How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This?: Reclaim Your Health with Humor, Creativity, and Grit [Paperback]

Carla Ulbrich (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2011

Having a sense of humor is essential to health, says singer-songwriter Carla Ulbrich, who has found laughter to be a lifesaver during tough times. Under the stress of multiple illnesses and constant health ''care,'' Ulbrich one day snapped and became the Singing Patient. She channeled her hard won victories, set about reclaiming her health, and penned How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This?, a collection of short, inspiring, funny essays that help people thrive and celebrate life despite illness.

As Ulbrich spins her tale (and shares some songs), she lampoons common fears and prejudices about illness and lovingly lambastes the foibles of the medical industry. She offers heartfelt and humorous advice for navigating mainstream and alternative therapies, and she guides partners, families, and friends who wish to help their loved ones. Her candid insights, wisecracking commentary, handy lists, hilarious song lyrics, and gentle camaraderie will put a smile on the face of anyone who wants to face illness with courage and humor.

Editorial Reviews

Review

''While writing a great book on how to recover from illness, Carla Ulbrich wrote an even better book on how to live a healthy and fulfilling life. No doubt, you have a good doctor if you see How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This? in their waiting room.'' --Michael Stock, WLRN Radio

''How Can You NOT Laugh at a Time Like This? is outstanding....Carla is your guide to navigate the emotionally and technically confusing world of illness with heart, humor, and bite-size chapters. Everyone needs a patient advocate-and now you have one, with this book.'' --Robert Aubrey Davis & Mary Sue Twohy, ''The Village,'' Sirius/XM Radio

''As a doctor, Patch Adams brought to mainstream America the concept of a caring, compassionate, and fun medical staff making a profound difference in the healing of their patients. Now we've been given the gift to hear about it from the patient's perspective. Carla Ulbrich is living proof that bringing fun, play, creativity, and laughter to the healing process does wonders for the mind, body, and spirit. Carla's uncanny wit is infectious-and that's an infection we can all benefit from!'' --Danny Donuts, CPA (Comic Performance Artist) and member of the Association for Applied and Therapeutic Humor

''I was completely taken with [Carla Ulbrich's] amazing outlook on life, her tenacity, and her passion.... Carla talks to you honestly, on every level, in her book. She also does it with a fantastic sense of humor.'' --LuckyYogini.com

About the Author

Comic singer-songwriter Carla Ulbrich has taken her music and love of wordplay all over the United States and England. She has appeared on USA TV, the BBC, Dr. Demento, The Bob and Sherrie Show, and Sirius XM Radio. She has recorded five CDs. Ulbrich grew up in Clemson, South Carolina, and now lives in New Jersey.

Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Tell Me Press, LLC; 1 edition (February 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0981645348
• ISBN-13: 978-0981645346
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 5.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #779,165 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #30 in Books > Health, Fitness & Dieting > Diseases & Physical Ailments > Lupus

More About the Author

The Singing Patient (Carla Ulbrich) is a touring comical singer-songwriter and a member of the Association for Applied and Therapeutic Humor. And now, she is also an author.

When the humorous songwriter fell ill in 2002, she used her wit and off-center perspective to cope with the many obstacles in her path. Carla suffered two strokes and kidney failure, along with accompanying anemia, hair loss, weight loss, congestive heart failure, pleurisy, fever, migraines, and fatigue.

Because of the strokes, she had to re-learn the guitar from scratch that year. She spent her many hours in doctors' waiting rooms writing humorous song lyrics about her malady and the absurdity of the health care system. Under the stress of constant "care," Carla finally snapped and became "The Singing Patient" with her third CD, "Sick Humor."

This collection features songs such as "What If Your Butt Was Gone," "Prednisone," "Sittin' in the Waiting Room," and "On the Commode Again."

On Feb. 1, 2011, Tell Me Press is releasing a book of Carla's humorous essays about her adventures as a patient (sometimes singing, sometimes not): "How Can You Not Laugh at a Time Like This?"

The South Carolina native's whimsical songs are heard on numerous radio stations, including Sirius XM radio, the syndicated shows "Bob and Sherrie in the Morning" "Housecalls radio show" and "The Dr. Demento Show." She has released 5 CDs on Romantic Devil Records.

Carla has taught guitar at colleges, music stores and summer camps, and is also the author of "Theory for the Young Musician: Notespeller."

visit her at www.thesingingpatient.com

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book! January 28, 2011

By S. OConnor

Format:Paperback

This little book is big on helpful advice and creative ideas. Carla Ulbrich shows us how we can all have an influence on our health and indeed, our lives. We can take charge of a lot, rather than just be reactive to what happens to us. This book is highly recommended. It focuses on the role of laughter and who can't use more laughter in their life? This book is recommended for everyone who is sick, and everyone who is well and wants to stay that way. The stories are short so can be read anytime you have a few minutes to spare.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent. February 1, 2011

By Nonfiction fan

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I've bought her CD "Sick Humor" for all my friends who have dealt with major illnesses. This book is even better. I understand better what to say and not to say to friends dealing with major illnesses, and it's also a great insight into the medical world from a patient's point of view.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Sense of Self February 1, 2011

By Lee A. Jacobus

Format:Paperback

This is a remarkable book in part because it is written with such verve and reveals a personality that is not going to easily yield to negative news. I think it goes way beyond just having a good sense of humor -- although that helps -- but it points to a determination that makes us aware that we too need to dig in when we feel that we are likely to get bad news from the doctor. Carla Ulbrich is a model of what one ought to do in the face of bad news: fight, explore, be willing to experiment, and don't give up on one's self. I found this an inspiring book.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars "Breathtakingly levelheaded" January 31, 2011

By T. Leathrum

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

First, by way of full disclosure, I need to say: I know the author of this book. More precisely, I knew her in high school, but lost touch with her after graduation. We reconnected on Facebook a year or so ago, which is how I found out about this book. With this context, then, let me ask: have you ever had the experience of meeting up with an old friend, perhaps over lunch, and as you sit and eat and chat, you find yourself laughing so hard you cry? For me, that was the experience of reading this book. It pains me to read about what my friend went through in the 25+ years since high school, but I am also delighted to see that she has kept her sense of humor and appreciation of absurdity. The book is not a narrative of Carla's illnesses, but rather a series of essays about various coping mechanisms she has developed over 20 years of dealing with autoimmune disease. I found myself reading many passages out loud to my wife (who did a great spit-take when I read her the part about the coffee enemas). Stepping back for a moment, I must say that I am more skeptical about "alternative" treatments (acupuncture, qigong, coffee enemas...) than Carla is. She does not proselytize about such things, though, which I find refreshing. Rather, she just writes about what works for her. She happily acknowledges the placebo effect. Borrowing a turn of phrase from J.D. Salinger, I find Carla's approach to her illness "breathtakingly levelheaded." This is a light read in spite of its subject matter, and I would recommend it to anyone who is having difficulty coping with prolonged health problems. The particular treatment and lifestyle recommendations may not apply in all cases, but Carla's positive attitude is (in a good way) contagious....

A quick note about the Kindle formatting: There is nothing particularly nonstandard about the text formatting in most of this book, so the Kindle handles it well. In the passages with song lyrics (Kindles are well-known for screwing up poetry), the lines are double-spaced, which makes the line breaks work out reasonably well even at large typeface sizes. Read more ›

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Lemonade makers truly control their own lives!! January 11, 2011

By S. Lacroix

Format:Paperback

If that headline doesn't peak your interest, hopefully this review of the book will. Here is a matter-of-fact, common sense opus that truly proves (in the author's words) that an illness is what you "have" and is not what you "are"!! Carla Ulbrich is a wonderfully talented songstress (sorry about the word stress - read the book to find many suggested remedies for that) and folk comedienne who has overcome several setbacks that life has tossed in her path and through her experience has captured the true essence and meaning of the word perseverance. She has proven that anything in life, including illness, can be overcome by education (do your own and don't rely wholly on so-called "experts"), steadfastness of will (to give in is not productive as it doesn't change your present situation), positive thoughts (your own and from others), accepting help (no, we don't have to be everything to everyone and we have to know when to quit) and the willingness of the person to truly listen to the lessons that their life is teaching them (don't always focus on the negative and slide into a "poor me" lifestyle). As "The Singing Patient", Carla has flown into the face of adversity by channeling her personal health issues into a humorous and thought-provoking look at how we can either become our own worst enemy or best friend. She describes the importance of food choices as a dual-edged component of life that can either contribute to our illness or to our wellness - are you a "Crapatarian"? Do you consume too many "excitotoxins"? Are you taking enough "Vitamin F"?... The bottom line is that Carla has finally put on paper what perhaps too many people are afraid to think about or to do something about and that is that despite unfortunate and sometimes life-altering events - life may not be fair, but it's ours and WE are in control of our lives!! To focus on making ourselves whole and to understand that "whole" means mind, body and soul, we have to find the silver lining and learn to make the proverbial lemonade. If you want a great supplement to this book, Carla's CD "Sick Humor" contains many of the songs referenced in the book and even with the frankness of some of the issues within those songs, they are truly funny and will make you laugh (unless, of course, you have no sense of humor whatsoever in which case you need to go back and read the book again)!! Thank you Carla for a wonderfully enjoyable and thought-provoking read!!! Read more ›

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars funny, sweet, thoughtful May 18, 2011

By Robin Greenstein

Format:Paperback

Carla has written a book filled with humor and empathy for people with chronic illness. Herself a chronic patient with lupus, as a humorist songwriter, she has unique perspective on being to express frustrations in life with humor and grace.

I was particularly delighted to read that she has made use of a lay-therapy called "co-counselling", which I first experienced back in the U.K. when I was a student there. It's great to know that people are still practicing this easy yet powerful form of expressing feelings in a structured way with friends and colleagues. I would have liked to read more about her experiences with it.

While she talks some about her own travails, she doesn't get into heavy details about her specific ailments and therapies. Rather she tries to look at the experience of dealing with an illness from a overall perspective: how to communicate well with Doctors, learning to trust your own instincts, how to make small changes towards wellness, etc.

The book is an easy read and would make a terrific gift for a loved one or colleague going thru some medical challenges.