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Healing With Humor
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Dave Mowry Wednesday, July 15, 2026
davemowry.com
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On Ask Win today (Wednesday, July 15, 2026), Best-Selling Author, Win C welcomes Dave Mowry. Dave was a successful businessman until Dave lost it all due to his bipolar disorder. When Dave had his breakdown, Dave began his 14 lost years and dark days of being unable to work or interact socially. Dave slowly recovered with the help of finding the humor in his challenges. Today, Dave teach stand-up to others with mental health challenges and see their lives transform and Dave is the author of "OMG That's Me!" and "Healing with Humor", two award winning books. To learn more about Dave visit davemowry.com
Welcome And A Life Upended
SPEAKER_01Welcome to Ask Win, everyone. Today I have David Maui with me, and I am going, David, take it away.
SPEAKER_00Hi, Wynn. Hey, thanks for uh thanks for thanks for having me. I'm really um looking forward today. I really uh appreciate and respect what what you do and and how you do it. Um I live with bipolar disorder and severe anxiety and have my uh all my adult life. And in 1996, I had a well uh we had a good life, my wife and kids and I. We seemingly had it all, and then I had a psychotic break and we lost everything. We were homeless for 18 months. Um I had I I went into severe depression, I hospitalization, I couldn't interact socially for 14 years, and I couldn't work for 14 years, and so lost everything.
Stand-Up Comedy Reframes Dark Memories
SPEAKER_00And then um then I my wife found a a stand-up comedy class for people with a mental illness, and she took me to it, and I started looking for the humor in my experiences and my challenges, and uh it started to reframe how I thought about things, and it didn't cure my bipolar disorder, of course, but it changed how I thought about it, how I felt about it, and uh it changed everything.
SPEAKER_01Well, isn't that interesting? So, stand up comedy was a blessing in disguise.
SPEAKER_00It truly was, it truly was. Um just the fact of um looking for the humor in the darkness, you know, I I'd be before the comedy, I'd hear a song in the radio and it would trigger a thought or a bad experience or when I'd have a panic attack or had something bad happen and I'd go back and I'd relive that trauma and I'd I'd just relive it and it was awful. And but after uh doing the comedy, then I you know, when I had that heard that song and had that trigger, I thought, okay, where can I find the humor in this? And I didn't go back to that dark place. I didn't go back to reliving that trauma. And um it really made a difference in my life. And and today I teach standard comedy to other folks with mental illness, and I see the same transformation happening with them.
SPEAKER_01So give us a typical day in your life.
Writing Healing With Humor And Workbook
SPEAKER_00Typical day. Now, um since I've written my books, um uh my new book, Healing with Humor, uh, just came out, and it's about a story about six people whose lives have been changed by by uh taking a comedy class and learning comedy. And that just came out, so I'm I'm working on um getting the word out about that. I've also started writing a companion book, uh, a workbook uh called Reframe Your Brain on how to uh use humor to reframe your thinking. So as so um it's a workbook so people can go through the process themselves and hopefully hopefully reframe their thinking so they don't go back to those dark places in that trauma and um you know can get past some of that trauma and that darkness and and live a full life.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
What To Tell Someone Struggling
SPEAKER_01So what would you say to people that are experiencing bipolar and severe anxiety? Um what would you tell them to the person who's struggling right now listening to this?
SPEAKER_00Well, I think, you know, during my after my psychotic break and my hospitalizations and my my 14, I call it my dark days, my last year was after, you know, um during that time I thought there was no hope. Um I thought the lowest I was at was always how it was always going to be. And um I think, you know, I needed to hear from somebody else that had been there that, you know, don't get stuck. That's not how it's always gonna be. Uh, don't get stuck. There is there is hope. You do come out the other side. So no matter how dark uh it is right now and how hard it is right now, uh, you do come out the other side and and it does get better. We do heal.
SPEAKER_01Exactly. Exactly.
Medication Sleep And Acceptance Without Resignation
SPEAKER_01Now I have anxiety and depression. I was finally diagnosed with anxiety and depression, and I take medication for, and I, as you probably know, I have the most screwed-up money ever anyway. And it's the most I have the most screwed up community about my brain and the lemony, and it's the pump of simple palsy, from the fact that about simple palsy. Um simple palsy is you can have epilepsy, which I don't have a thing, but permit of simple palsy is you can get diagnosed with anxiety and depression because we're trapped in our own bodies, and I agree with you. There is hope. Medication can't fix it all. There is hope.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I um you know, and I I have I take my medication religiously. Um it's really helped me. The other thing that's been really important that's really important is my sleep. I'm very protective. If I don't get enough sleep, I I you know things get worse. My my my brain doesn't react well and things get worse.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, no.
SPEAKER_00But um, you know, I think, I think, you know, you're an example of, you know, what the things do get better. You know, you you could have got stuck. I say got stuck, you know. I I call it, you know, you could have resigned yourself to, okay, things are bad, they're always going to be bad, this is how it's always gonna be, and and kind of given up. And and I call it um acceptance without resignation. You know, we can accept our challenges and our hardships and things, but but but not resign ourselves to to that this is always how it's always gonna be. You know, we get stuck in our heads and we go round and round about how bad it is. And that's the thing about the depression, we get stuck in our heads, and with the anxiety is so overwhelming. My anxiety was so overwhelming, it was awful, maybe the worst part of it. But we get stuck in our heads and and to know that we can't come out the other side. Um you know, and to hear stories, it was important for me. I read I read a book uh called Darkness Visible, and it was about an author who was going to accept an award for his book, and he was in a deep dark depression at the time, and he described it and talked about it. And and before that, I'd been suffering in silence and feeling like I was all alone, you know, thinking that I was the only one. And I read that and I realized that I wasn't alone, that other people are going through it, and that was a huge, huge help for me.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And I kept saying, two people all the people and believe me. I swear I have depression and possibly anxiety. And it wasn't until I got the help and properly diagnosed that I learned that I do have anxiety and depression.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's so hard to get diagnosed correctly, especially I think with you know cerebral palsy, people are seeing other things and they're not.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, they are. Oh yeah, they are. They're saying other, they're saying other things. They're not just seeing the mental part of cerebral palsy, but yes, they are.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so it's hard to get diagnosed, but but just getting diagnosed and and realizing that it, you know, that that's what's happening with us. Um because I knew I was different and I used to hide in the shadows, you know, try to blend into the walls. Yeah. Um just getting diagnosed and knowing that there was there was there was a reasonable thing.
SPEAKER_01There was actually something wrong with you. It's a huge step slash a huge relief. Now you don't have to blend and blend a square pack into a round hole into a wall.
SPEAKER_00That's right. That's right. That's exactly right.
SPEAKER_01Because you're different, you accepted the difference, you made a challenge into a blessing with stand-up comedy.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's turned out that way, and you know, there was no clue that I was ever gonna do this or have any talent for it, or I mean, you know, it's kind of like I mean, it just came out of nowhere. But now being able to perform and um um, you know, tell my story. I say I tell my story one joke at a time. Um and it helps shatter stigma. People that live with a mental health challenge, they can hear it and and hear it from somebody who's who's got a mental health challenge and um finding some humor in it and it helps it helps everybody find a little humor in in their lives.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
Performing Comedy While Shattering Stigma
SPEAKER_01So tell me how people perceive you as a comedian with anxiety and bipolar. Do they um do they perceive you with good intentions, or sometimes the audience goes, I don't get it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, uh, I haven't had the I don't get it part. They've it's always gone well. I think, you know, I I preface things just by saying that, you know, I live with bipolar and and severe anxiety, and that I tell my story one joke at a time. And you know, I don't make fun of myself. I don't make I don't make I don't make fun of anybody. Um but I find humor, you know, I find the humor in it, and the audience is accepting of that, and um it it you know it always goes well. I mean, I tell I tell jokes about um just all sorts of different things. Um one of my jokes, can I tell you a joke?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, go ahead.
SPEAKER_00I was um um one of the jokes I tell, it's it's you know, being being mentally ill, I see I see discrimination where other people don't. Um I was walking down the sidewalk the other day and I saw a sign out front of a restaurant said happy hour. I think that's being discriminatory.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_00There should also be a crappy hour for depressed people.
SPEAKER_01Oh boy, I love it. I love it. I absolutely love it. That should also be a crappy hour. Depressed people know how about disabled happy hour. Let's be let's just be open and honest there. When I see happy hour, and I think, great, now I can't even open up the door to join the happy hour. I'm like exactly can we make can we use a crappy hour, but can we make the wall just a little more accepted to disabilities, please?
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah, exactly. You know, and when I was first diagnosed and I told people um a lot of people just disappeared from my life, you know.
SPEAKER_01I uh I bet.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and they didn't they just didn't know how to but but yeah, the world, you know, to be more accepting of people with disabilities to see us as human. You know, the thing with yeah, the thing with mental illness is usually you know you don't see it from the outside, you know. Nope. So the discrimination doesn't come until after we talk about it or somebody hears about it or finds out about it or whatever. But with the physical challenge, you know, um the the stigma and the discrimination comes, you know, it's just right up front.
SPEAKER_01Well, I I have both. And when I say I have a mental illness, people are like, What? You have a mental illness? I did a podcast once, and the podcaster said, and this is a 7 30 morning, how do you deal with your depression ending scientist? I said, Joe, you start off with that question, how do I deal with my depression-end anxiety? And he goes, Yeah, I said, geez, Joe, you did research, you found out about me. Most people start off with what is CP, and I'm like, good on you. And the episode is called, if you guys wanna look it up, it's called You You Don't Look Like You Have Depression. No, because I'm the happiest person on the planet. People like when I first told people, people like, you have what? You don't seem like you do. You have what? But then I explained, because I'm trapped in a body that doesn't work, that's why I have anxiety and depression. They're like, oh, I get it now.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's it's yeah, yeah. Yeah, two things two food people get it now. Yeah. Which uh which podcast was that was that you were on?
SPEAKER_01That was Joe Pike's podcast. I'll send it to you and you can listen to it.
SPEAKER_00Okay, great. Yeah, that'd be great. Thank you. Thank you. I'd like to listen to that.
SPEAKER_01Oh um, yeah, because it was really interesting that he started out with that at 7:30 in the morning. And I'm like, okay, kick it off with that. We'll yeah. Yeah, yeah. But yeah.
Books Audiobooks And Where To Find Dave
SPEAKER_01So where can people find you if they want to get a hold of you? And if they want to learn stand-up comedy from you, where can people get a hold of you? And especially where can people get a hold of your new book?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, um Dave Mawrie.com. And it has links to the book. I've got another book called OMG, that's me. Um, and uh that just tells my story about living with my mental health challenges and then also healing with humor. So Dave Mawrie.com and they can read more about me and uh learn about the books. And uh if if you know if their songs line, they can pick up a book, that'd be great.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Are they in audio?
SPEAKER_00Uh uh OMG That's me is an audiobook and Healing with Humor audiobook is gonna come out in two weeks. Well, so yes.
SPEAKER_01I'll I'll read both of them on way to healing with humor coming out. Because fun fact is about me, people. That's uh the only way win can read a book, win can't hold a book, I'm an audio learner, I'm an audio learner, I'm a yeah, podcast learner. Obviously, I am uh audiobook lover, so slow me audiobook. You make me happy as a glam.
SPEAKER_00What I will do is I'm gonna when the audiobook does come out, I'm gonna send you a promo code. So good. You can just put that in the audio promo code. Good. Uh and the audiobook is great because it's it's really, really, really good because we're able to the the six comics that are featured in the book, we were able to splice in their live show, them telling jokes from Swiss.
SPEAKER_01I can't wait. Yeah, I cannot wait to leave
Reviews Promo Code And Farewell
SPEAKER_01it. So and you guys go support David Matley because he's doing great work in the um bipolar community slash severe anxiety community. So please, please, please leave his book a review on Amazon and let's try and make it number one when the audio when healing with human comes out, please get it, because they both sound like amazing books.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much for that one. I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_01We'll have more information in the show notes about David, so you guys can email him and figure it out and yeah.
SPEAKER_00That's good. I appreciate that. The um the books essentially I wrote them so people realize they're not alone. Uh they can't come out the other side, and then with the comedy, you know, that we can reframe our beings and improve our lives. Uh and kind of the same message, just in a in a in a fun way. So yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, it sounds like you're doing the wonderful work. I will have more information in the show notes. You guys, thanks you guys. Bye you guys.
SPEAKER_00Bye bye.
