glasses, and lived happily ever after. Unfortunately, therapy doesn’t work
that way. Not even on television.
Rachel and I still had piles of [expletive deleted] to slog through. The
glasses gave us a way to talk about it. And joke about it. I believe so strongly
that depressed people need to learn to laugh at themselves, that I’m not above
laughing at them. I am not unusual among therapists in this respect. Humor
is one of our most important tools. You can use it too. Don’t be afraid to
joke with depressed people about their depression. Be gentle and loving,
but most of all, be funny. If they get offended, tell them it was my idea.
Randy’s wife hands him a small stuffed donkey. “What is this?”
he asks.
“It’s Eeyore,” she says. “From Winnie the Pooh.”
Randy looks at her blankly. She beckons him into the room
where the grandkids watch videos on the only working television
left in the house. She starts a tape, and together, sitting in bean-
bag chairs on the floor, they watch the depressed donkey ward
off all attempts at good cheer.
Randy’s wife holds up the stuffed animal again. “You’re
my Eeyore,” she says, hoping she hasn’t pushed it too far.
Randy takes a deep breath.“Thanks for noticing me,” he
says in a deep donkey-voice.Talk about manifest and latent content! Freud himself wrote a treatise
attempting to analyze humor. I guess he didn’t realize that jokes aren’t funny
when you have to explain them. Humor, nevertheless, is the best argument
that human experience exists on a number of levels at the same time.
Affectionate joking is the best answer to the I just don’t feel up to it explo-
sion, but if you don’t feel affectionate, don’t use humor to disguise irritation.
Jokes, whether Eeyore, expletive-deleted-colored glasses, or whatever
else you come up with, provide a useful means of externalizing the per-
ceptual distortions inherent in depression. Not only does despair get to
know itself, but, if your timing is good, it may laugh at itself as well.
If you don’t get a laugh, immediately take responsibility for whatever
aggression you’re feeling. You’ll still provoke a useful conversation. Even
ill-received humor will work out fine if you remember this rule: Never try
190 ❧Explosions into Sadness