All-nighters are different for those of us who have sleep disorders. All through college, I wondered why I was the only person I knew who had never "pulled an all-nighter." I could never stay up for an entire night studying. As a matter of fact, my roommate used to joke about my studying consisting of opening up my books and falling asleep instantly.
Surprisingly, this wasn't far from the truth. Reading is one of the easiest ways for me to fall asleep. I have found that if I have insomnia (which is torture for people with narcolepsy), all I have to do is pick up a book, and by the third page, I can't keep my eyes open.
Unfortunately, this poses some problems for a student. If my automatic response to reading is falling asleep, studying becomes nearly impossible. When I was working on my Master's degree (which I graduated with officially last week), I tried everything to read those long books originally written in another language, translated into English poorly. I would spend all day at the school's library - far away from my bed. I would go somewhere where I knew the AC was way too cold. Or I'd have soda and snacks with me, just to have the stimulation to keep me awake. It didn't usually work. I almost always fell asleep anyway - I'd find the couch in the library, give up, and snuggle into my sweatshirt, or even fall asleep sitting at the desk with my face on the textbook. Back then, I had not been diagnosed, so I didn't know what made me different from everyone else. I just thought I was weak or lazy.
Anyway, it occurred to me the other day that I have pulled all-nighters, but when you have a sleep disorder, sometimes it takes a different shape. I am now a teacher, and I stayed up until 1:00am grading papers when I had to get up at 6:00am the next day. For me, this is an all-nighter. Normally, if I am up until 11:00pm, I am exhausted and non-functional the next day. Staying up until 1:00 made me practically delerious. For me, that was an all-nighter. For most people, they wouldn't think twice about staying up that late once in a while.
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