Many of you may be asking yourself, 'hey Kat, why did you go to a sleep clinic anyway?'. And I would answer, 'well kids, it's a little thing I get called sleep paralysis'.
'What the hell is that?' you ask.
Well, first of all I'm not crazy or sick (although I suppose some of you may beg to differ). But the whole experience is pretty unnerving and has been happening on and off for as long as I can remember. I don't have narcolepsy and I've never been abducted by aliens. But the rest of what you'll read if you follow the link, will give you a pretty good idea of what I go through when my head hits the pillow.
http://www.stanford.edu/~dement/paralysis.html
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Monday, January 23, 2006
Sleep is Overrated
So I've decided that sleep is completely overrated.
Last night I had the pleasure of having a little sleep over at a sleep clinic and let me tell you this clinic has the wrong name. It should be called the we are going to do everything short of prop your eyelids open with toothpicks clinic. I arrived at 8:15 sharp, tired and ready for bed. Usually my bedtime is much later but I never get any sleep on Saturdays and am pretty much ready to fall over by late afternoon every Sunday. So here I am, filling out my little questionaire about sleep, wishing I was getting some myself. Low and behold one of the questions was 'could you go to bed right now?'. And I thought, why yes I could thank you. Stupid me. This question had apparently no bearing whatsoever on whether or not I was going to bed anytime soon. Boo hiss.
I was sent to wait in the 'lounge' which reminded me of what a tv room at an AA meeting might look like. Two strange men, who probably snore really loud and fart a lot, were seated on two seperate couches watching ofcourse the football game. Reluctantly, I joined them.
About a half hour later a lovely man named John took me to get wired up. This was fun.
First I was marked out in red grease pencil. Including several spots through my hair, which
is where being bald would have definately come in handy. We started with (yes just started),
2 beside my eyes
2 behind my ears
1 on my chin
1 on each leg
3 on my chest
4 on my head
and one right smack dab in the centre of my forehead.
I was pretty sure at this point that sleeping was completely out of the question. But if I was to nod off, I might be visited by Hannibal Lector or butt- probing aliens. Neither of which is ever good.
Now I was back off to the lounge where -under usual circumstances I might have felt embarrassed looking like I did- we all looked like we were about to undergo a full frontal lobotomy.
It's about 10 pm at this point and I'm beginning to feel delirious but pleased that I'm actually going to get to see Grey's Anatomy which actually sucked. Boo hiss.
So now it's 11:15 and I'm wired for sound and John my little wiring buddy is MIA.
I actually wanted to cry. So I went back to my sleezy bed in room 7 and waited. At this point I was sure the earlier questionaire was designed to be cruel and unusual punishment.
20 minutes later, John was in my room and as if all the electrodes and wires weren't enough, he added more.
1 heart rate monitor taped to my finger
1 tube stuck up my nose
1 electrode taped so tightly to my throat I thought I was being strangled. This one John said, was to detect snoring...I asked him if he was sure it wouldn't be the cause of it.
We laughed.
Boo hiss.
Lights off, camera on, 12:00 am, wired up, choked and taped. I'm all ready for bed....oh no wait...I forgot my teddy, I'll never be able to sleep now.
At some point I actually contemplated peeing the bed because I was sure it would be
easier than asking John to come and help me. So I held it.
6 am...rise and shine.
And a new questionaire.
'How would you rate your sleep at our clinic compared to your usual sleep at home?'
Are you serious?
It was another one of their cruel questions.
So I answered it honestly and obviously, tied up my tangled sticky hair and made my way
to Tim Horton's.
Oh sweet Dr. Timmy,
you were my cure all along. I'll never stray for other answers ever again.
Last night I had the pleasure of having a little sleep over at a sleep clinic and let me tell you this clinic has the wrong name. It should be called the we are going to do everything short of prop your eyelids open with toothpicks clinic. I arrived at 8:15 sharp, tired and ready for bed. Usually my bedtime is much later but I never get any sleep on Saturdays and am pretty much ready to fall over by late afternoon every Sunday. So here I am, filling out my little questionaire about sleep, wishing I was getting some myself. Low and behold one of the questions was 'could you go to bed right now?'. And I thought, why yes I could thank you. Stupid me. This question had apparently no bearing whatsoever on whether or not I was going to bed anytime soon. Boo hiss.
I was sent to wait in the 'lounge' which reminded me of what a tv room at an AA meeting might look like. Two strange men, who probably snore really loud and fart a lot, were seated on two seperate couches watching ofcourse the football game. Reluctantly, I joined them.
About a half hour later a lovely man named John took me to get wired up. This was fun.
First I was marked out in red grease pencil. Including several spots through my hair, which
is where being bald would have definately come in handy. We started with (yes just started),
2 beside my eyes
2 behind my ears
1 on my chin
1 on each leg
3 on my chest
4 on my head
and one right smack dab in the centre of my forehead.
I was pretty sure at this point that sleeping was completely out of the question. But if I was to nod off, I might be visited by Hannibal Lector or butt- probing aliens. Neither of which is ever good.
Now I was back off to the lounge where -under usual circumstances I might have felt embarrassed looking like I did- we all looked like we were about to undergo a full frontal lobotomy.
It's about 10 pm at this point and I'm beginning to feel delirious but pleased that I'm actually going to get to see Grey's Anatomy which actually sucked. Boo hiss.
So now it's 11:15 and I'm wired for sound and John my little wiring buddy is MIA.
I actually wanted to cry. So I went back to my sleezy bed in room 7 and waited. At this point I was sure the earlier questionaire was designed to be cruel and unusual punishment.
20 minutes later, John was in my room and as if all the electrodes and wires weren't enough, he added more.
1 heart rate monitor taped to my finger
1 tube stuck up my nose
1 electrode taped so tightly to my throat I thought I was being strangled. This one John said, was to detect snoring...I asked him if he was sure it wouldn't be the cause of it.
We laughed.
Boo hiss.
Lights off, camera on, 12:00 am, wired up, choked and taped. I'm all ready for bed....oh no wait...I forgot my teddy, I'll never be able to sleep now.
At some point I actually contemplated peeing the bed because I was sure it would be
easier than asking John to come and help me. So I held it.
6 am...rise and shine.
And a new questionaire.
'How would you rate your sleep at our clinic compared to your usual sleep at home?'
Are you serious?
It was another one of their cruel questions.
So I answered it honestly and obviously, tied up my tangled sticky hair and made my way
to Tim Horton's.
Oh sweet Dr. Timmy,
you were my cure all along. I'll never stray for other answers ever again.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Apparently it's A MILLION LITTLE LIES
For those of you who watch Oprah and like to read (or maybe one of the 2), you might be interested to know that James Frey is now accused of being a liar. I'm half way through his gripping, raw personal truth entitled A Million Little Pieces, and apparently it's mostly embelleshing to the point of being plain old lies. This is all to my dismay because the book is actually quite riveting whether fiction or not. According to www.thesmokinggun.com, Frey is nothing more than a beer drinking college student who happened to smoke some pot. Sounds like most teenagers right? In his defense, the novel was refused to be published as a fictional work. So where do we draw the line. I mean, no writer can be completely removed and objectional when it comes to writing. Experience and self cannot help but filter into any piece and even science fiction includes part of the truth. Many world pronounced authors include much of the truth in their fiction, setting exact times and places and merely creating a story around them, interjecting characters. So what if James Frey wasn't convicted of Felony Mayhem and never spent more than a day or so in jail. If what it takes for people to relate to his pain is to embellish, then so be it. Afterall, he finished rehab and probably didn't write the book for therapy. He wrote it to have a life and to inspire others to have one too. Take it for what it is and leave the rest. Good press, bad press, it's all good in Mr. Frey's pocket book right? So it may be he knows more of the truth than the rest of us who are wasting time picking it apart.
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