Narcolepsy

[Guest]

and perhaps I should first give you an idea of my demographics, background, and so on and so forth. This would seem to be the appropriate thing to do.

I am a native South Carolinian living some 60-70 miles east of my place of birth, in Columbia, with an equivalent drive coming west from North Myrtle Beach.

I am formally trained in biochemistry and work in a sales capacity for Johnson & Johnson in the quaint little town of Florence, SC.

I have been based here for two years now and it was my first "real job" after college. What I mean by real job, is the job I would have liked to get immediately upon my graduation from The University of South Carolina.

I have provided a link below in my signature to messageboards that afford friends and alumni of The University of South Carolina a place to communicate year around on a range of topics. This is part of a sports network that is dominated by College Football. However, there are some boards that allow for more casual conversation (ie college women, good beer, current CD rotation, so on and so forth). I serve in a volunteer capacity as maoderator at this site.

I am a very analytical, alpha male, with no children, no previous marital obligations (although the opportunity has presented itself on two seperate occasions) and of Protest-Anglo Saxon/Western European decent paternally, and of Lebonese/Portugese decent (as I understand it) maternally.

I am roughly 6-1 215 pounds, with darker features in terms of eye/hair and have an olive complexion.

People would probably describe me as reserved, yet quick witted once I become comfortable with my environment, with a dry sense of humor that can be quite funny when intertwined with general converation.

My first episode of sleep paralysis (cataplexy) that I can recall occurred in my sophomore year of High School in Irmo, SC.

After several initial episodes, I had myself convinced that it was the ghost of a young boy of like age. I beat the s*** out of this kid two years earlier for being rumored to have "gone down" on one of my highschool girlfriends. He was killed six months later after our fight in car crash and burned as it was told to me, alive. When I first heard of it I felt terrible for him, and guilty for kicking the s*** out of him over a silly little girl.

In retrospect, it was obviously that I was having nightmares where he was a featured character in the cast and the hallucinations carried over as I came into my waking state.

During periods when the sleep paralysis went away as I had progressed through college, I assumed that this bastard had decided to finally leave me alone and then he would return. Overtime, he began to come with his friends.

I always had the ability for several years to fight them off. Every last one of them and that gave me a sense of pride in some strange way. Remember now, I am an alpha male that happens to also be a Leo.

Somewhere along the way I read "Tale of The Body Thief" by Anne Rice. It is a story about a soul that manages to move from body to body over time but longs to become a vampire. He finally finds his vampire, one whom longs to see through mortal eyes but only for a short time. Of course, the soul tries to still the vampire's body because he never has to move over to another body again, and the vampire wants his body back.

This further compounded my perspective that my sleep paralysis was of spiritual descent.

The depression came as well, as did the daytime sleepiness, and I gained weight through my early 20s. This further compounded my depressions and I lost the desire to fight these bastards that I thought were after my body, sometimes thinking "FAHQ IT, take it, he's all yours." The funny thing is that they would never finish the god d*** job in my mind at that time. This pissed me off like you would not believe. Cowards!

And besides, I was ready to get out of my fat a** body anyway. Time to make a change as I told myself at the time. My sex life sucked and I was working a full time job trying to pay my way through the aforementioned undergraduate studies at USC. We have some of the best d*** looking women on a college campus in all of america. Ah, Springs on The Horsehoe is a young man's dream. But I was a depressed, fat guy that worked his a** off paying his way, fought tooth and nail for my grades because I couldnt focus. I blamed it on all the hotties that were out of my league at the time.

I never really had hallucinations that would be seamless in the middle of the day, and I suppose that if I did, why how would I know now anyway?

In the recent past, I have always likened myself to a very mild case of whatever the guy in the movie Fight Club was going through.

I couldnt sleep and when I did, so it seemed, I would have these "episodes" although I did become aware they were less common as I began to become more physically active.

Florence is a boring town for the single, young professional, alpha male so I did something radical. I joined a gym.

It has helped me in more ways than I could have originally dreamed. I have my swagger again. Although it comes and goes. Like a Yo-Yo, I am up and down. This is something that I have just noticed about myself in the last year. I can go for weeks longing to go from workout to workout, I did two-a-days while managing a hectoc work schedule for example for quite sometime. Then, I would just say the hell with it and stop cold turkey and become bored and depressed.

I have had several young ladies in my bed. None of which I care to remain obligated to longterm. One of which is a dear friend that dealt with me for over a year. My sex drive with her sucked, and this is while I was in fairly good shape. She was a collegiate hurdler, who works in the same industry as myself, and I like to think she looked like Sharon Stone the day I met her. Of course, we became complacent and then I started to think that she looked a little like a male. This was how I rationalized my low sex drive with her. All hopes of continuing to bang her out were gone, effective immediately.

About three months ago, I had my sleep study performed and as it turned out I have narcolepsy. Atleast that may appear to be the diagnosis to me. I went to my doctor telling him I was tired, I would fall asleep while driving periodically during the course of my day, and I was simply depressed. I couldnt focus for s***, couldnt sleep worth a d***, and he sent me off with a prescription.

I have had severe insomnia for most of the last two months, but I think that is because I bought a new computer and I have always been a "gamer".

My focus is still s***ty but I think that has more to do with me not making a to do list.

I took my first dose of a new medication today that he asked me to try for a month.

I have not fallen asleep during the day for any other reason than my insomnia which I attribute to the medication I was taking previously.

The sleep paralysis has been abscent up unto this point.