I have Narcolepsy

I'm telling you the end of the story before the beginning and middles of the story. But there you have it: cat is out of the bag. I'm still going to tell you the story, though.

I've always been healthy, but would you believe me if I told you that I might have a real disorder? Could you start to guess what it is? -----wait...that isn't really going to work anymore. Let me try a different approach.

Right about the tail end of my senior year of high school (2008), I began to notice that everything was not exactly normal. I suddenly began having trouble getting up in the morning, and I had trouble sustaining any kind of energy throughout the day. I fell asleep at Six Flags for crying out loud.

In the months and years following high school, it seemed that I had developed a new love for sleeping: a common happenstance in the college years, I was told. And partially to blame was my college-boy sleeping patterns which usually found me getting in bed in the morning and sleeping until noon.

It was in my second fall semester at college, however, that I thought something might really be up. I had a 9:00 class that I really just couldn't get up for. Noone likes getting up, no doubt. But at times, I COULDN'T do it. And if I did do it, I was overwhelmingly ready for sleep by the time I got there.

Like anybody, though, I attributed my sleepiness and tiredness to the stresses of life and school. And several people made the excuse for me that I was simply lazy. That was much of how things went on for the first three years out of school.

Then around Christmas 2010, after Christmas Eve dinner with my dad's family, my mom asked me if I felt ok. I said sleepy, but that was an all-the-time thing these days. She was concerned that feeling sleepy all the time was not normal for someone of my age and health, so she had me to schedule a doctor's appointment.

After ruling out diabetes, hypo/hyperthyroidism, and and other horrible health prospects, my medical doctor, Dr. Alan Crews said something to me that I would have never imagined hearing: "I think you might have a mild case of narcolepsy".

I laughed. My mind went immediately to Mr. Bean in Rat Race and his constant nodding off and causing disasters. After months of testing and visits, he says narcolepsy. He sent me to Dr. Chandra, a sleep specialist in Chattanooga. Dr. Chandra had me do a sleep study. I fell asleep in 5 minutes on the night of the study, and I entered REM sleep in 9.5 minutes. The following day, I slept during all 5 scheduled 40-minute naps, and once, I fell asleep in 1 minute. It was official: I had narcolepsy.

Those results came to me today. So now I'm a guy with a dog, a girlfriend, and narcolepsy. And I do not just fall asleep at random times. But I could if I wanted to, which up until now, has made me feel like a mutant in the X-Men world.

I've been prescribed medicine that will help me stay awake during the day. As I jokingly told my good friend earlier, I feel like I'm having my mutant-ness taken away, and in a weird way, I wonder if this disorder is partly what makes me me. I wonder if my behavior and outlook will change with the medicine. I don't know, but I'm going to give it a shot.