"Laugh Box" Podcast from AATH: Hope and Humor: Dr. Brad Miller's Approach to Cancer

Cancer got you down Pretty grim, huh?

How about a show that turns the grim into a grin?

Way to go.

You made it here to the Cancer and Comedy Podcast, the show to lift you up with hope and humor that heals.

Hey there, lifter uppers.

Dr.

Brad Miller here from the Cancer and Comedy Podcast.

This indeed is the podcast we like to offer to cancer impacted people.

A means a ways to cope with hope, to turn the grim of a cancer prognosis into the grin of a fulfilled life.

On our last episode, episode 61 of Cancer and Comedy, you heard from a great guest that we had, Katie B.

Who has a whole process of being a joy advocate and she was such a great guest and I hope that you'll tune into that podcast.

Episode number 61.

KDB also is a part of an organization called the AATH, which is the association of Applied and Therapeutic Humor, which is a lot of what we do here in cancer and comedy humor as therapy.

And their website is a T H.

And she and her co host, Jim.

Wow, Jim Bob Williams, have a wonderful podcast of their own called the Laugh Box Podcast, which is the official podcast of a T H.

And I was privileged to be a guest on their podcast here recently.

And so here on Today's episode, episode 62 of Cancer Company, I just want to play you the episode that we had on the AATH podcast, which you can find@aath.org and hope that you'll check it out and enjoy that and take it to heart.

You get to hear a little bit in depth of my story and some things going on from from me and why we do here the cancer Comedy Podcast.

So here for you, this episode here of the Laugh Box podcast where I, Dr.

Brad Bellevue, is privileged to be a guest with the host, Katie B.

And Jim Bob Williams.

Enjoy.

You have arrived at Laughbox, the podcast for the association of Applied and Therapeutic Humor.

We are so excited you're here.

Welcome to Laughbox, the official podcast of the association for Applied and Therapeutic Humor.

I'm Jim Bob Williams.

And I'm Katie B.

And our special guest today is Dr.

Brad Miller.

And Brad's going to be talking about comedy and cancer.

Those are two words that you generally don't see in the same sentence.

That is true.

And first of all, hey, what a thrill and honor to be on Laugh Box with the famous Jim Bob and kdb.

I'm stunned and amazed.

Thank you for having me very much.

Super honored to have you here with us too.

So yay for everybody.

Awesome.

Awesome.

All right, so our general outline is something like past, present and future.

So tell your journey in therapeutic humor.

So far, my journey in therapeutic humor goes back in one sense a long way.

It's a long story with a amplified, shorter version.

I have always been, I'm a retired pastor, was in ministry for 43 years.

And throughout my whole history as a pastor, I just always like to employ humor in my messages and in my interactions with people.

I was known as the dumb dad, joke guy and that kind of thing, and would usually kind of frame my sermons and things like that with a joke at the beginning or the end or both and send humor stories out of my life.

And so I found that would be an effective form of communication, not only in that, but also when I would interact with people with, in the hospital and different situations, even in funerals and things of this nature.

I just found that the people I was around, Katie and Jim Bob in my ministry and in my life.

And when, when I took the attitude that the Bible says a cheerful heart is good medicine.

And when I came with that approach and listened to the humor in their lives, even in bad times, things were better, things were lifted up a little bit.

And because we live in such a depressing, messed up world, in many ways, when I saw that happening, that's what I clung to.

And so when I did various things in ministry, I would do some.

I was a church planner for a while.

So we had drama and we'd often infuse humor in the drama.

We'd create videos and this type of things.

We often would have kind of a humorous slant on those things, but mainly in this personal interaction with people, hospital settings, funerals, things like this.

And people were able to tell a funny story or tell a story that brought a smile to the face.

Wasn't always a hot story.

There's a story about that.

So that's a long story that goes back my entire life really, because I'm a preacher's kid and my dad had that attitude as well.

But so, but a couple years ago, my story took a bit of a turn when I was getting ready to retire in the summer of 2022 and my wife and I were looking forward to me retiring and moving on to travels and other things.

We wanted to do grandkids and all that good stuff you do in retirement.

And then literally a month after I did retire, I got flagged for cancer.

Turned out to be a rather aggressive form of prostate cancer.

And that meant all the rigmarole of testing and so on by my, my and eventually surgery.

But my first reaction was to laugh, to keep from crying because it was so daggone devastating to me.

Even though I'd gone through all this training, all this stuff and all these experiences with other people, including people my own family, my own dad died of cancer, things of that nature, when it hit me hard.

And so I went and I just had a laugh and chuckle.

I had to hand the phone off to my wife and for some tears and that kind of stuff.

But I saw that dichotomy between grief and the grief and the anger and all that kind of stuff and kind of the nervous laughter and that kind of thing which happened.

And I immediately went off into.

Did my.

Went into a funk.

I was, I called it, I called my queen of denial stage because I was like Cleopatra that way and just.

But I went out there and I finally decided, okay, I'm not the type of person that just.

I can have my get into a funk moments, have my depressed moments, my grief moments, my shock moments, but I don't want to stay there.

That's not my style.

That's not what I'm about.

That's not what I taught my ministry all those years and not what I wanted to be here now and certainly not want the life I wanted to live with my, my wife and my three adult children and my two granddaughters.

Didn't want to have that there.

So I just said, okay, what are you going to do about this, Brad?

So I said okay, I did an evaluation of my resources is what I teach now.

Okay, let's assess where you're at.

You go through the shock situation, you go through that, then what are you going to do?

Assess what your assets, what do you got going for you?

So I had my 43 years ministry experience and I had also I've worked, my doctoral degree is in transformational leadership, transforming organization, churches and other organizations.

And I said okay, what can I do to apply my doctoral studies and all this work I've done in transforming lives and organizations.

How can I transform my own life and be helpful to others?

And then so what else I like?

I said I like comedy stuff.

I like to laugh.

I like not only tell dumb dad jokes myself, but I like comedy shows.

I was a little bit over the years influenced by late night comedians, David Letterman, big fan of him, that kind of stuff, wry humor, that kind of thing.

And then some of the things that were particularly emphasis on people with disease and other things like that years ago they had the comic Relief which had to do with hunger and so on and then other things of that nature.

Okay, Comedy can be leveraged then towards doing some good here and taking action, which is my bias.

If you're going to get out of your funk, you just can't stay stuck there.

You got to take some action.

And that led me eventually to get really involved, getting more.

And I've always been involved somewhat in the research of the therapeutic humor.

Years ago I read Cousin's book about the anatomy of an illness.

Elton True Blood is a guy who you may or may not be familiar with, but I got to meet him.

He has a book that came up many years ago, 50 years ago, about the humor of Christ.

And I got, I got to meet him towards the end of his life.

And so that kind of aspect I got started reading a little bit.

But it basically I decided, okay, what else do I like to do?

I've been in podcasting for about 12 years in radio.

Before that, okay, I've been doing a podcast, doing some other podcasting endeavors I've been doing, but maybe I could turn this around.

So that led me to create about a year or so ago, a little more than a year ago, the cancer and comedy podcast.

I have a co host, Deb Krier, and she and I got together.

She's a breast cancer survivor and I'm a prostate cancer survivor.

And we both like to have fun and we've come together and we've created this podcast.

We, we published episode 57 just today.

And we have a lot of fun with it when we.

Among the things that we do, Katie and Jim Bob is in.

We research and talk about some of these therapeutic issues.

We break them down ourselves because our own research, we also bring in guests, we have to, to speak to them as well.

And these include guests who are on the more.

Little more on the serious side, but also actual comedian who have dealt with their own trials or tribulations, health wise and otherwise.

We talk to those people, have a lot of fun with it, and then we seek to help.

Our whole focus here is to help cancer impacted people to heal with hope and humor.

So that's what we're all about.

And we've contracted into turning the grim of cancer into grins.

We turn the grim to grins.

So that's a short story.

There's more to it there and there's some other twists and turns there, but that's got me involved in it and now I'm just.

Now I'm hooked on it.

So I've been doing that.

So does that help a little bit?

Give you a little framework?

Oh, that helps a lot.

And I think we've been living.

Yeah, I think we've been living in parallel universes.

Okay.

You're a prostrate survivor, too, is that right, Jim?

That's right.

Back in 2020, I was diagnosed with prostate cancer during Prostate Cancer Awareness Month.

Right.

What a way to be aware of it.

September.

Yeah.

That gets you.

It gets your attention, doesn't it?

It gets.

Certainly does.

I'll say that much.

It gets.

It says, okay, here we go.

Got to deal with this.

Yeah.

The first time I did it, I said, okay, how can I find the humor in this?

Because what's funny about cancer?

Nothing at all.

It's that grim.

It's the.

We call our podcast Cancer and Comedy because cancer is a metaphor not only for the disease of cancer, but bad stuff that happens.

But cancer is basically the multiplication of bad cells that happen in your body, bad things that can happen, whether it's other diseases or mental health or violence, any number of things, anything that can happen.

And then we use the comedy kinds of metaphor, not only for high belly laugh stuff, but having more of a.

An outlook of cheerfulness and approach to what can you do about something rather than be dissolved into the depression.

I think the.

The whole process of being diagnosed and then going through treatments and whatnot, that's where the.

You can find the humor.

That's where you reach out and connect with other people.

Yeah.

Turn that grim into grin.

That's what we like.

That's what we like to do here on our podcast and love what you do with yours and just similar focus of seeing the humor and things and leveraging that for healing.

Love that about what you do.

All right, so how did you find about aath?

I'm a kind of a researcher type guy.

Once I get involved with something and so I, I just started digging around.

I also been very involved with the podcasting world, so I go to these.

I've been fortunate enough to get involved with some of the bigger podcasting conferences I've spoke at.

I've spoke a couple times at one called podfest, one of the bigger conferences.

And then I sponsor my own podcast conference here locally.

I'm based in suburban Indianapolis.

I have my own podcast.

So I've got involved with that world and I heard about this.

I was.

I went on the comedy track in some of these conferences and then some are online.

Someone I mentioned at a T H.

So I looked you up and found you there.

You're almost two years ago now.

I found you folks about that, heard about you, and then what I heard and it was resonated with what my interests are and yeah.

So I like what you do.

I know you've got your podcast seems to be doing great and you two have a great rapport with one another with your guests.

Love it.

And I'm here to serve your audience best I can.

So can you tell us about some of the current projects you're in and some of the things you've got going on?

I know you've got the podcast.

Are you doing any local speaking?

Are you doing a standup tour, any fundraisers?

Yeah, I got a little bit.

Little bit of all that going on.

I have a little talk that I give and I'm going to be speaking at a local health care facility pretty soon about the part about cheerful heart is good medicine, that type of thing.

But I really.

So I'm been working with developing my own kind of TED Talk sort of thing that I'm working on as these various things.

I did a presentation about the launching of the podcast here a while back.

Right.

Indicated how we were able to get on local TV and get our message out and how we're able to that that local TV went into a nationwide network of independent television stations from Sacramento, California, Tampa, Florida.

We were across the board there.

So we shared a message because we did a.

We sponsored a local comedy show as a part of the launch of our podcast last year about this time.

And so we brought in Rick Roberts, a comedian, a touring comedian who has also a prostate cancer survivor.

And he has a great show.

He's.

He does a.

He was in some of these movies about Andy Griffiths show Mayberry reread Don.

He does a Don Knotts, a Barney Fife character which is really co killer.

But he has a great show.

And so we brought him in to do a local comedy show fundraiser which we then put out there into the world otherwise as well.

So we raised some money for cancer.

We got great local awareness for this which got us some impact us got me some more opportunities including what we're doing right here to share what I'm working on.

And then he's.

We're going to bring him back in January and we're going to have another cancer fundraiser there with that.

It's also led me then to have insight inroads into the local community because I'm involved with podcasting networks and television networks here locally.

But this has also got me connected with one of our major research hospitals here, which may lead me to doing some training and so on with their staff and possibly some interaction with other people.

Maybe patients and that type of thing.

It's one of our big teaching university hospitals here, which has given me that at least that opportunity.

We're having these conversations.

You guys probably appreciate that these conversations are a little bit.

When you deal with some of the medical folks, they're a little bit dicey in the sense that they don't quite get it.

Not everybody quite gets it.

So we're having those conversations, but we're where our foot is in the door in those places.

And our deaf foot is definitely a door with healthcare facilities because they're looking for programming for people come in and help brighten the day of retired folks.

Basically that's what I do.

But so that helps a little bit.

I'm looking forward to leaning into that.

I'm developing this TED style talk that I'm looking to do.

So I'm working with kind of a coach to do a TED talk here about this and the talk that I'm working on.

And so that they.

The.

It's really leaning into my own experience about my prostrate cancer.

And it's.

Try to.

I'm trying to be sensitive about it, but also to be pertinent and direct about it.

I call.

My working title is Impotence, Incontinence and Insolence.

The Fun and Facts About Coping With Prostate Cancer With Hope and Humor.

Because the three eyes, I love it.

Yeah, I just found that when I had prostate cancer.

Okay, what happens to you then?

And it's a little bit sensitive, but hey, I'm going to go there with you.

We can go there here with it, here.

But it's just that what, what happens then?

This is a cancer journey, I think for everybody in one degree.

But I'm just focused on my own experience.

You go through the insane period.

What in the heck is happening to me here?

You, it's dizzy.

It just throws you off.

It just puts you, it knocks you on your heels.

And I call that the insane part of things.

You're just, you're nuts.

You can't focus on anything.

And that's when you gotta try to cope.

And then the next part of this is what I.

The incontinence part is when you literally in prostate cancer, they say, hey, in my case it was a very aggressive form of cancer.

And the doc said, hey, you don't do something about this, you're probably not going to.

You're going to be very sick in a year or two and you're not going to be here in three or four years.

And God, okay, get your Attention, you're going to be.

If you don't do something about this, you're going to be dead in three years.

And then also here, oh, by the way, you're going to be incontinent, which has no control over your bladder and other things.

So that's a lack of control, which I don't like.

And I don't think many people like being out of control.

So that's.

And then the impetus part is, oh, by the way, not only are you going to die in a couple years and only going to lose control of your bladder, your sex life is going to be completely messed up.

So that doesn't make me happy either.

I don't think it makes a whole lot of people very happy.

It's going to be.

It's going to mess.

And that's a matter of power.

Impotence means potent.

Yeah.

So just that takes away your power.

So what does cancer then take away?

Or what is the bad things take away?

It drives you insane.

It takes away your control.

It takes away your power.

And then the last I of a little deal there is it makes you insulin, it makes you mad, makes you kind of ticked off because that's the self, that's the selfish part.

And what I was turning into Katie and Jim Bob, I wasn't a very good husband, I wasn't very good dad, wasn't a very good friend and all that stuff.

I was just upset about things.

And so I work on this talk here.

Here's these things you got and what do you do about it?

And I have a whole process then and I have a gift for your audience too that will give them a little bit taste of this that I call the AX Plan Acts is how do you deal with this?

But how do you take control?

And they.

I'll just break it down for you briefly here and then we can talk about more if you want to.

And the Axe plan, which is what I teach, I've taught some form of this through my whole ministry.

The A is to take action and that's dealing with the crisis at hand.

That's crisis management at hand.

And doing something about it rather than just letting the cancer or whatever it is take over, which you can do.

And a lot of people do that.

And part of what the.

And really the tendency is to say the heck with it and give up.

And so that's the tendency and.

But the action place is to what are you going to take action to do about it?

And that goes to the medical stuff.

That goes your mental health, it Goes, what do you need to do?

Crisis management.

The C in the word acts is to connect with something greater than self.

In my case, I like to take that in a spiritual realm, connect with a higher power.

But it can be connect with friends or family and emotional state, connecting with something beyond self, not seeing yourself in that selfish mode.

And to go to that place where that and that can deal, I believe when you get that.

But the action piece is the crisis management of that insane part.

And then the connect part is dealing with that discomfort.

Because if you go to a place of some comfort spiritually people otherwise it can give you some comfort to deal with the what is incontinence is uncomfortable, it's just not comfortable.

So that gives you some comfort there.

And then the T and the word acts is to think strategically.

That's your plan.

How are you going to apply all this kind of stuff?

How are you going to be your day to day kind of thing that you're going to do?

And that, that has to do with impotence.

That's a response to the impotence, which is taking control, which you can control, control and then apply that accordingly, whatever that means.

It may mean you change your health care habits, it may mean that you spend more time journaling or something like this, whatever it is.

But it means thinking strategically and applying.

That's your daily plan, that's your daily habits and things of that nature, how you live your life.

And then so that's taking control of the taking power back where you had that.

And then the last part, I believe is to deal with the selfishness and the meanness of the insolence is to have a something to create.

This is where you give back something else.

This is where you give back.

And that's the S.

The other word acts is to serve others and serve others with love.

That's the emotional aspect of this.

And so I've got my own plan of how I do that.

But I also like to teach others how to do that.

So in my case, my action was to.

Was to get off my rear end and to take action to create a podcast.

The C was I get a little deeper in my spiritual life.

I got involved with a church and I got some connections there, some things there spiritually.

I got a little more involved with journaling and things of that nature.

The T is I began to process here, which is writing out what I'm talking to you about now.

My own process of here breaking it down, writing it out.

And the S is to serve others with love, which is where I actually then produce the podcast and give it to others and teach this process, which is a gift I'm going to give to your audience here today, is this whole process here.

And so that's what I do.

I now teach this stuff and I try to help people to heal with hope and humor.

And my co host, Deb, and I do that.

And we've created a community on our Facebook page and so on and other things atcancer and comedy.com to help that.

And the idea is to bring people together who have this same mindset that a guy.

I'm not done yet.

Cancer, whatever it is not going to beat me down and not done yet.

And here's the results of it.

I want to tell you how it manifests itself and the results.

Because what I then created and the goal for people that I shoot for with them is to create a cancer coping credo, which is an actual statement that I read on a daily basis for myself.

And then I help people to create their own credo, the kind of their statement of faith or statement that cancer is not going to beat them and that kind of thing.

And so that's what I did for myself.

And it's a practical.

I like to think in practical terms.

And will you allow me to read my own credo?

Can I do that?

Yes.

So this is what I created for myself, and this is what I help people create through that Axe process and the Acts process.

And just I wrote this out about a year ago.

I keep it posted right here in my office.

So I'm in my home office every day.

I see it every day.

I read it every day.

And just simply this.

I, Brad Miller, will not let cancer define me.

I will leverage cancer to refine my life to the better in my relationships and to drive me forward in my remaining days to fulfill the mission of sharing a message of healing through hope and humor and teaching the biblical message that a cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

So that's.

And that's a direct quote from Proverbs 20, Proverbs 17.

But that's what I do, and that's what I try to teach people to do.

Now, I've talked a lot here, and I apologize.

But you know one thing that came to me when you're talking, you talk about the insanity, incontinence, impotence, and insolence.

Like the song goes, if you're happy and you know it, then you haven't been diagnosed with prostate cancer.

I love it.

Yeah.

That is A true statement, my friend.

And just.

And you hear horror stories, you talk to people and you go to Dr.

Google.

Dangerous thing to do.

And Ed as Bob particularly I know you do too Katie Prostate cancer particular impacts I don't know the exact statistic but it's the majority of men particularly I'm over 60.

Particularly over 60.

The majority.

It impacts us and it's also I believe and see what you think Jim Bob particular an underserved area and that even though it's prevalent, there's not a lot of people who are responding to it in terms of what are the act.

What are the actual kind of psychosocial, sexual and marital family dynamics.

All kinds of stuff that go on here.

Not just on the physical ramifications.

All the other stuff too.

And I want to dive in a little deeper in that kind of stuff.

Try to be helpful.

Yeah, I found to be that to be the case.

I don't know whether it's because it's involving your private parts or whatnot that people don't like to talk about it or whatnot, but they're there really was.

When I went to look for support, I really didn't see a lot out there.

There's a fair amount about the medical part of it and some of the details and all the stuff that you can do to respond to it.

But the mental, spiritual and the emotional side and the interpersonal side of it is underserved, I believe.

And so I believe that stuff like therapeutic humor can be approached to something that's a little bit sensitive.

A little bit.

Whatever you want to say crew, I don't want you to say it.

That's not exact word I want to use.

It's a little bit awkward for some folks to deal with.

Call it deep.

It's a little bit deep.

Yeah.

A little bit deep.

That's true.

And grief is deep.

And this is part of a grief thing.

And so I don't.

What do you think, Katie?

I've talked on it here.

Am I on target at all with what I'm talking about?

No, we like that you talk a lot.

That's good.

That's.

This show is about you today.

I will share that my uncle is retired now, but he was a urological oncologist famous with the University of Michigan.

Famous around the world for exactly what you guys are talking about.

And he wasn't interested in nutrition.

He wasn't interested in humor.

He.

He's still alive.

But like when I was trying to approach with nutrition and lightheartedness, that wasn't exactly his way.

It was very serious.

Yeah.

And my mom's a dual breast cancer survivor and I will say that one of our favorite moments together was when she thought she had a spot on her liver.

And that was it.

And I brought up the idea of getting spiritual by experimenting with psilocybin mushrooms.

And we laughed like more than we had laughed in a very long time in the lobby of the hospital, just about becoming incontinent because we were laughing so hard.

And that actually is a memory that both of us go back to and think, oh, what a funny moment.

She really thought it was over if she had a spot on her liver.

She had a limited amount of time.

Luckily the, the scan was incorrect and so she's still with us.

And I want to say she struggles with the.

She's very religious, but she struggles with the humor side and the appreciation of still being alive side.

And that's.

I try and bring therapeutic humor to her discussions and family memories and things like that.

Lighten her up.

And so I love what you're talking about.

Hey, my friend, I just wanted to share with you that here on Cancer on Comedy we have a special gift for you that's going to help you if you're impacted by cancer in your life and you want to do something about it.

It's our free course.

We call it the HHH or Triple H course, which stands for Healing through Hope and Humor.

It helps you to develop your cancer coping credo, a statement that's going to help you get through that.

It's a free course, just takes you.

It's five short sessions.

It's all audio.

You can get that free course@cancerandcomedy.

But just even just to take it aside bar there, would you mention what you mentioned with your aunt, I believe it was who's or your mom.

And with the religious aspects and so on that this gets a little awkward and a little strange for some people and that kind of stuff.

But the Bible has a lot of stuff about humor in it.

It has triplet talks.

There are 30 plus passages that had one.

I mentioned here from Proverbs, just one of them.

That's just one aspect and certainly that whole severe aspect of some religious upbringing generally doesn't help.

It just doesn't help as much as you would.

So I try to come from a different angle on that and I believe it is valid.

It is valid to have joy.

It's joy is what we're talking about here is some people equate humor with haha belly laughs or Something that's inappropriate.

That's not what I'm talking about here.

You need to have appropriate humor.

It may be a little weird.

You're talking about incontinence and that kind of stuff.

It can be a little gross and weird.

Stuff can talk about whatever.

My.

In my case, I was.

My.

One of my granddaughters was like a year and a half or two years old.

We're going through this.

And my family, we talk about grandpa and the granddaughter having diaper issues together or whatever.

Oh, here we are, kiddo.

Just you and me.

We're going through it together.

But I bet Proverbs 17 is something I could send to my mom today.

Yes.

To remind her how important it is to stay cheerful.

Yeah.

And because she still struggles.

She's 85, and so life is a bit hard.

She's in a wheelchair and stuff, and she struggles.

It's a kind of a constant movement toward.

Hey, Mom.

Gratitude, humor.

Let's talk Proverbs and help her understand the value of trying herself to empower herself to be happier.

The other fact part of that proverb is I can't see it.

I want to take it.

Yeah, there it is.

Hold on, Mary Hart, Just.

Yeah, there you go.

That's on my business card.

There you go.

Oh, good for you.

But just to kind of just reflect with Katie for a second there.

The other part of that verse.

I hate to be preacher guy here for a minute, but I will.

The other part of that verse is it says that your heart is good medicine, but it also says that in the same verse that a crushed spirit dries up the bone.

Yeah.

And so that's the other side of it.

So many people as.

It doesn't have to be cancer be 85 to have a crushed spirit.

Right.

We know that depression and loneliness is a crushed spirit in our world right now, but am I saying that's a response to a crushed spirit?

Because a crushed spirit is so incredibly prevalent.

And as you do.

My mother's 85 as well, and she's having heart surgery next week.

So we're dealing some of this stuff right now.

Yeah, but you got to have both sides there.

Do you have both sides of it here?

But.

But you got to have both sides.

And we're dealing with a loneliness epidemic all over the country.

Oh, my gosh.

It is.

It is ridiculous.

And in a sense, the more we have connectivity electronically with any number of ways we're doing it.

You two are in different parts of the country.

I'm in Indianapolis and you're in West Virginia and California, and we're connected that way.

That's all cool.

That's great.

That's gravy.

But also we also know there's still isolation in people all over the place.

And we got to do something about that.

We got to be responsible.

And I think therapeutic humor is one way to do that.

But you also got to get out there interpersonally, not just electronically to do that.

And so that's one of the reasons I'm a big believer getting out there is every day and try to put maybe even a little.

Even maybe a little.

Put it on your happy face a little bit, even if you're not had a bad day.

But to try to brighten up somebody else's day, that's one of the reasons I.

One of the things I say almost every day when I go out, wherever I'm at I migrating to people, whether it's somebody serving me coffee or whatever is hey young man or hey young woman.

It could be.

They could be 4 years old or 94 years old.

But it seems most of the time it's brightens their day if you just say that young you're.

And more many times you probably.

No one's called me young in a long time.

And so that's one of the things I do.

Let me share briefly that I have a nonprofit.

I'm just going to do a quick plug.

Joy first foundation is all about that interpersonal connection.

So wherever I go, I have cards like this that say thanks for being on earth today.

And then I give a standing ovation to whatever stranger is in front of me and I tell them that they matter.

And I tell them, I say thanks for being on earth.

Thanks for all you do.

Thanks for all you've survived.

And I send them with a little 3D printed joy.

Oh, that's cool.

Quick and easy and makes a big difference.

People cry, they tell me their stories and everybody here at AATH knows all about it so we don't have to go on too much about it.

But I just wanted to plug that because that is exactly what you're talking about.

I just.

It's copacetic.

If that's a word.

I'm not sure it's a word or not, but I like to use it that we.

You think that way because one of the things I do is I carry these little cards around with me or joke cards and I don't know if you can see it or not.

There's just this.

I buy these called word teasers and anyhow and just they're just one liner, dad.

Joker has one that I just pulled out.

What do you call two birds stuck together?

Velcros.

So I just get.

I would just.

I just give that to.

If I'm running around, give it to people as a gift.

Yeah.

You want to joke when a joke today?

Sometimes I tell them a joke if it's appropriate like that.

But a lot of times I was given this.

They'll go, hey, thank you for.

For that kind of thing.

A tangible thing.

My.

My dad.

I learned that from my dad years ago.

He would carry around a pocket full of little tiny crosses.

They were back, and you just get everywhere.

I go give somebody a cross, and there's still people I meet today.

He's been dead for eight years.

Still people.

I met somebody the other day who was, hey, Mary, dad, gimme a cross.

20 years ago.

That's just my version of sort of something like that to brighten somebody's day.

Just like what you're doing, Katie, with Jared Joy.

How awesome is that?

Now I just want to know what Jim Bob's doing.

What are you doing, man?

Are you.

Are you.

What are you doing to help people out?

I write jokes.

That's what I do.

There you go, my man.

Very big of the dad joke.

You were there.

And I'm thinking we have to have some other conversations because I'm seeing that we have a number of Venn diagrams that are overlapping here.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

But let me start with one.

One is, which authors did you find to be most helpful?

I'll share mine first.

The first book I ever read about prostate cancer was by Jerry Parisio.

May rest in peace, Called I Barf, Therefore I am.

Jerry was a writer for the Tonight Show.

Wow.

Diagnosed with prostate cancer.

And he survived it for many years after that.

But it was his training as a comedy writer that helped him navigate the hard stuff.

Okay, I might have to get that one.

Yeah, it's excellent there.

There's also a gentleman named Harold Wolinsky.

He's with the aspi, which is a group trying to promote awareness of active surveillance as a means of managing the lower risk of prostate cancers.

He and I actually sponsored a contest last year for prostate related humor.

And I'm thinking it's time to reload that and perhaps take it to the next level next year.

Prostate related humor.

Wow.

I can see the website now.

Prostrelatedhumor.com.

that'd be great.

That's kind of.

Yes.

We don't.

It's not a glamorous disease.

Okay.

A lot.

And it seems like people like Joe Tory, manager of the Yankees.

Yeah.

Oh yeah, A lot of people.

When you see a celebrity who disappears for a couple of days for a procedure and comes back and doesn't say anything about it, it's probably prostate cancer.

They probably just had the radical.

Yeah, you hear about it once a month.

Different people handle it differently.

I know there's.

I'm an old rockable DJ from back in the days and so I.

There's been a couple of old rockers who.

I can't think of the names now who've passed away from prostate cancer because they didn't do anything about it.

That kind of stuff and that kind of thing.

Yeah, that's what I read and that kind of.

I, I haven't read those particular books about prostate cancer.

Be honest with my prostate cancer research has been mostly online.

That kind of stuff.

I've been reading other stuff.

I been reading the Klein's book and breaking that down and that's Healing Power.

Of Humor by Ellen Klein.

Available to find bookstores everywhere.

Okay.

Yeah, Alan Klein, Healing power humor, some of his other stuff.

I've read other things as well.

I went back and looked.

I believe in the sense of having a purpose in life.

So I reread Warren's book of the purpose Driven life, Things of that nature and I have several.

I got a whole big bunch of books back there and I got a whole bunch of books right behind me.

A Laughing Cure by a name by a good guy named King is one I've read recently which I found helpful.

He's a.

Yeah, I think I found.

A long lost brother here.

So for those that can't see, they're bragging about their libraries.

Read this one recently.

Brian King, who's a doctor and a standup comedian.

The Laughing Cure.

I've been reading that kind of stuff.

More of a therapeutic humor generally.

But thank you for pointing me towards some of the prostrate specific things.

I need to share reading lists here because I think we could come up with a.

An essential library.

Have you.

Okay.

Have you heard of the website prostatecancer.net.

Yes, and I've been there and looked at that.

And there's a couple other prostate related cancer sites as well.

I've looked at probably all the.

Not all of them, I'm sure, but a bunch of them.

And yeah, I'm familiar with that and I just think there's good stuff there, but there's room for, there's room for more growth, don't you think, Jim Bob?

Oh, definitely.

It's terrible.

There's so little promotion of prostate cancer awareness.

When they sent me the blue awareness band, I wasn't sure where to wear it, but yeah.

Oh.

Oh, wow.

Wow.

That.

That's about as risque as we get here.

On left boxer.

That's a little.

That's a low.

And that's as low as I'm going to go on that.

Oh my gosh.

I was the poster child for prostate cancer awareness last year.

Oh, let.

Okay.

Yeah.

When you're in your 60s, all you can do is get on the lawn and yell at the make a Wish kids.

It's terrifying.

There you go.

There you go.

I'm sorry, that's where my mind takes me in that.

But.

Oh, I.

I'm right there with you.

It just said I'm going a little further out than you.

I'm going to let it be.

But yeah, but it's.

I can lead you that way and you can go to.

Just to talk about comedians in this whole area.

For instance, I've had a few guests on my show who've deal with some pretty severe.

I had a comedian, a guy named Frank King on my show.

Who Comic?

Yeah, Suicide awareness.

He was a guest on my show and he was a writer for Jay Lenold tonight's show and he has a great take on suicide awareness.

So we deal with not only cancer and prostate cancer and all kinds of stuff like that.

I had another fellow on.

I had a woman just on my show, just the episode just went live today.

Older woman in her 60s or 70s.

I'm not sure how she is, I shouldn't say, but she dealt with breast cancer, a very aggressive form of breast cancer.

And she leveraged that to become a standup comic.

And now she even has her own in her own community at Tampa, Florida.

So I've been praying about her that regard.

She hosts shows and does open mic nights, particularly for these.

This type of things.

So she's done that.

I had another guy on our show, guy named Ed Raminsky who was at 26 years old was and was a performer in a Broadway style show, a traveling Broadway style show.

Ended up with terrible chronic illness.

He and his book is called Cancer and Musical Theater and Other Chronic Illnesses.

And he has some great stories to tell about musical theater.

He relates it to musical theater and then they've got those kind of things.

Then I have a local guy, the local.

One of the local news guys here whose daughter had, at age 3 or 4, had bad leukemia, real bad.

But he relates how his daughter saved him by his daughter laughing through the cancer that she had.

So he has that kind of story.

So we talk not only about the actual victims, but I call it cancer impacted people.

Because it's the whole family, it's the whole community, it's everybody and who's involved.

In fact, we've had several shows, Deb and I have Deb Kerr, my co host, about caregivers and how they are so much impacted by all this kind of thing.

And that's a whole nother track there.

But they're definitely underserved.

Absolutely.

I want to tell you, if I can, I want to make sure that your audience knows that I have a gift for them if they would like to take advantage of it.

Can I share that with you?

Now, I mentioned to you that I have my plan here that I put out called the act Plan, acts.

And I put that into form of a short audio course.

5 lessons, 10 minutes or so a piece.

And if I just make it available to anybody who wants to have it, they just Simply go to cancerandcomedy.com/free cancer comedy.com free and boom, they'll get it.

It's just five lessons.

It's basically more or less what I outlined earlier, the ACTS plan.

But it helps people get a handle on this.

And then they can always go deeper if they want to.

But I want to offer that as a gift to the laugh box audience for me, Dr.

Brad Miller, not a medical doctor, but I'm a doctor of ministry.

And I like to feel like I can offer something.

We like to call it healing with hope and humor.

That's what we like to say.

Where else.

Where can we find your podcast?

Where can we.

Your website is cancerincomedy.com the best.

The best thing to do is we're on all.

We're everywhere but the best, we're on all the channels, on audio and on YouTube.

Best thing to go is simply go to cancerandcomedy.com follow and you'll get everything there.

I try to make it as simple as possible.

So just two things.

Cancer and comedy.

Just like it sounds.com follow and you can follow all the links to every place you want to go.

And if you want the free course, it's just cancer and comedy.com free.

And I will say, if people then reach out through the website to me, I respond personally every single time.

And then we also are always looking for those little tidbits, those little.

Those little stories of lifting.

We like to call our fans, our followers and their growing number.

We call Them lifters, we call them, because it's short for lifter uppers.

Because that's the approach we want to take with the people who follow us.

Because so much is a downer, right?

So much of the world is a downer.

So we want to be the opposite of that.

We want to provide a means to be a lifter upper.

So we call them lifters.

So I have a voice.

We have a voice message section as well on our website.

People can leave us a voice message, you can leave us a written message on the tech, the comment section of the website.

We love to hear from you people.

And oh, by the way, we've got a couple of our guests on our podcast just that way.

So we're wide open to this.

We're building community that is so important to us.

And I just want to say this here.

I believe the solution to all this kind of stuff is, is I like to use alliterations.

You heard the thing earlier about the eyes and all that kind of stuff.

I also like to think about how people.

The healing part of this has to do with the four Cs.

That is you got to cope.

You got to cope with the thing at first and you got to connect with others.

We thought about that.

And to end up to have the connection part and then the conversion kind of thing, but then also the community.

That's what I mentioned to you here.

It's so important to have community.

That's what you guys are doing such a great job with Aath, building community not only through your podcast, with your website and through your conference and all the things you're working on.

Building community, that is the key.

The personal, the connection leads to community because the crisis.

And then you deal with this stuff.

But you connect with other people interpersonally or online and you build community, which is the caring where you share caring.

It might be sharing a note, it might be sharing a Facebook post, it might be a physical thing, it might be buying somebody coffee.

Whatever it is building community we're doing on our Facebook page and other places, but mainly on our website.

If they people want to connect with me personally, I will respond to you personally.

I promise that.

If you go to our website@cancerincomedy.com following, look me up, I'll be there.

All right.

Awesome.

I have a question for both of you.

Yes?

What kind of thing can you say?

I don't know how to put it differently to the people that are currently being watched because a lot of times the PSA goes up and guys are being Watched before any surgery happens or anything like that.

And that can be from my perspective, a woman maybe that could be a scary place for guys to be.

So what would you say?

Funny, not advice, whatever you want it to be.

Each of you, what would you say to the guys in waiting or observation?

I can address that because part of the I've been in active surveillance now used to be called watchful waiting.

But in active surveillance you develop a plan, you take regular blood tests, you look at other to try to decide when you're going to have surgery or radiation or chemo or whatnot.

Active surveillance.

It is strange, you're stalking yourself.

But I would say the thing to do that is to find a community, as Brad was saying that of guys who are going through it there.

So I can recommend some good websites, et cetera on that.

But they're all that.

You're not going through it alone.

And Jerry Parishio, who wrote this book I mentioned okay when I got my first elevated psa.

I know Jerry through a mutual friend, a comedian and a comedy writer, Neil Berliner in Florida, who simply said hey, you're worried about prostate cancer, you need to talk to to Jerry.

And she said, gave me a lot of excellent advice.

And one of the things mentioned was in having a second opinion because if your numbers go up, there's more than one reason why a number can go up.

It can be an infection that can, for example.

And I went one time when it went up, went on antibiotics, it went back down, we're fine there.

The other thing I would say to look at is it's important to know whether your at a high risk or low risk.

And that involves looking at your family history.

There are some biomarker genetic tests that can be done.

They're imperfect.

That's another tool you can use.

And of course they may just want the peace of mind and say let's remove it.

I'll manage the incontinence and the other issues with it, but I just don't want that weight on my shoulders.

And here's the one, here's the main thing.

Whatever you think decide is right for you, that's fine.

There's no one way I would just.

Affirm and basically second everything Jim Bob is saying and add my own twist to it or angle to it or add to it.

In this regard, I have always experienced and felt that waiting is one of the most hard, is one of the hardest things people do in any kind of a medical situation.

And believe me, I've spent a lot of time in Waiting rooms and hospitals and doctors office, not only for my own deal, but in my ministry I'm talking sometimes overnight and things like this.

Waiting is so hard.

And in my.

And if it's you who's doing the waiting, it's exacerbated in this particular case.

That is one of.

For my case, I think many people's cases that's one of three approaches to prostate cancer is basically the watch and the weight and the observing and the blood test and so on and so forth.

And the others are surgery and then radiation or chemo or something like that.

In my case, those were the three options that were before me.

And I had.

My doc said, you have a rather aggressive form here.

And whatever you.

If you decide to do the waiting thing, you just need to know that these are the ramifications of it.

So that's one aspect, that conversation with your doctor and if you need to get second opinion.

And I sought some of that kind of stuff out as well.

I've had a great deal of trust in my doc, but still it was hard and that kind of thing.

But the other things I would say is be very intentional about reaching out to people who can inform you good, bad or otherwise.

In my case, the doc is one of them.

I'm going to give you three groups of people.

The doc, the medical people is one of them.

The second was some friends of mine, Ibn a guy in my 60s, some of my friends, some of my buds been dealing with this.

So I said, man, I called up one, I called one of my buddies on January, on New Year's Day and said, we need to talk.

And we had a great conversation.

And I talked to two or three other people who dealt with this or they had relatives dealt with this.

Those were helpful.

They gave me different perspectives because basically almost everybody's dealing with those three choices and they're dealing with their own deal, just like you're saying Jim Bob.

And then the other one that I just need to share that is really important here is your significant other, your spouse.

You get with My wife and I, we had to go deep on this because she.

I was one who wanted to wait a long time.

I wanted to.

I wanted to wait it out because I was not honest or frank about it.

I.

The whole impotence thing was not a thrill.

Was not a thrill for me, okay?

It was not.

It was just not.

And we had some talks and we've had some deal with that in some other ways, resolution that in that regard.

But the whole thought of incontinent Impotence, the whole being without, without control and without power for the rest of my life.

I was just thinking, okay, then why do I really want to live?

It was a part of my thinking.

And she didn't like to hear that kind of stuff.

We had to go some kind of deep, a little bit dark places on that.

But that was the conversations.

Those conversations had to be had.

And ultimately, I'll say we made the decision as a surgery and it's a good thing.

And I feel pretty good.

And even some of the other issues and continents and epithets have been resolved.

But that is.

Was not a sure thing at all in the beginning of this whole deal.

But I would just say those things.

You gotta have those conversations with your doc, with your friends and with your significant other, and you get to go to those kind of uncomfortable places.

Yeah.

And I could see us doing this forever.

This, you guys are just.

This is an amazing conversation.

We have a limited amount of time.

Go ahead.

There are some other.

You'll be getting an email from me, Brent.

Don't worry, I'll try to.

Yeah, maybe we'll do a follow up at the.

In the beginning of the year.

Because this is so interesting, but I.

Do have a.

Yeah, I need to ask Brent the question.

Okay, lay it on me.

Lay down.

Is this a Thursday?

Is this the Thursday question?

This is the Thursday question.

Okay.

When somebody's going through cancer diagnosis or treatment or not, what do you want them to remember on Thursday?

In my case, it's what I shared earlier about me is good morning, Good morning, young man.

Good morning, young woman.

That kind of.

That word, young to me means vitality and it means live your life to the fullest, to the end.

And so that's what it means for me.

And so that's.

I'd like.

Yeah, that's what I do.

That's what I do.

I try to do that every day, but even on a Thursday.

And so that's what I try to do.

Let me lay on you my one little funny story that.

About my whole deal.

And then you can close it out, whatever you need to do here.

But this is.

I got several.

We didn't get to.

I told a couple dumb jokes here, but this is one of my.

One kind of really funny and certainly a prostate related funny story, but anyhow.

And people who have prostate surgery and other kinds of surgeries, you often go home with a catheter.

That's part of the fun.

You go home with the catheter.

And so I was in the hospital a couple days.

Went home with the catheter for 10 days and got home and just spent a lot of time in bed.

But I finally got out of bed and we had at that time a 17 year old dog and I went out in the hallway just to get out into the living room to watch TV and something.

My dog, who has no energy and is incontinent herself at 17 years old, comes down the hallway.

She's excited to see me.

She starts to jump on me but she gets tangled up on my catheter hose.

And then she gets and I yell at her because I'm not happy.

She starts down the hallway and so we took a little walk.

The most tender generals, the hoppiest walk I've had in a long time.

And oh boy.

And that was a sight to behold because you had an incontinent dog and a guy being taking a walk by his catheter hose and he's just getting out of bed after the first time.

So that's my one of the stories I tell and my little talk that I do.

She waited 17 years but she finally got to be the one on the right end.

Oh my goodness.

Oh she.

Yeah, it was the most tenderest walk I've ever taken.

Brad, this has been amazing.

Massive pleasure.

I think we have to bring you back at some point.

Thanks for your velvety voice and your lovely story and your activities and all that you do for the world.

Thank you.

My pleasure.

It's a pleasure to be on Laugh Box on the hey group.

Katie and Jim Bob, you are awesome.

Love to be with you and I'd love to serve your audience.

Remember cancer comedy.com free get connected with me.

I just had so much fun to be on the Laugh Box podcast with Jim Bob Williams and kdb.

I hope that you enjoyed it as well.

Got to hear a little more in depth about my story and why why we do what we do here at the Cancer and and comedy podcast.

You can check out that podcast laugh box@a.org and there's lots of other great resources there for people who are interested in therapeutic humor.

I also hope that you'll tune in to episode number 61 of the interview that I did with Katie B.

And hear her great story about being an advocate for for joy, traveling the country, spreading joy wherever she goes and look forward in a future podcast episode.

We're gonna have Jim Bob Williams on on here with with us on cancer and comedy.

I know that you're going to enjoy that while we're always here for you to be an advocate for you, the people who are impacted by cancer or some other bad circumstance in life that cancer could even be a metaphor for and we look to try to give you some tools and some helps to help you to get through that.

You can always go to our website cancerandcomedy.com follow and find out what myself and my co host Debrier and I are up to and find out how you can be part of the Cancer and Comedy community.

We look forward to always serving you as we look to transform the grim of cancer into the grin of a fulfill of a fulfilled life.

We'll see you next time here on Cancer and Comedy.

Until then, remember that a cheerful heart is good medicine.

Hey, thanks for joining us on the Cancer and Comedy podcast with Dr.

Brad Miller.

Make sure you visit our website cancerandcomedy.com where you can follow the show and get our newsletter.

Like what you hear?

Then tell a friend about Cancer and Comedy, the show that lifts your spirits with hope and humor that heals.

Until next time, keep turning the grim into a grid.

It.