triggered another one. Stupid, trivial thing, but it set me off. I had suddenly had it, and I was in raving shrieking out-of-control lunatic mode for, oh, an hour or two after I got home from the butcher, er, stylist. Then I calmed down and went to bed and slept like a baby. I had been suffering from really annoying insomnia, bizarre, sometimes disturbing dreams, waking at 3 or 4 and unable to go back to sleep, and since the haircut/screamfest afterward, I have slept like a baby. The dreams are gone. The insomnia stopped. I'm calmer and more able to focus at work. I feel like my brain is sharper.

I have no doubt that whatever Bess was holding inside could have caused the cyst to grow, and screaming let it all out and popped the cyst in the process. The mind-body link is not well understood by the mechanics in the medical profession, and too many of them would be better off fixing air conditioners so they dismiss it out of hand. Sometimes we need to do this, and it's not a sign of insanity and it shouldn't be medicated away. Nor can it be scheduled - which is why "primal scream therapy" strikes me as hilarious. "Oh, next Wednesday at 3 I will have my Scream Therapy!" That's like scheduling a bout of diarrhea. It happens when your body says it has to happen. And like other random bodily events, it's not a sign of insanity or necessarily a bad thing. Embrace your occasional craziness, let it out, listen to your body and get in touch with your soul. You'll figure out when it's not occasional or helpful or a release, and that's when it's not a good thing. An occasional good deep scream, some serious, really filthy cursing, punching soft objects, or hard physical exercise until you are exhausted, it lets the bad ju-ju out. Nice Girls need to do it much more often. Maybe we wouldn't have so many people on mood-altering medication if screaming was more acceptable.