This is an unusual condition, affecting perhaps one in a thousand of
the population, where an irresistible desire to sleep comes over the individual
several times a day. It could occur at a meal, a business meeting or while
talking to someone. About 70% of sufferers have 'cataplectic' attacks in
which the muscles suddenly lose their power and the person collapses, unable
to move - although aware of everything going on around. The attacks often
occur suddenly as a result of an emotional situation : laughter, anger,
amusement, excitement, or even an orgasm. Sufferers are often obese and
there seems to be a genetic factor involved. The age of onset is mainly
in the 20s and 30s.
Narcoleptics, when they fall asleep, go straight
into REM sleep - with its accompanying muscular paralysis - instead of
the various stages of slow wave sleep. That is the physiological basis
to the condition. They begin to hallucinate things, being simultaneously
in the state of dreaming and wakefulness. The duration of these attacks
is usually just a minute or two.
One woman reported : 'I used to feel weak
in the afternoons. I would fall onto the sofa and started to see things.
I went to the doctor, who wrote a note to a psychiatrist saying I was displaying
'schizoid symptoms.'
This woman, was actually mis-diagnosed and
labelled a schizophrenic. Unfortunately, because of ignorance by physicians,
many narcoleptics are wrongly adjudged to be psychotic. However, a greater
awareness of narcolepsy is now spreading and various effective treatments
have been developed.