The Importance of Laughter

 IF THE LAUGHTER HAS GONE OUT OF YOUR RELATIONSHIP….DANGER WILL ROBINSON! WARNING, WARNING, WARNING!

“The couple that doesn’t laugh together has lost a critical healing component to their relationship.”

The Bible says:

Laughter (or a cheerful heart) is good medicine.    ~Proverbs 17:22~

“If you stop laughing together, your marriage can naturally slide into crisis mode.”

Another benefit of laughter in marriage:

“Research has found that laughter produces Oxytocin, a chemical in the brain also referred to as the bonding chemical.”

https://marriagemissions.com/laugh-marriage-mm-109/

As Brenda and I get older, we are discovering the process of aging provides a lot of material to laugh about.

For example, our mistakes in what we hear each other say is frequently hilarious.                                      

 I’m  also discovering as I age, my filtering abilities sometimes slip.

Brenda and I went to Pacific Grove to celebrate our forty-first anniversary.

The beach was windy, so we ordered take-out. We parked our car along side the ocean to enjoy the scenery while we ate.

I ordered salmon. Brenda ordered chicken. I suggested we cut our meals in half to share each other’s meals.

I was both shocked and disappointed when Brenda said “No.”

What was shocking to the both of us was my reaction to her hard pass on sharing meals.

In a loud voice I said:

“KEEP YOUR DAMN CHICKEN!”

There was a long pause. 

Then Brenda and I spontaneously burst out laughing together. My filter slipping gave us our biggest laugh of the day!

We’ve mastered the ability to laugh at our imperfections. I can say from experience, that’s a whole lot better than fighting about them.

I never forget the period in my life, in the beginning of my journey with prostate cancer. I went for months without as much as a single laugh.

I’ll never forget how our laughter returned. Brenda showed me a Charlie Brown comic in which Charlie learned the secret to coping with life was learning to hate one day at a time.

The idea struck me as brilliant!! I was hating my life months and years into the future. 

The contrast between my coping and Charlie Brown’s coping struck me as hilarious. I roared with laughter. My sense of humor returned! 

When I felt called to write a book about our experiences I wanted to do something which I thought might not be possible. I wanted the title of a book about cancer to bring a smile or a laugh.

In other words, I wanted the healing process of laughter to begin as soon as someone looked at the cover of our book.

I prayed for weeks. The picture below, the cover of our book was the result of an answered prayer. I made sure the humor didn’t begin and end with the book cover.

A reader’s review said it best:

“With humor and candor, Rick tackles difficult to discuss topics such as living with a catheter, urinary incontinence, depression, erectile dysfunction, and penile rehab. 

In addition, there are informative chapters about how to share the news with others and how to cope with their reactions, what to expect during the process, why he opted for surgery, insurance questions, dealing with lack of sleep, returning to work, and more.”

If you’ve learned to laugh with cancer, and all the related issues mentioned above, your sense of humor is priceless.

If you’ve learned to laugh with your spouse, your marriage will go the distance.