I took a job with a multiple hour commute. I was miserable and alone in an unfamiliar state. I was working 16 hour days just to keep the place from imploding after they laid off the rest of my team with zero warning. Had just broken up with my girlfriend. Things were bad. That coupled with the insomnia led to me basically not sleeping at all aside from naps for days on end.
We got hit with a major storm and after 5 days of no power or heat my parents suggested I drive to their house. It was about 2 hours away. I jumped at the chance to get out of that hellhole. Hopped in my car, thought I was a little sleepy but I’d done longer drives many times before. 2 hours was nothing… right?
I started dozing off about an hour in. Couldn’t keep my eyes open. The lines on the road were hypnotizing me. I remember cranking the A/C to max even though it was freezing, turning the radio up and even slapping myself in the face to try and wake myself up. Nothing worked and I started getting scared and looking for a rest area. There were none and there wasn’t a safe spot to pull off. I thought I could make it as I had ”only” 20 minutes of travel left. Nope.
I started microsleeping. Though it’s possible I was doing it the entire time and didn’t even realize it. Nothing would keep me awake. At all. Until I woke up to my car bouncing off a concrete divider on the left side of the highway when I had been in the right lane before. I remember hearing horns blaring and people gunning it to get away from me. I was definitely awake then. I drove home the rest of the way white-knuckled, eyes big as saucers. Couldn’t believe nothing worse happened. I felt like such an asshole putting myself and others in danger like that.
So I can see this happening. Ataxia is no joke. It will creep up on you slowly. You might not even realize you’re microsleeping ever. And hers was obviously much worse than mine. If you think you have insomnia or sleep apnea, tell your doctor.
In Utah they have highway signs that say something like “Drowsy driving is worse than drunk driving. Pull over if you’re tired.”
My insomnia got so bad at one point that from my POV I started blacking out for several hours at a time. I’d look at the clock, blink, and the time would go from like 3pm to 11pm instantly. In reality my brain was just too tired to register anything that happened to me to memory, even the memory of existence in the moment; just…not there. I was my same old self, according to my wife, which I believe, I mean, who the hell else could I be? I don’t live duplicitous, I’m not worried I might have said or done something contrary to me.
It happened one night where I had gone out to dinner with my wife’s grandparents = no memory of the events at all. I drove, apparently…and that’s when I made the earliest appointment I could to get sleeping pills.
Lack of sleep is no joke. It was like someone else was living my life. the highlight reel parts at that. I’d snap back while playing Civ or having to go to work.
