Saturday, August 21, 2010

We'll Sleep When We're Dead

This is long overdue. Yours truly was the subject of a sleep study a few months back. It was awesome, in terms of the fact that it involved not only retching, but crying.

So, I don't sleep. Seriously, I'm like a gazelle, half awake, waiting for the lions to eat me all night long. The entire night? AWAKE. But only half so, as it turns out.

Anyways, the sleep issue was getting progressivly worse, and nothing was fixing it. Melatonin? PFFFF. Tylenol PM? I MOCK YOU. Ambien? Try this: sleep for 30 minutes and then WIDE AWAKE AND READY TO KILL. Honestly, that drug is a crock.

So....the study. I was nervous (what, me, worked up? NEVER), so I went in advance and checked to make sure that I A: wasn't allergic to the adhesives and B: that they could move some of the leads so as not to trigger a migrain (I have pain points on my skull.)

So, my demands met, I show up at 9 as requested. To find that they weren't putting me to bed for two hours. You know what ratchets me up? WAITING. With some dudes I don't know. And no cat. Or any comforts at all.

I request a walk around the area for a bit, which they grudgingly permitted. Maybe they thought I'd run away? Who knows why this was such an issue, but it was. After about an hour, I returned, and awaited my fate.

Apparently no one had received the memo about moving the leads, so I had to tell them again and again. I need special tape and NO LEADS ON MAH FACE. I did agree to the one on my leg, because, you know, who cares if the skin comes off there anyhow? It's just a leg.

So, my surly helper attempted to put all the leads in. A challenge, considering I have the most unruly hair, and it had to be clean. She would part, it would fall over what she was working on. As time progressed, she was pressing into my head harder and harder with each lead, as they didn't want to stick to my scalp, either. At this point, I was starting to feel nauseous, and the lights were starting to star out-a sure sign a migraine was brewing. She strapped me into bed (Seriously, there's this stupid belt thing that goes around your waist and you're also tethered by your brain. and they expect people to sleep like this.)

The nausea rising, I request that the trash can come for a visit. I get glared at, but she DID thrust the bin at me, so I wouldn't puke myself. Nice.

For the final insult to injury, she then got an oxygen lead? You know, the thing with the prongs that goes in your nose. YEAH. That. Which reeked. Like an old strawberry shortvake doll. And it was huge, filling one side of my nose entirely, as I have a deviated septum-one side has less room than the other.

Let me tell you, IS A JOY to have stinky things stuck up your nose when you're already migraning. STENCH FTW! Within minutes I was retching. Violently. OVER AND OVER, because every time I tried to breath, it smelled of that horrible, weird, plastic-toy smell. The leads were burning into my skull, and it reeked, and I had a weight belt on.

Apparently, they could hear me. After about 20 minutes, they asked if I was okay. At this point, I was quietly sobbing on the floor, OUT OF BED. After much begging on my part, they called the neurologist, who gave the go ahead for pain meds. THANK THE GODS.

At that point, I was told to go back to bed. Did I mention the bed was made of rocks? And springs? And everytime I moved, I hurt from it? I curled up on my side (BAD CALL) and festered there. I think I fell asleep for about 15 minutes. At which point I awakened in MASSIVE PAIN because the bed was so hard.

At 3:45 I threw in the towel and demanded release. I walked home, after much admonition that IT WASN'T SAFE. Yeah, my neighborhood, the DC equivalent of Rodeo Drive? SO DANGEROUS. Did I mention I saw two people walking their dogs when I went home? And one dude jogging? THOSE SCARY PEOPLE. WITH THEIR PETS AND THEIR EXERCISE.

Turns out I slept about an hour total. But I was able to tell the doctor everything that was said and everything that happened in the place overnight. She tells me I don't really go to sleep-I'm asleep, in REM and all that jazz, but I'm constantly waking up because OMG! WOLVES!

I would have made a great sentinel back in the day. Alas, nowadays, I am the girl that doesn't sleep, because OMG! CAT! OMG! CLICKING! OMG! LIGHT! OMG! WAS THAT SOME RAIN? HALP! COULD ATTACK AT ANY MOMENT. OMG! I MOVED! SOMETHING MUST BE COMING.

Yeah.....so, we'll see. it's a hard issue to treat. But at least I won't have to sleep on rocky, the bed of doom again.

3 comments:

Quintam said...

The only thing dangerous about your neighborhood is getting run over by one of the many 200-year-old residents who are driving their large cars. But it won't kill you because they are going 4 miles an hour.

Oh, speaking of Rodeo, Rachel Zoe was snickering at people who shop at Sacks. . .and then laughing at the people who shop at Saks ON SALE. Because they are skanky.

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