Dear Blake,
I am a female in my mid-20s. My whole life I have been in a constant state of exhaustion. When I was in school, I’d try so hard not to fall asleep in class. (I actually enjoyed school and got good grades.) But when I got home, I’d have to take a nap before doing my homework or chores because otherwise I would fall asleep in the middle of it. Fast-forward to now: I am a working adult. I’m going back to college, and I have been recently diagnosed with hypersomnia/borderline narcolepsy. I’m on stimulants to help me through the day, but they don’t always work. Some days I struggle to find the motivation to do the simplest tasks because my body just wants to rest. No one I know seems to understand, and I’m often regarded as lazy. Please help!
Signed, Hannah
From Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
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Dear Hannah,
Sorry to hear about your medical condition. But if people think you are lazy because you sleep a lot, turn the tables on those insensitive boneheads and blame them for your perpetual drowsiness. Here are some suggestions. Tell them you aren’t really sleeping, but you have a rare disease that causes you to close your eyes to avoid looking at someone that you find extremely unattractive/borderline ghoulish. Or, you can inform them that their body odor causes you to sleep, because it will slow down your breathing, which will cause you to drastically reduce the amount their fumes that you inhale. You can even tell them that your constant yawning is prompted by them being a very boring person, and then allege that their voice is like an audio version of Sominex. And your last option is this. Tell them that the real reason why you sleep spontaneously, is because you would prefer to dream about the things you would like to do to them, that you know if you did in real life… would no doubt land you on death row. I hope this helps.
Blake