When life gets so bad it becomes funny

[Apathy79]

I was at a funeral a few days ago for my uncle who recently passed. His wife had passed a few weeks earlier. I was chatting to their daughter, my cousin, who was wheelchair bound after a climbing accident late last year, and she was telling me everything they'd been through in the last few weeks. Her Mum had looked after her ever since the accident but had recently become very sick with cancer and was in and out of hospital with multiple operations. Her Dad had to retire early to look after both of them but this put a huge financial strain on them and the 3 of them had to move out of the house they were renting and into a caravan. Then he had a stroke and was hospitalised and couldn't look after either of them anymore. So my cousin and her mother were left trying to look after each other when neither had the capacity to look after themselves. The mother died soon after. The father couldn't even leave hospital to go to the funeral but he insisted they spend much of what little they had to celebrate her life. It's fine because he would go back to work shortly he said. So they did. About a week later he had a seizure and died too. And now here she was sitting with me at his funeral, having lost both her parents, with no money or inheritance left, having paid for a funeral she couldn't afford with no idea how she would pay the debt, living in a caravan she would soon be evicted from. While still trying to come to terms with never being able to walk again. All in a couple of months. Her life seemed fine before that.

She told me all this and something in me just flipped. I got the urge to laugh. And quickly I couldn't hold it back. I was just sitting there laughing. And thinking of all the absurd things that could happen next. After a while she started laughing too. And playing along. Seeing how bad we could imagine things getting and laughing about it. I think it was the strangest conversation I've ever had. Like an emotional release in the middle of the torment.

Am I just a weird person? Do you guys have any experience with this? When it's just so ridiculously bad that all you can do is laugh?

 

[Csmith8827]

I was at a funeral a few days ago for my uncle who recently passed. His wife had passed a few weeks earlier. I was chatting to their daughter, my cousin, who was wheelchair bound after a climbing accident late last year, and she was telling me everything they'd been through in the last few weeks. Her Mum had looked after her ever since the accident but had recently become very sick with cancer and was in and out of hospital with multiple operations. Her Dad had to retire early to look after both of them but this put a huge financial strain on them and the 3 of them had to move out of the house they were renting and into a caravan. Then he had a stroke and was hospitalised and couldn't look after either of them anymore. So my cousin and her mother were left trying to look after each other when neither had the capacity to look after themselves. The mother died soon after. The father couldn't even leave hospital to go to the funeral but he insisted they spend much of what little they had to celebrate her life. It's fine because he would go back to work shortly he said. So they did. About a week later he had a seizure and died too. And now here she was sitting with me at his funeral, having lost both her parents, with no money or inheritance left, having paid for a funeral she couldn't afford with no idea how she would pay the debt, living in a caravan she would soon be evicted from. While still trying to come to terms with never being able to walk again. All in a couple of months. Her life seemed fine before that.

She told me all this and something in me just flipped. I got the urge to laugh. And quickly I couldn't hold it back. I was just sitting there laughing. And thinking of all the absurd things that could happen next. After a while she started laughing too. And playing along. Seeing how bad we could imagine things getting and laughing about it. I think it was the strangest conversation I've ever had. Like an emotional release in the middle of the torment.

Am I just a weird person? Do you guys have any experience with this? When it's just so ridiculously bad that all you can do is laugh?

I know what you're talking about. I just think you might have a sick and twisted sense of humor but at the same time i think it's just your brains way of trying to make sense of the situation and it can't because it's so horrible and unrealistic, almost like something out of a cartoon, so all it can do is laugh as tragedy after tragedy seems to unfold. That's how I rationalize those moments anywhoo...

 

[yeaimhere13]

this is one of the saddest posts ive read on here. i really hope she finds some kind of peace.

 

[Yume Nikki]

I think you were laughing not because you thought it was funny but because you realized how truly fucked and unfair this world is.

No one is promised a happy fulfilling life, some of us are doomed to suffer for eternity while others thrive with support from their families and friends. There is also people out there who have neither. It's a huge gamble.

When I went through some horrific shit during my breakup and was stuck in a horrid family system that dismisses all of my problems. It's hard not to laugh. It's hard not to release that pain and turn it into something humorous because honestly, what can you do at that point when you watch your own life fall apart? I laugh sometimes watching my mom and brother argue because they are so dysfunctional it's unreal.

My mom had me for selfish reasons and my brother calls me horrible names due to a learning disability. My own family in Poland does not care about me. My abusive ex left me after I told him about my mom's grief. The same guy who told me to stop screaming while he was hurting me. I get ghosted for expressing my feelings to people when society has told me several times to do so because it helps. It's funny, it's all funny, We might as well put the clown suits on at this point because life itself is a fucking joke.

 

[mikgazer6]

This reads like the plot of a black comedy. Life is too absurd to not laugh at. I think tragedy can be hilarious because it highlights how nonsensical life is.

 

[grandeur.egg]

Sometimes people laugh to ease or release the tension when theyre uncomfortable. Youre not broken for having that reason

 

[Apathy79]

Yeah it's hard to explain. Like I'm sitting there trying to put myself in her shoes and it's just awful and keeps getting worse the more she tells. I'm trying to think of ways out or ideas to manage the situation but drawing blanks. It was just an awful situation. At some point I gave up on solutions but then didn't know what I was supposed to say. So I flipped and started imagining how it could get even worse. And those ideas started making me laugh. I guess it felt like the Universe was finding ways to screw her at every turn so what if it keeps happening? Then I was ashamed of laughing and desperately trying to stop and put on a straight face because I figured it was so rude with her opening up like this to get laughed at. But I couldn't hold it back. The relief came when she started laughing too. And we started talking about how it could get even worse. And that was funny, in a twisted way.

It was just a strange conversation. I don't think I've ever had one like it. And I wasn't sure if it was really a rude thing to do and I was being strange or if others do the same thing.