Laugh Therapy?

Question

A friend told me he heard of a new clinic offering "Laughter Therapy" to benefit people with depression and to aid in healing of various diseases. He wants to try it and when he called they told him they use different techniques to produce the laughter, including tickling. Has anyone heard of this before? It sounds too weird to be true. Do you think they actually tickle people to make them feel better?

Answer 1

i've heard of the concept, but not the tickling aspect of it. Some people find tickling abusive, especially when it's not stopped the minute they ask. If someone tickled you passed the point of enjoyment, how good could that be for either of you?

Answer 2

Laughter Therapy sessions have taken place in large cities like New York. I have seen news stories on television confirming this. It consists of a group of people just gathering and under the instructor of a leader just start laughing. It is so infectious that it spreads throughout everyone who attends.

The medical proof is in that laughter does help with the production of endorphins and is good for your health.

Although I feel there would be potential benefits from tickle therapy as well, it would not succeed unless everyone was informed ahead of time that tickling would be the source of laughter. Then only those wanting to be tickled would attend. Even then I would suggest having a release form for the records showing their consent.

Answer 3

Rumor has it that Drew Barrymore sees a ticke therapist.

There is a little know alternative medicine growing called tickle therapy and it can be incorporated into laugh therapy.

When you are being tickled in a consensual setting, your brain will flood your body with endorphins which promote healing and reduce stress. This is factual.

Any type of positive laughter will produce these endorphins and tickling is one way to acheive it.

I would love to have a good female tickle therapist!

Answer 4

I have definitely read about laughter therapy, and seem to recall that any tickling involved was not anything threatening or invasive, and that it was used with patients who were receptive to the idea.

There certainly is a curious power in laughter. I've heard of groups or clubs that meet regularly just to laugh, and even once a laughing church, in which apparently the experience is a bit similar to when people start speaking in tongues.

Answer 5

Humor therapy is an effective therapy for a lot of illnesses. It is a complementary therapy, meaning that it is used along with other medicine or treatments. Laughing will release chemicals in the body that can blunt pain and increase emotion, which makes you feel better. Tickling may be a part of that therapy, depending on what the patient's illness is, along with spontaneous laughter, joking, and therapeutic interventions to change a person's responses to stress and traumatic stimuli.

Answer 6

When you laugh you sent out endorphines (hormones which makes you feel good) they strengthen the immune system and help the body to deal with stress or sickness. But laughing out of being tickled won't help much, too artificial, you have to feel good while laughing. Remember, in the Middle Ages tickling someone to death was used as a torture! Definitively not healthy ;)

Answer 7

Can't say that I have ever heard of it but as the old saying goes: "Laughter is the best medicine."

They could be on tho something. I know that when I am sad or depressed, my husband or children will try to make me laugh, (and usually succeed), that I do feel better psychologically.

It wouldn't hurt for him to give it a try. Go with him so you can see how this works and what goes on if you are skeptical. That's what friends are for.

Best wishes,
Elvn

Answer 8

The act of smiling (*whether you mean it or not*) releases endorphins in your brain, and makes you feel better. I have a friend and I who discussed this at work because she mentioned that she's so depressed at home, but at work she feels fine. So I let her know that it's because we aren't forced to smile at home like we are at work. So, that's why the phrase "fake it til you make it" works so well.