Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology

Humor, the capacity to express or perceive what's funny, is both a source of entertainment and a means of coping with difficult or awkward situations and stressful events. Although it provokes laughter, humor can be serious business. From its most lighthearted forms to its more absurd ones, humor can play an instrumental role in forming social bonds, releasing tension, or attracting a mate. Tune in and learn how powerful humor is and the healing it offers!

Gender is related to but distinctly different from sex; it is rooted in culture, not biology. The APA (2012) defines gender as the attitudes, feelings, and behaviors that a given culture associates with a person’s biological sex. Gender conformity occurs when people abide by culturally-derived gender roles. Resisting gender roles (i.e., gender nonconformity) can have significant social consequences—pro and con, depending on circumstances. Tune in and learn how to navigate these difficult decisions from being, parenting and supporting!

A divorcee is not a supernatural being who needs to be kept at bay and never considered for marriage. Nevertheless, there are a few problems in marrying a divorcee that needs to be taken into account before you plunge into a relationship. Tune in and learn how to navigate this complex union!

t has become increasingly clear to me that at the basis of most divorces are problems of sexual connection. Two people may think that they are fighting about the kids or the in-laws or about whether to renovate the kitchen, but underneath it all is that unspoken tension related to the pressure of establishing a satisfying sexual relationship for both parties. I will explore what happens when a woman’s body shuts down and is no longer receptive to her husband’s touch. I’m looking at women who have no history of sexual trauma. This “shut down” typically appears a few years into the relationship, often after the kids are born. Whereas in the past, they used to have a fun, relaxed time in bed, now it has become a psychological wrestling match, with her avoiding and him bewildered and unsure how to proceed. This leads to her closing up and him feeling rejected and angry. And because she doesn’t understand and can’t explain what’s happening, it’s impossible to talk about. Tune in and learn about this vast virus to marriage issues!

Some lucky people are born into families they adore spending time with—their loving mutual bonds make holidays and multi-generational vacations a drama-free joy. But for others, simply seeing an incoming call from a parent triggers an anxiety that dates back to childhood, and they leave family gatherings feeling hurt, angry, or exhausted. Toxic family dynamics can have far-reaching impact on our lives as adults. Tune in and learn how these toxic people can be overcome!

It’s normal for us to need time to ruminate and go over a romantic break-up in minute detail when we feel like we were the one who was dumped. Break-ups can definitely qualify as traumatic events and telling and re-telling the break-up story is a relatively normal reaction if it was traumatic for you. However, if you’re telling the same story two or three months after the break-up to the same friends; feeling that you're more depressed than just sad; experiencing emotional pain that is keeping you from engaging in your normal routine, it’s likely going to qualify as “too long.”  Unfortunately, there’s not a magic number for how many weeks or months it takes to get over a bad break-up, but if you find your thoughts are getting in the way of you moving forward and your friends are tired of hearing you complain, then those are two signs it’s time to get yourself together and move forward. Tune in and learn how to overcome a broken heart!

For as long as America has been a country, the straight white American man has been king of the hill. But as society changes and culture evolves, the ground beneath that hill is growing shaky. Economically, physically and emotionally, many American men are fighting to maintain a foothold.What it means to be a man today is different than what it meant 20 years ago, says James O'Neil, PhD, a psychologist at the University of Connecticut who studies gender role conflict. There's a paradigm shift occurring in our country regarding what it means to be masculine, and many men have had difficulty adjusting to that transition. That shift might have been a factor in the 2016 presidential race. President Donald J. Trump's vow to make America great again seemed to resonate with the nation's male voters: Exit polls showed the widest gender gap among voters since exit polling began in the 1970s, with men favoring Trump over Hillary Clinton by 12 percentage points and women favoring Clinton over Trump by the same margin—for a total gender gap of 24 percentage points. Tune in and learn about what is dramatically happening to men!

Loneliness is often defined as the distressing feeling generated by a lack of meaningful, intimate, and reciprocal interactions. One might describe it as emotional isolation. Exacerbated by its gross under-recognition, loneliness is rapidly emerging as the great public health crisis of our time, especially after COVID. Academic research and an onslaught of headline news reveal that loneliness is to suicide, addiction, bullying, obesity, gastro-intestinal disease, metabolic syndrome, type II diabetes, cardiovascular disease, hematological conditions, and more, as poor hygiene is to infection. While loneliness is not the only cause of these and other consequences, it is a highly significant one. Loneliness can be, in a word, deadly. Just as the loss of millions of lives to infection in the 14th and 19th centuries required combating terrifyingly poor hygiene, today we must battle loneliness to prevent a public health catastrophe, both economically and personally. While many organizations throughout our country are deeply dedicated to preventing and battling the consequences of loneliness and supporting our communities. Tune in and learn the impact of loneliness!

There are two paths we can take in any given situation: one is the path of avoiding pain in the moment, and the other is the more difficult path of delaying pleasure for a bigger purpose. Our cultural norms encourage us to seek Band-Aid solutions and temporary comforts—basically, whatever it takes to ease our discomfort now. This is apparent in the prevalence of casinos, commercials for psychiatric medications, and get rich quick schemes in our culture. Some people don’t see the value in having patience during difficult times or working toward a goal; they want to lose the weight now and would rather buy the latest, greatest cell phone than save for retirement. We often make our life choices according to how we can avoid pain in the moment and, in doing so, fail to see that the path of delayed gratification is sometimes where the real solutions to our problems lie. Tune in and learn what causes this enormous emotional issue!

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) is more than simply feeling sad, experiencing grief, or being super drained of energy. Those feelings are totally valid, but like most feelings, they’ll eventually pass. MDD is an often-debilitating mental illness that presents as a cluster of depressive symptoms. For most people, clinical depression won’t go away on its own and you can’t “just snap out of it.” While melancholy and exhaustion are part of depression, there are other symptoms to look for, including losing interest in things you once enjoyed, trouble sleeping, sudden crying spells, withdrawing from others, hopelessness, thoughts of self-harm or suicide, and more. Depressive episodes vary in severity and duration, but they must last for two weeks or more to qualify for an MDD diagnosis. Many people with clinical depression do their best to conceal symptoms from the people around them. They may feel vulnerable and embarrassed for showing “weakness,” or worry that their friends and colleagues might judge them or just plain ghost them. Remember: MDD is not a negative attitude, a character flaw, or a sign of weakness. Tune in and learn how to recognize Major Depressive Disorder!