I Need to Talk About My Stupid Body
1. About a year ago, now, I developed a wildly new sleep disorder. I didn't know it at the time. I thought it was jet lag. Even if it wasn't the adjustment from GMT to PST, this wasn't the first time I'd needed to sleep a lot: as a veteran depression-haver, my life has been a near-constant vacillation between three-ish week stints of insomnia, then hypersomnia, then insomnia, repeat. So I wasn't worried about it. This, too, shall pass, I thought. Only, it didn't. I went a whole year of needing twelve to fourteen hours of sleep per day. Doctors were unhelpful, tests were unhelpful, and insurance in the US (which has never been "good") is particularly unhelpful when you are suffering from a chronic mystery condition. If it doesn't seem like it will kill you outright, then you can either shell out your life savings to be shuffled around hopelessly, or you can give up and learn to deal with it. It was a difficult year. The official diagnosis was I...