“Laughter is the Best Medicine” I have always had issues with this phrase… NO MORE. It is true for me anyway, and it is not a question of ‘To laugh ot cry” – it is
I guess in an instance where you have an alternative treatment available in the form of a pill, fluid, or procedure, it may rival laughter, but still, I think you would simply add “one of the” to the phrase. I could substitute other words like chocolate, gold bullion, a villa by the sea, or life insurance… actually, laughter trumps these materialistic topics for me. I put it alongside huge factors in life like faith and family, but these I don’t classify as medicine because they are the basics of life.
Laughter is simply so, so important to me… it is a lifeline.
People say, “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry”—for me, you need both!
Last weekend, we had a family meal on a Jewish holiday on Friday, and partly fueled by alcohol, we simply laughed so, so, so much. We didn’t discuss “You Know What”—we laughed about everything, and it was beautiful.
Two weeks into this new diagnosis (probable diagnosis, or more formally, according to the way it is written, “appears to be” PSP), I believe I have some basis for an opinion on the relative importance of different medicines from recent years. In so many ways, life should be depressing beyond belief, and in some ways it is, but we can and do laugh, and it is like manna from heaven.
We laugh about both the ridiculous things taking place in our current world and also at all the things that are still normal. As per usual, my kids usually laugh at me rather than at what I say, because apparently they don’t actually think I’m usually humorous—they think my humor is old-fashioned, ridiculous, and fundamentally not funny (in a respectful way, of course) and of course I commit the typical ‘old person’ mistake of labouring the joke for longer than I should. Yet, we laugh because in many ways I’m still the same Dad in many respects—I don’t wash up the mugs like I should, I leave mess, I have the same eccentricities, and I’m turning into an interesting passenger in the car, amongst other things.
Of course, we cry and we grieve and we have dark moments—it is far from the perfect life, but laughter cuts through. As I said, laughter and tears exist together.
I’ll give two examples related to future vacations planned ahead of recent events.
I won’t provide details here, but my wife and I both turn 50 in the next 4 months. We planned a holiday of a lifetime, luckily backed by good travel insurance (which is also updated for my new situation). Without spilling any information, the recent family joke has been: If you planned a vacation for someone who has chronic balance issues, what is the one thing you would try to avoid putting them near for any amount of time. Yes, you would not include a boat in the itinerary. It is genuinely funny. Now, I pray and hope we make the trip, but you can’t underestimate the irony. It is laughter and tears.
The second is the trip I arranged with my son. A few days after arranging a distillery tour in the Highlands, I lost my ability to drink whisky (it tastes acrid, peppery) across a range of malts from Laphroaig to Macallan. Again, the irony has provided much humor. Again, it is laughter and tears.
Then there is what is becoming my standard catchphrase—and believe it or not, it is true—”Apart from that, all is OK.” A social worker (among many examples) asked me to describe how things are, and after going through some of the darkest things you could possibly ever tell someone, I genuinely said, “Apart from that, all is good.” We laughed.
As I said above, it is not without tears and a huge amount of heartache. It is tough, believe me. It is also tougher still for my loved ones.
Laughter, however, is a simply incredible tonic. I have read studies about it, seen facts and figures, and heard lectures. To me, that’s not relevant anymore. I see it up close in the darkest of times. Tears alone would just be heartbreaking.
A smile, a joke (or at least a valiant attempt) at the right time is important because the truth is—life goes on, and our lives go on, and my illness, however disturbing and all-consuming to me, is simply not the main show in town. It is one of many moving parts, and it needs to have its time and place, but it also needs to be in context.
Either laugh or cry? NO. In my view, I think you need both.
Positivity is a big psychological word with a lot of effort required. Laughter is a much cheaper and easier drug, and it helps. My blog is my blog, and as always, other people will probably disagree, but I do feel, right here, right now, that laughter is the best medicine.
And on that note, I’ll end with a memory I had last night, courtesy of a dear friend in the North of England. He described the beautiful moment many, many years ago (yes, over 30 years ago) when he saw me and my wife walking together for the first time. Last night, he reflected on it with nostalgia and deep emotion. He will hopefully also recall that in a speech at our wedding, he described us as looking like the QE2 and a tugboat because of our relative size difference. This brings back beautiful moments for me, reminds me how blessed I am, and I will take that into the day…
