It’s just not funny anymore…

A couple weekends ago we got the opportunity to go and see one of our favorite comedians Ralphie May.  Everyone’s taste in humor is different but Tony and I think this guy is hysterical.  The first time we saw him was probably 6 or 7 years ago at a comedy club and it suffices to say we laughed until we cried…Everything that came out of the guy’s mouth was funny.

If you’ve never seen Ralphie he’s about 400 pounds (which is down considerably from when we first saw him perform at around 700 pounds) I didn’t bring my scale so I’m just guessing at his weight but you get the picture the guy is HUGE! 

If you can be happy and be over 600 pounds you have a really good sense of humor and this guy seemed genuinely happy.  He (like everyone else in the world) talked about wanting / “needing” to lose weight but he said it in the same vein most people would use, just a casual mention of “ha ha I should really drop some weight for my health…but hey no biggie…whenever I get around to it”. 

About the time we first saw him he was recently married to (oddly enough) a, very tiny, comedian.  They seemed happy and all was right in the world….

Fast forward to today and the reality of life has caught up to the comedian.  The hard unfortunate fact is you may be able to “laugh off” weighing nearly 700 pounds but your body can’t handle it and is breaking down.  We hadn’t kept track of the comedian but heard he would be in town and jumped at the chance to see him perform again.  We were caught up on his tale real quick because his show, this time, wasn’t so much a performance as it was a sad look into the reality of being that unhealthy.  Just weeks before he was given a 20% chance to live by his Doctor as he sat in the hospital with double pneumonia, hooked up to a breathing machine, with everything that could go wrong….going wrong.  He was literally told by the Doctor to put his things in order because he most likely would not be coming out of surgery the next morning.  The Doctor said this to a brand new father of two as if he had just told him to go lace up his shoes.

Well Ralphie made it…but at the moment his sense of humor seems to be hanging by a thread.  See the reality is “it’s just not funny anymore”.  The reality is, he’s very sick and it’s very sad but he has to keep making money and getting up on stage.  Making people laugh is how he makes his money so no matter how “un-funny” the whole situation is, he still has to get up there, every night, and do his best to make people laugh (which considering what he’s going through is absolutely unbelievable how funny he still manages to be).

We wish him a full recovery (the odds are not in his favor).  He has a compromised immune system and because he had gastric bypass, to help him lose weight, his immune system is further compromised because he can’t take in all of the nutrients he would need to get better.

The fact is, no matter how much we try and “laugh off” our bad habits it doesn’t take away the harm they’re doing to you.  Humor might make it more manageable, for the moment, but the reality of the situation is without your health you have nothing and humor may just be a way of easing your guilt about not having dealt with it.  As long as you can laugh your way to recovery, that’s wonderful, but if you’re making jokes in lieu of making yourself better…there will come a point when no one will be laughing anymore.

Ralphie,  if this (for some bizarre reason) ever finds its way into your hands…You and your family are in our prayers and if anyone can make it through this (still laughing)…it’s you!  Good luck man!