Laughter is good medicine

Cancer is no laughing matter but you’ve all heard the saying, “Laughter is good medicine.” Turns out that’s actually true – laughing releases those “feel good” chemicals in our brains. When everything around you is swabbed with rubbing alcohol, when you find yourself bald and on hold with your insurance company for 97 minutes at a time…when you’re so angry that you wanted to be the room mom at your child’s school but you’re sitting in the chemo chair instead…when there is nothing but heaviness and gloom to be had – perhaps a little giggle will lighten your day!

Here’s a classic medical joke that I saw taped inside the Gamma camera machine when I had a scan in October 2007. It was funny to me even then as I faced my new life as a woman living with stage 3c breast cancer. Here it is today – September 2010 – almost 3 years later and I’m going strong. And I still think it’s funny.

Looking back on that day, I could have chosen to cry at my condition and no one would have blamed me. But I’m glad that on that day, in the middle of the unknown, I chose to laugh. Whoever taped this list inside that machine – thank you for lighting my trial. Maybe it’ll do the same for you!

(I titled it “Elvis has an Evil Twin too” as I have a twin whom I love to tease!)

It was a cruel, cruel test. “Lay still,” they said positioning me under the Gamma camera yesterday. But right above my eyes, this joke was taped to the machine. “Lay still?” I almost wet my pants!

Backwoods Medical Terms

Artery………………….The study of paintings.
Benign………………….What you be after you be eight.
Bacteria………………..Back door to cafeteria.
Barium………………….What doctors do when patients die.
Cesarean Section…………A neighborhood in Rome.
Catscan…………………Searching for Kitty.
Cauterize……………….Made eye contact with her.
Colic…………………..A sheep dog.
Coma……………………A punctuation mark.
D&C…………………….Where Washington is.
Dilate………………….To live long.
Enema…………………..Not a friend.
Fester………………….Quicker than someone else.
Fibula………………….A small lie.
Genital…………………Non-Jewish person.
G.I.Series………………World Series of military baseball.
Hangnail………………..What you hang your coat on.
Impotent………………..Distinguished, well known.
Labor Pain………………Getting hurt at work.
Medical Staff……………A Doctor’s cane.
Morbid………………….A higher offer than I bid.
Nitrates………………..Cheaper than day rates.
Node……………………I knew it.
Outpatient………………A person who has fainted.
Pap Smear……………….A derogatory common against your father.
Pelvis………………….Evil twin to Elvis.
Post Operative…………..A letter carrier.
Recovery Room……………Place to do upholstery.
Rectum………………….Darn near killed him.
Secretion……………….Hiding something
Seizure…………………Roman emperor.
Tablet………………….A small table.
Terminal Illness…………Getting sick at the airport.
Tumor…………………..More than one.
Urine…………………..Opposite of you’re out
Varicose………………..Near by