http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/12/061212213922.htm
Science Daily reports what we've known all along: Laughter is contagious.
Researchers have pinpointed the pre-motor cortical region of the brain as the area that responds to laughter [and other things like smiles, cheers, and barfing.]
fMRIs showed greater responses to cheerful stuff like laughter and weaker responses to screaming and barfing. Science Daily wrote that this shows that laughter is more contagious than other "negative" stuff. [sapphoq's note: Thus, laughter is more contagious than barfing or chicken pox?]
sapphoq says: Some of us folks with traumatic brain injuries have a difficult time mirroring the expressions of those around us. Perhaps funny movies would be an easier way to re-learn some of this stuff, even if our sense of humor has been "altered" to something unrecognizable by the professionals.
Professionals often claim that we T.B.I-ers don't "have a sense of humor." That is more their failure to recognize rather than our lack. I spent many hysterical hours in the tbi chat room-- with folks who were like me-- trying to figure out the names of the seven dwarves. None of us did remember all of them and we frequently diverged into other names for the dwarves which were funnier than the originals.
At any rate, those hours in tbi chat were indeed healing for me and the beginning of being able to re-establish communication with others on a meaningful human level for me. We had our own version of the English language going on there called tbi-typese. [One friend remarked during that time that it was difficult for her to understand my e-mails. She didn't know tbi-typese. Re-learning how to spell came for me months later as I participated in various e-groups. She never did pick up on tbi-typese. That was her lack!]
So if any professional helper-person tells you that you, a survivor and thriver of traumatic brain injury, do not have a sense of humor, you have my permission to laugh at them however silently and to be assured that they are seriously wrong about that one.
sapphoq healing tbi
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