For as long as I can remember I’ve had the secret talent of being a great napper. In high school, I used to come home from school during my early release period, catch a quick nap, and then return to school completely refreshed for practice. In college, I think I napped nearly every day. Those college naps even prompted a roommate of mine to post “Heidelberg College Nap Rankings” as his AOL status, and I was, of course, ranked the #1 napper, just ahead of him. Even my days teaching at Delaware have included what I called “curriculum naps” during my prep period.
The funny thing about most, if not all, of those naps is that whenever I have wanted to nap, I have been able to, with very little struggle to sleep. People have told me how “lucky” I am to be able to nap, and have mentioned how they “would pay to be able to do that.” I will admit, the naps are great, but I must make a confession, I have been cheating this whole time. Let me explain…
A few months ago I made the decision that I was fed up with being tired all of the time. I go to bed about 9:00-9:30 every night, and get up between 5:30 and 6:00, there was no reason I should be tired all day. So, I went to visit the doctor. I told him my situation of being excessively tired despite my good nighttime sleep. He asked me a few questions, took some blood, and then recommended me for a “sleep study.” The next day he called me and told me my blood was fine so he wanted me to go through with the sleep study, and when the results were back, he would do further tests if needed.
I visited the sleep doctor about a week later, and I told him my story. He asked questions about my daily routine, my napping habits, my eating habits, and much more and ended at the conclusion that he thought I had Narcolepsy. He then said that they wanted to do an overnight sleep test on me to be sure, and that they would gather some more information before a final diagnosis.
My initial thoughts: Yeah so, listen buddy, I see your degree in sleep medicine there on the wall, and I see your fancy white doctor’s coat and all, but I’m not sure if you heard me correctly or not but I said that I was tired all of the time, NOT falling asleep mid-sentence and stuff like that. So, it’s a good thing for you that you are recommending this further study because you could not be further off with this diagnosis. Just wait until these results are back, what a joke. What a waste of time.
Fast forward to a few weeks later when I have my sleep test. I arrived about 9:30 at night. The nurse took me to my room, hooked me up to a bunch of sensors (picture message I sent to my wife and a few others from the clinic), gave me the remote to the TV, and then said “Ok, go ahead and go to sleep, we’ll be getting you up about 5:30.” Sure enough, she flipped the lights on at 5:30 and then told me she would bring me breakfast soon, and left me with only one direction “do not fall asleep.” It was MUCH more difficult than it sounds. I sat in a lazy boy, watched TV, messed around on the computer, ate breakfast, and then she came back in at 7:30 and uttered one of the top 5 sentences ever spoken to me...
“Ok Mr. Morrison do you think you could take a nap right now?”
I cannot remember if I even replied. I felt like a 5 year old kid that was just asked if they wanted to go to Disney. I climbed back into the bed and she hooked the sensors back up to the machine, turned out the lights and left the room. The lights flipped back on in 20 minutes, and she gave me the direction again “do not go back to sleep, I’ll be back in about an hour and a half for your next nap.” I was upset with the length of the nap, but realized it was a study, and went back to the lazy boy. This pattern continued for 5 total naps, and then they released me to go home. I’m not sure I could dream up a better day… Bob Evans breakfast and lunch, lazy boy, computer, TV, and 5 naps.
Fast forward again to March 30 for my results appointment with the doctor. (Before I get to the results, let me just say that I was terrified that I was going to go into this appointment and the doctor was going to just say, “well, Mr. Morrison, we have reviewed your results, and there isn’t anything wrong with you. We aren’t sure what is making you tired, but you’re just fine, and what you’re feeling is just the normal life of a working man.”) I was informed by the nurse that I was meeting with the “results specialist,” not the doctor I had last time. Good thing- he didn’t know what he was talking about! I was on the edge of my seat awaiting the results, like one of the houseguests on Big Brother about to be evicted, when Julie Chen comes on the screen to announce who stays and who goes. The doctor walked in, sat down, and opened the manila folder carrying my results.
Doctor: Scott, in your overnight sleep test we learned that the 8 hours of sleep you get is good quality sleep. Your levels are all normal, and there are really no red flags to report. You get plenty of oxygen, your sleep sequence is….
(I think I tuned her out for about the next 15 seconds because I got to thinking that for the rest of my life I’m going to have to go to bed at 9, get 8 quality hours of sleep, feel excessively tired all day long, and have to fight the urge to sleep constantly. I was disgusted.)
Doctor: But, your daytime sleep results are ALARMING!
(In my mind I did fist pump with more passion than any fist pump you’ve ever seen. It was euphoric.)
She continued: Scott we had you take 5 naps, each nap between 20 and 30 minutes. You fell asleep in each nap- that is definitely NOT NORMAL. (Please continue, this “alarming” and “not normal” stuff is great) For a normal person taking just one nap, it would take them, on average, upwards of 10 minutes to fall asleep. You fell asleep in an average of 3 minutes throughout the 5 naps; this is ALARMING. You also entered REM sleep, which is deep sleep in which you dream, during your 4th nap. This is also ALARMING, because it takes a normal person 90 or more minutes to enter deep sleep. So, looking at all of this information, it shows the characteristics of a person with Narcolepsy.
She could have told me that I had (insert whatever you want here) and I would have been ok, I was just so happy that it wasn’t just me imagining being tired for the past 10 years that I was totally fine with the Narcolepsy diagnosis. She then taught me about Narcolepsy…
Doc: Many people think that Narcolepsy is just when people fall asleep while in the action of doing something. That is Narcolepsy, but only a small percentage of narcoleptics are that severe. In the brain, there is a center called the Hypothalamus that is responsible for producing a chemical that promotes “wakefulness.” In people with Narcolepsy, this chemical is not produced correctly, therefore causing excessive sleepiness at all times. Narcoleptics are able to fall asleep very quickly, at almost any time, and are able to enter REM sleep quickly and relatively easy. You show all of these characteristics.
All I could think about was how much of a bozo I thought that first doctor was, and how uneducated I now feel for thinking that. But anyway, the visit ended with her prescribing me a drug that will help the hypothalamus produce the wakefulness chemical. She said that taking this pill should make me feel as good as new from here on out.
Now that I have put all of you non-narcoleptics to sleep with 1400 words of my life, I’ll sign off, and update you on my progress at a later date. Take care.
