A man is telling the bartender about his nightmares and difficulty sleeping as he sips his beer. Another patron arrives and sits a few stools away, listening to the other guy talking about recurring nightmares from his childhood – monsters under his bed that keep him anxious, worried, and awake all
Posted by ReasonableGator@reddit | Jokes | View on Reddit | 38 comments
The second patron is a psychiatrist and feeling compelled to assist, offers the man with nightmares a session at a discount and gives him his card. The psychiatrist finishes his drink and leaves the bar.
A few weeks later the psychiatrist stops by the same bar and sees the same man, now much happier and laughing with the bartender as he sips his beer. The psychiatrist greets both then says to the other patron, “wow, you’ve had a nice turn-around. You never came to my office so how did you get over your nightmares about the monsters under your bed?”
Man, “oh, yeah, the bartender helped me.”
Psychiatrist, “interesting, I did not know he was trained as I am. How could he possibly help you in so short a time?”
Man, “it was easy, he told me to saw the legs off my bed.”
tom_swiss@reddit
Reminds me of this from Slate Star Codex:
Basically, this one obsessive compulsive woman would drive to work every morning and worry she had left the hair dryer on and it was going to burn down her house. So she’d drive back home to check that the hair dryer was off, then drive back to work, then worry that maybe she hadn’t really checked well enough, then drive back, and so on ten or twenty times a day.
It’s a pretty typical case of obsessive-compulsive disorder, but it was really interfering with her life. She worked some high-powered job – I think a lawyer – and she was constantly late to everything because of this driving back and forth, to the point where her career was in a downspin and she thought she would have to quit and go on disability. She wasn’t able to go out with friends, she wasn’t even able to go to restaurants because she would keep fretting she left the hair dryer on at home and have to rush back. She’d seen countless psychiatrists, psychologists, and counselors, she’d done all sorts of therapy, she’d taken every medication in the book, and none of them had helped.
So she came to my hospital and was seen by a colleague of mine, who told her “Hey, have you thought about just bringing the hair dryer with you?”
And it worked.
She would be driving to work in the morning, and she’d start worrying she’d left the hair dryer on and it was going to burn down her house, and so she’d look at the seat next to her, and there would be the hair dryer, right there. And she only had the one hair dryer, which was now accounted for. So she would let out a sigh of relief and keep driving to work.
lorarc@reddit
Weird, when I was told that story in University over 20 years ago it was an iron not a hairdryer.
tom_swiss@reddit
I'm inclined to believe Alexander is relating the case accurately as something that happened at his workplace. Maybe his colleague heard the iron story from an earllier case and applied the idea here; maybe your professor heard the hair dryer story and misremembered it. (But it's possible Alexander is presenting himself as closer to the story than he really was.)
lorarc@reddit
Probably the story originates from somewhere else. Rather than actual case it sounds like a motivational speaker story or one of those stories where a common man is smarter than all the educated people. Though I wouldn't be at all surprised if it's centuries old.
absolute_Friday@reddit
I'm afraid I may have left the alembic over the fire.
tom_swiss@reddit
The anecdote from Slate Star Codex (a very well-known blog) is about two different strategies from mental health professionals and is being related by a mental health professional, not "one of those stories where a common man is smarter than all the educated people" or a "motivational speaker story".
lorarc@reddit
Yeah, and I'm talking about where they might have taken it from. That story has been around the world at least a decade before that blog started.
rogue74656@reddit
So what are you supposed to do if it was the stove?
lodav22@reddit
Last year one of our cats managed to turn on the hob of our stove in the middle of the night. There had been a tea towel and a chopping board left on top and it was burning, luckily my middle son is a night owl and he had come downstairs for a drink at 3am and found the flames and smoke and ran upstairs to wake me. I quickly put it out but if we had all been asleep the whole kitchen could have gone up. After that we made sure to switch the main switch on the wall off when it’s not in use, but I developed a real fear it would happen again so I had to keep checking and double checking. Now I keep a pen by the stove and after I check it’s off before I leave the house, I make a mark on my hand so I know it’s definitely off.
lorarc@reddit
Sell it and get catering.
MarlenaEvans@reddit
There can be more than one story of this. There are plenty of people with OCD. I take pictures of my things that worry me but that doesn't do it for everyone.
Vondecoy@reddit
It was a hair straightening iron in the one I heard. Which may or may not be the iron you're meaning.
lorarc@reddit
No, it certainly was a clothes iron, though it might have been a bad translation from the straightening iron, probably that fits much better in a purse.
A-fungi@reddit
Reading these replies, as well as your long winded explanation, I’m wondering who really has OCD! Reading these replies…, reading these replies…. Oh NO, me too…
Grimol1@reddit
I was thinking an Internet connected camera, but that works too.
jreddit0000@reddit
This worked until someone (who didn’t know) gave her a (second) hair dryer for her birthday.
hearke@reddit
That was a delightful read, thank you for sharing it!
CageUK@reddit
My other half frets about the cooker... I'll have to tell her this little trick!
Cold_Table8497@reddit
I think you're gonna need a bigger truck.
ReasonableGator@reddit (OP)
Nice reply! She could be someone I dated in my past. My GF was obsessed with turning off the water to her clothes washer. We returned to check after paying bridge tolls a few times.
Flibbons@reddit
Reminds me of this one https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/s/DW47i5CRrS
Kind_Substance_2865@reddit
I’m picturing the psychiatrist as Frasier and the barman as Sam, and the bar being located in Boston.
Yes, I’m Gen X.
StnCldStvHwkng@reddit
Toothpaste factory finds out it’s accidentally sending out empty boxes of toothpaste. It’s starting to seriously affect their sales and reputation, so they hire an expensive engineering firm to find the problem. Engineers put a scale in the production line, and when the scale senses an empty box, the line is stopped and an alarm goes off so they can investigate. First day, the alarm goes off several times, but they don’t find anything conclusive. Second day, the alarm doesn’t go off at all. They ask the workers about it and are told “that alarm was annoying, so we set up a fan to push the empty boxes off the line.”
julet1815@reddit
My anxiety is not as bad as this, but I do worry when I’ve gone away that I left the oven on or my alarm clock set to go off. So I try to take a picture of those things before I leave so I can look at the picture and reassure myself. Sorry sorry I know it’s just a joke. Just wanted to say.
GetInMyMinivan@reddit
That’s a good idea
heavydutyrunnun@reddit
This need to go into the lifeprotips subreddit
Busy_Log_7128@reddit
I've driven around the block a few times just to make sure that I closed the garage
ReasonableGator@reddit (OP)
I have an app now. Didn't know I'd use it sp much until my new condo came with one.
Mikesaidit36@reddit
But now his bed needs a bed psychiatrist.
NoYouCantUseACheck@reddit
I picture the bed as having a fear that it would have its legs cut off and now it's going through that Metallica music video of One, that used the movie Johnny Got His Gun.
KaizenHour@reddit
I'm still trying to picture a bed reclining on a lounge
buttcrack_lint@reddit
Seems like there's a subspeciality for everything these days
ddekock61@reddit
b o o
villageboyz@reddit
My psychiatrist told me to sleep on the mat on the floor. I sold my bed.
ReasonablyConfused@reddit
As someone who has worked in the psych field:
When I was new I thought I was really clever for coming up with stuff like this, but I soon learned that anxiety always “finds a way” if it goes untreated.
The typical response from my patients would be, “great idea about the bed doc, but now they’re in my closet!”
InfusionOfYellow@reddit
I don't think I understand.
ReasonableGator@reddit (OP)
The psychiatrist is still available- if you would like to talk about things 🙂
BKehew@reddit
Nicely done