Abnormal "Humours"
When examining such a dark subject, it often helps to keep a
sense of humor about things.
Here is a page entirely devoted to the purpose of lightening things up when you feel
weighed down by it all.
If you have a bit of humor to submit (joke, cartoon, whatever), please send to bstillion@mail.clayton.edu
with the subject, "Abnormal Humours."
From the Perspectives Department:
Joe has been seeing a psycho-analyst
for four years for treatment of the fear that he had monsters under his bed. It
had been years since he had gotten a good night's sleep. Furthermore, his
progress was very poor, and he knew it. So, one day he stops seeing the
psychoanalyst and decides to try something different.
A few weeks later, Joe's former
psychoanalyst meets the old client in the supermarket, and is surprised to find
him looking well-rested, energetic, and cheerful. "Doc!" Joe says,
"It's amazing! I'm cured!"
"That's great news!" the psycho-analyst says. "you seem to be
doing much better. How?"
"I went to see another doctor," Joe says enthusiastically, "and
he cured me in just ONE session!"
"One?!" the psycho-analyst asks incredulously.
"Yeah," continues Joe, "my new doctor is a behaviorist."
"A behaviorist?" the psychoanalyst asks. "How did he cure you in
one session?"
"Oh, easy," says Joe. "He told me to cut the legs off of my
bed."
An award for great performance in the Psycho-Educational Complex
A man walked into a bar and ordered a glass of white wine. He took a sip of the wine, then tossed the remainder into the bartender's face. Before the bartender could recover from the surprise, the man began weeping. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm really sorry. I keep doing that to bartenders. I can't tell you how embarrassing it is to have a compulsion like this."
Far from being angry, the bartender was sympathetic. Before long, he was suggesting that the man see an analyst about his problem. "I happen to have the name of a psychoanalyst," the bartender said. "My brother and my wife have both been treated by him, and they say he's as good as they come."
The man wrote down the name of the doctor, thanked the bartender, and left. The bartender smiled, knowing he'd done a good deed for a fellow human being.
Six months later, the man was back. "Did you do what I suggested?" the bartender asked, serving the glass of white wine.
"I certainly did," the man said. "I've been seeing the psychoanalyst twice a week." He took a sip of the wine. Then he threw the remainder into the bartender's face.
The flustered bartender wiped his face with a towel. "The doctor doesn't seem to be doing you any good," he sputtered.
"On the contrary," the man said, "he's done me world of good."
"But you threw the wine in my face again!" the bartender exclaimed.
"Yes," the man said. "But it doesn't embarrass me anymore."
Free Mary
Jim and Mary were both patients in a Mental Hospital. One day,
while they were walking past the hospital swimming pool, Jim suddenly jumped
into the deep end.
He sank like a stone to the bottom and stayed there. Mary promptly jumped in to
save him. She swam to the bottom and pulled Jim out.
The medical director became aware of Mary's heroic act and he immediately
ordered her to be discharged from the hospital, as he now considered her to be
mentally stable. When he went to tell her the news, he said, "Mary, I have
good news and bad news. The good news is you're being discharged because you
were able to jump in and save the life of another patient, so I believe you've
regained your senses. The bad news is that Jim, the patient you saved, hung
himself in his bathroom with the belt of his robe. I am so sorry, but he's
dead."
Mary replied, "He didn't hang himself, I put him there to dry."
Ethical Principles
of Psychotherapy
It is unethical to:
•Inquire about whether you are in the will of a suicidal client.
•Use whoopee cushions on anxious clients.
•Do John Wayne impersonations during a homosexual panic.
•Double bill for obese clients.
•Use an ejector button at the end of 50 minutes.
•Contaminate elegant interpretations with reality.
•Measure lateness in milliseconds to compulsive clients.
•Refer to ECT as a kind of breakdancing.
•Diagnose a client as borderline just because they have more fun than you.
•Arm wrestle over the truth of an interpretation.
•Reply to disclosures of wrong-doing with, "You slimeball."
•Say to a guilt-prone person, "You never call, you never write - Oy."
•Use thumbscrews on resistant clients.
•Sneak up on paranoid clients and yell, "Booga-booga."
If someone with multiple personalities threatens to harm himself, is it
considered a hostage situation?
Free CME Presentation!*
Differential Diagnosis in Psychiatry: How to Distinguish Paranoid Schizophrenia from Cell Phone Use
Social Distance: The individual with schizophrenia will generally retreat to a considerate distance from others when he needs to converse with his voices. The cell phone user will stand right next to you, talk in a loud voice, and gesticulate in your face.
Safe Driving Technique: The cell phone user often needs to look at his phone to dial while driving, causing him to drive over yellow lines and endanger others on the road. The individual with schizophrenia does not need to dial, and thus is a much safer driver.
Restaurants: The cell phone user is more likely to be talking loudly in a quiet, expensive restaurant. The individual with schizophrenia is less likely to be noticed because he usually has his conversations in eateries where the ambient noise drowns out his conversation.
Prognosis: Individuals with schizophrenia often seek help for their difficulties, and are quite responsive to treatment. Cell phone users are remarkable for their lack of insight and resistance to any form of social, medical or legal intervention.
*Funded by generous grants from Pfizer Pharmaceuticals and Verizon Wireless.
http://www.baltimorepsych.com/mcjokes.htm
Answering Machine at the Mental Hospital:
"Hello, and welcome to the mental health hotline.
If you are obsessive-compulsive, press 1 repeatedly.
If you are co-dependent, please ask someone to press 2 for you.
If you have multiple personalities, press 3, 4, 5, and 6.
If you are paranoid, we know who you are and what you want. Stay on the line so we can trace your call.
If you are delusional, press 7 and your call will be transferred to the mother ship.
If you are schizophrenic, listen carefully and a small voice will tell you which number to press.
If you are a manic-depressive, it doesn't matter which number you press, no one will answer.
If you have a nervous disorder, please fidget with the pound key until a representative comes on the line.
If you have amnesia, press 8 and state your name, address, telephone number, date of birth, social security number, and your mother's maiden name.
If you have bi-polar disorder, please leave a message after the beep or before the beep or after the beep. Please wait for the beep.
If you have short-term memory loss, press 9.
If you have short-term memory loss, press 9.
If you have short-term memory loss, press 9.
If you have short-term memory loss, press 9.
If you have low self-esteem, please hang up. All operators are too busy to talk to you."
Or, here's another version of the same joke, with some different "options":
Hello, and welcome to the mental health hospital.
If you are obsessive-compulsive, press 1 repeatedly.
If you are co-dependent, please ask someone to press 2 for you.
If you have multiple personalities, press 3,4,5 and 6.
If you are paranoid, we know who you are and what you want. Stay on the line so we can trace your call.
If you are delusional, press 7 and your call will be forwarded to the mother ship.
If you are schizophrenic, listen carefully and a small voice will tell you which number to press.
If you are manic-depressive, it doesn't matter which number you press, no one will answer.
If you are dyslexic, press 96969696969696.
If you have a nervous disorder, please fidget with the pound key until a representative comes on the line.
If you have post-traumatic stress disorder, s-l-o-w-l-y & c-a-r-e-f-u-l-l-y press 0-0-0.
If you are bi-polar, please leave a message after the beep or before the beep or after the beep. Please wait for the beep.
If you have short-term memory loss, press 9. If you have short-term memory loss, press 9. If you have short-term memory loss, press 9.
If you have low self-esteem, please hang up. Our operators are too busy to talk with you.
If you are menopausal, hang up, turn on the fan, lie down and cry. You won't be crazy forever.
Christmas Carols for the Psychiatrically Challenged
SCHIZOPHRENIA: Do You Hear What I Hear?
MULTIPLE PERSONALITY DISORDER: We Three Kings Disoriented Are
DEMENTIA: I Think I'll Be Home For Christmas
NARCISSISTIC: Hark, the Herald Angels Sing About Me
MANIC: Deck the Halls and Walls and House and Lawn and Streets and
Stores
and Office and Town and Cars and Busses and
Trucks and Trees and
Fire
Hydrants and . . .
PARANOID: Santa Claus Is Coming To Get Me
PERSONALITY DISORDER: You Better Watch Out, I'm Gonna Cry, I'm Gonna
Pout,
Maybe I'll Tell You Why
DEPRESSION: Silent Anhedonia, Holy Anhedonia, All Is Flat, All is Lonely
OBSESSIVE-COMPULSIVE DISORDER: Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell
Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell Rock,
Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle Bell Rock, Jingle Bell,
Jingle Bell, Jingle
Bell Rock,
........ (better start again)
PASSIVE-AGGRESSIVE PERSONALITY: On The First Day of Christmas My True
Love Gave To Me
(and then took it all away)
BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER: Thoughts of Roasting on an Open Fire.
A psychiatrist was conducting a group therapy session with four young mothers and their small children.