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ChronicBabe Blog Carnival #14: The funniest thing about chronic illness

Hey Babes, this time we asked, What are the funniest things you've experienced or done to deal with chronic illness? and you responded with some pretty funny stories. You proved our point that chronic illness isn't all about tears and struggles; sometimes chronic illness is damn funny! This edition showcases 16 posts—from porn to poop—that prove laughter IS the best medicine and humor a mighty powerful coping mechanism.

Seriously Funny

Amy at Diabetes Mine shares that diabetes + home renovation + temporary relocation = tons of fun. Read her post, Diabetes and Home Improvement for a giggle and some great remodeling questions, like: Which carpet colors make finding a wayward test strip easier to spot?

Ever used humor to make the people around you feel better about you being in the hospital? Or spent time contemplating the absurdity of a life with multiple chronic conditions? Annie has, and shares her thoughts about Chronic Illness = Humor over at It's Time To Get Over How Fragile You Are.

We've mentioned Allie and her Better Pain Scale before, but her post is so awesome we have to mention it again. Not only did it make us laugh until we cried, it inspired us to print out her revised pain scale and take it with us to our next doctor's appointment! Join in on the guffaws when visiting Boyfriend Doesn't Have Ebola. Probably. at Hyperbole and a Half.

Laughing At Ourselves

We couldn't stop chuckling when we read Helena's description of her less-than-graceful exit from a red Volvo sedan in Sweden. What makes the story so funny was the reaction from a witness to this clumsy moment. But don't just take our word for it, check out Are You Laughing Yet? over at Chronic Marriage.

Have you ever heard of food porn? (Don't worry, Babes, it's strictly G-rated.) Sarah lives with celiac disease, which means adhering to a pretty strict diet. But a girl can dream of the food she can't eat and Sarah's found watching cooking shows on television fuels her fantasies. Guaranteed to make you laugh, enjoy Food TV is porn for
celiacs. (We posted it at ChronicBabe as a guest blogger.)

In her post, The Fibro Fog Follies over at FibroDAZE, KD starts by giving us the definition of fibro-fog and then shares some pretty hilarious examples. She sounds like the kind of Babe we'd love to hang out with and share a good laugh with. Although if she asks us to come over for dinner, we think we might just suggest eating at a restaurant instead...

Dana Morningstar at I Already Gave My Right Arm to be Ambidextrous! tells us about her belly dancing experience in The Funniest Things About Chronic Illness. While she thinks it's pretty funny, we also think it's pretty darn inspirational!

Fun and Games

Paul is one very funny ChronicDude. Skilled with a video camera, he's had some fun making mock drug commercials and sharing them over at the ChronicBabe forum. We especially like his aproach to pain killers, "We don't pop pills, we crack jokes!" Watch Laugh your fibromyalgia pain away and Real or fake drug commercial and consider posting your own videos to the ChronicBabe Forum too.

Leave it to Selena from Oh My Aches and Pains! to equate fibro-fog with playing a classic game from our childhood. In Chronic Illness Is _______ she introduces us to her favorite nouns, verbs and adjectives that get a real work-out on her more cognitively-impaired days and asks us all to play along.

Need a comedic escape? Welcome to the Fabulous Fibro Spa and Resort! The very clever fibrologists Laurie of HibernationNow's Blog and Phylor of Phylor's Blog put together this very amusing parody description of the ultimate in fibromyalgia spa care.

Situation Comedies

Maya has been traversing a medical maze lately and all she can do is laugh. You see, she's coping with a treatment side-effect that has
transformed her into a superhero of sorts. Read My Continuous Battle with Tiger Girl! at her blog Loving with Chronic Illness.

For those of you babes who have been in the hospital, you know all
about this. For those who haven't or have forgotten about this
discharge requirement, head over to Tales of Rachel to get the scoop on poop. (Yes, we said poop.) When we read Queen of TMI, we couldn't stop giggling.

Gerri wants to smile and have some fun. So she put together a list of funny things about her life with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue so we could all smile too. Check out You've got to have a sense of
humor, right? over at 50 is the new 40.

If You Don't Have Anything Nice to Say, Don't Say Anything At All is the latest comic adventure of Miss Waxie of A Comic Life, Indeed. In this episode, it seems that Miss Waxie has taken a shine to the hunky anesthesiologist that has knocked her out two times. But is she becoming the Lindsay Lohan of the hospital? You've got to click the link to find out.

Laughter as Social Lubricant

Lisa Copen of Rest Ministries went for a caridac nuclear stress test early this year and learned that while the health insurance customer
service staff and medical technicians don't always want to hear about our problems, they are always up for some humor. Read how she gave them permission to laugh in Learning to Laugh at the Little Things with Chronic Illness.

While she doesn't consider herself funny, Kairol of Everything Changes is certainly smart. In her post What's So Funny About Cancer? she wonders why others are cracking so many jokes about cancer and makes a compelling argument for addressing young adult cancer sans the slap-stick song and dance routine.

Like what you see here? Why not enter the next ChronicBabe Blog Carnival?!

We're having so much fun running a blog carnival! But maybe there's room for improvement; we want to hear your suggestions. Let us know what you think of this edition in the discussion over at the Forum.

Want to participate in the next carnival? It's a little less than two weeks from today (publish date: Monday, October 18, 2010), and the theme is: Trick or Treat! Halloween is coming soon and we started thinking, wow, medicine is like Editrix Jenni's favorite holiday. Sometimes you get treats, and sometimes you get tricks. We'd love to hear about the ups and downs of your experience. Show us the highs and lows, and the surprises!

If you want to participate, send us your name (as you would like it to appear), the name of your blog, the name of (and link to!) your post, and a 1-2 sentence description of the post. We'll let you know if you're accepted. Send all that to chronic babe @ gmail dot com. The deadline is Friday, October 15, at 10pm CST.

We want to give a special thanks to Selena at Oh My Aches and Pains! for doing such an awesome job pulling together this edition of the blog carnival. Hooray!

P.S.: Why not spread the love and submit a post from your favorite ChronicBabe blogger? Tell us who you love to read and we'll include her, too!

Posted: 10/5/2010 in Blog Carnival | Also posted in: Inspiration

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