I am hesitant to state what the final straw was because just about the time I think that was it, a whole new bale of hay falls in my lap. 

What is with the farm metaphors?

I am ready for this chapter to be over. It has helped walking through it sleep deprived, I can chalk it up to one long nightmare, but even those end in the morning.

Is it morning yet?

Oh wait, I think I actually need to sleep to wake up.

I arrived at the sleep study promptly at eight P.M. and was escorted to the waiting room to watch a video. I never really considered just how freaky looking a CPAP mask was and the thought of having to wear one for the rest of my life made me a little uneasy.

The video was well done by two thousand four standards but could stand for some updating. Next time you are in a waiting room, take note of the head prints on the walls behind the chairs.

Gross.

Near the end of the video another patient showed up and I vacated the one seat that faced the screen so she could add her head print to the wall. I fiddled with my phone until the technician came in and took me to my room.

This place is not a clinic, it is a suite in an office park that has been converted into a clinic. On the way past the exam rooms I asked the lady leading me if people actually slept here? I told her I had a hard enough time sleeping at home.

She didn’t laugh. I think she was the bad technician.

She took me to my room, a windowless twelve by fifteen space with a queen bed, familiar waiting room chair, night stand full of equipment, sink, small countertop, and mirror tucked in one corner and door to the bathroom.

The bed was covered in a white blanket and on top of the covering was a disturbing array of wires and sensors in plastic bags. She directed me to the bathroom and said I could change and my technician, Angela would be in shortly.

The bathroom was really a toilet room as there was no bath present. It was rather large, spartan, with the typical aluminum assistance bars framing the thunder box.

I quickly removed my clothes and slipped into shorts and a t-shirt. Hooks would have been a good addition to this space, but the top of the toilet was sufficient to keep things off the floor. I have issues with stuff touching bathroom floors.

Gross.

I made my way back to the chair and proceeded to make a head print on the wall behind it that also held the sink. The front kick panel of the sink was sitting perpendicular to the floor and up against the top edge of the supports for the couter top. It was designed with plywood blocks cut at a forty five degree angle that would allow it to hang concealing the pipes behind it. For some reason it was set on the industrial grey carpet and I was tempted to place it back where it belonged, tilted forward thirty degrees lining up with the edges of the supports. I figured it was off for a reason and besides, no one likes it when visitors start fixing stuff around your sleep study room.

I grabbed my “The Supernatural Ways of Royalty” book and started reading where my pink post it note said I left off months before and 3 pages in Angela knocked on my door.

Angela was a soft spoken woman with dark skin and black hair in her thirtieths. She was very professional and explained that she would start getting me ready for the study.

The first thing we did was a blood pressure reading which took an uncomfortable amount of time. I hate feeling my heart beat in my arm and the cuff was on so long my fingers got numb.

The next thing I needed to do was drop four wires down the outside of my shorts that would connect to two patches on each lower leg. They measured leg movements. She applied some very cold cleaning solution to the area and attached the electrodes. To these electrodes the wires were snapped into place and the other end plugged into something that looked like you could pick up at Radio Shack.

The next electrodes to adorn my body were placed on my chest one over my heart and one over my right scapula. Same cold cleanser, same sticky patch, same snapped on wire leads.

Two elastic bands found their way across my chest and belly and it was at that moment, as she was reaching around to strap them on, that I thanked God I was not a sleep technician. Each of these bands received two wires that ran up and over my shoulders.

The next part of the procedure took me by surprise. Angela grabbed a red crayon and a tape measure and started drawing on my head. It made me laugh because I had an eyewitness view of the whole thing since the chair had been moved in front of the sink before we started. It was at that moment I thanked Alla that I was not a sleep technician although my lack of hair made it easier for her to see what she was doing.

The next series of electrodes, three on my chin, two on my cheeks, two on my eyes, and seven on my skull were all pasted on with dielectric glue and tape. The finale piece was shoved in my nose and I was all ready to rock.

Seriously?

Who came up with this? It was about the most uncomfortable thing I have ever put on and it was about to get worse.

I wasn’t ready for bed yet so she left me to myself for a little while and I navigated around the room holding the interface box in my hand. I started thinking about all the other people that held the interface box in their hand while going to the John and I promptly washed my hands.

Gross.

After taking a couple pictures I was off to bed. I instinctively started to lie down on my half and realized I could sleep in the middle tonight.

It wasn’t that great, I much prefer to share my bed.

I grabbed the remote for the T.V. and flipped through until I found some classic car restoration show on National Geographic or something. We don’t have a T.V. so I could be wrong about that.

I watched the show and before long Angela was back in to complete the hook up. Since there was still room in my nostrils, she grabbed a nasal tube and proceeded to add that on top of the other nasal sensor. I try and make a habit of keeping my nasal passages clear so the sensation of these two devices competing for space was incredibly distracting.

She also placed a pulse ox monitor on my left index finder which immediately caused my brain to fixate on the heat and pressure all but guaranteeing me discomfort.

The show was nearly over and Angela left the room and was now talking to me over the intercom on the ceiling. It was directly adjacent to the small dome camera and both perched over the T.V. which hung on the wall that separated the bathroom.

The next five minutes consisted of breathing and grinding teeth, moving eyes and legs, and more breathing. I even got to fake snore, the highlight of the exercise. Later I would try and give them the real thing, although the reality of that was becoming less likely.

I was done with the testing and had passed enough to be ready to start the sleep study. I hoped my years of training would pay off. I was determined to be the best sleeper they had ever seen. I would sleep like no one else had slept before! Rip Van Winkle was my idol and I would not let him down.

I moved my head two degrees and two electrodes popped off.

I knew I couldn’t fix the sink, but this I could do. With my glowing pulsating hot finger I found the electrode and tried in vain to stick it back on.

“Sir, you need to leave the electrodes alone” drifted from the ceiling.

“It came off”. I retorted.

It was at this moment I considered just going home. I don’t like being corrected, especially when it wasn’t my fault. All I did was move my head!

Soon the door opened and another technician came in. She was a heavy set light skinned lady with blond hair. I told her it just popped off when I moved my head. I was expecting a fight, but she was very nice, especially when she looked at the tangle of wires.

Some more glue, more tape, a bit of rerouting of copper and I was good to go. I asked her if I could lie on my side and she said no. I never sleep on my back, but they need to have the study done on my back.

Great. I was going to fail for sure now.

The final thing she did was move the pulse ox monitor to my pinkie finger which helped lessen the sensation of my heart exploding out of my fingertips.

The next 5 hours were to be blunt from hell.

I kept waking up, very aware that I was not breathing. I could hear the woman next door moaning, the technicians talking, the air conditioner conspiring to freeze me, the gulf oil well spewing, it was the most unrestful sleep and then it was over.

Five A.M. Angela came in and unhooked me and I felt like a reprieved man. A warm wash cloth, a brush of the teeth, a change of clothes and I was out of there to come home and blog.

Which is what I have been doing for an hour and a half.

I type slow but thank you Jesus I am not a sleep study technician.

Results next week. I already know what is in my future, another date with Angela, another night of torture, but the goal of sleep lies just beyond and I for one have earned it.

I never thought about sleeping as learned behavior, but it is. Apparently even though the act of sleeping is natural, how we arrive at that blessed event is quite unique.

My sleeping habits are so unique, and ineffective, I will need to be studied to find out how to correct them. I am not sure how I feel about being asked to sleep in a strange room with dozens of electrodes stuck to my skin in front of a camera, but I am certain it will make for interesting television.

If I discover myself on YouTube I demand a royalty.

In preparation for the study I have been keeping a log of when I get to bed, what I did before bed, when I wake up, how many times I woke during the night, and my total hours of sleep. There are a few more details I need to log such as caffeine ingestion, exercise, emotional conditions etc.

I discovered eating Papa John’s pizza at 9 P.M. is a good way to have no sleep. I don’t think that is ground breaking, but I never considered it before. Granted, pizza at night is something we rarely do, and after last nights experience, something we may never do again. The pepperoni and big green pepperoncini may have had something to do with my inability to rest. I am no sleep expert, but stomach acid in the esophagus feels uncomfortable and could contribute to waking up.

My biggest fear is they will find nothing wrong with me. It would be my luck that the combination of strange room, electrodes, my own bed to myself and narcissist tendencies line up for a perfect nights sleep.

Until that time I will do what I have always done and fight with my pillow and blankets until I fall asleep.

I may put a camera in my room tonight just for fun.

There is something strangely comforting knowing I am being watched.

It started out innocently enough yesterday morning as I went in for my “fasting labs” at 9:45. I arrived on time and took my seat with the other cattle waiting for my turn. At least this visit was “free” but isn’t it weird that we pay for medical services BEFORE we get them? I can’t imagine paying for my diner before I get it but for some reason insurance and co-pays and address changes and your debit card is the most important thing required for the privilege of seeing a doctor.

Twenty minutes later they call my name and the nurse who would very soon try and kill me greeted me in the lobby. She apologized for the wait and said that the next time I come in if I have labs I should only be sitting five minutes and to let someone know. I had my iPhone, so I really didn’t mind the wait.

She proceeded to take me to a chair covered in sea green vinyl and told me to take a seat and she would be with me shortly.

I surveyed the empty tubes and alcohol prep wipes, the centrifuge next to the little stainless steel door that passed into the bathroom, the little sink and fridge with the bio hazard sticker and piece of paper stating that no consumables should be left inside. There were magnets with drug names, soap dispensers with drug names, drugs with drug names, even the scale had drug names. It looked like the room had been decked out by NASCAR, I half expected my doctor to come out in a fire retardant suit with the Pfizer logo and bulging pants.

After watching a lady get weighed, overhearing a conversation about how a certain patient was a hypochondriac, a nurse trying to tell another nurse from Chesapeake General about a RNT or RMT or PMR or something for five minutes I was ready to get my labs over with. I kept looking at the little door with the beaker half full of liquid stamped into it thinking how nice it would be if I could pee. I had been holding it for a while and I desperately wanted to fill a couple cups for them right about now.

My nurse that would soon kill me finally came over and apologized again for the wait. I told her I was fine and she proceeded to pull my arm hair out with a blue rubber band she stretched over my elbow. She grabbed a drug company labeled squishy thing and had me pump it as she looked for a vein. I told her they were shy and since I grew up in the North they had learned to retreat from the cold. She was from New Jersey. I was glad to know that, because very soon I would be dead and being killed by someone from New Jersey is much more believable than someone from Des Moines.

She decided to try my left arm and ripping out more hair she switched the blue rubber band over there. More pumping of the gray squishy drug labled thing and I felt the pinch of the needle and asked her if I should keep squeezing. She said I could stop.

Apparently when she said I could stop my body heard I could die.

The next thing I know I am in a conversation with 50 people and I am literally buzzing back and forth in my head like a ping pong ball. As I start to regain consciousness I am acutely aware of the fact that I can’t wake up and the more I try to get out of the static the harder it is. A couple seconds pass in this state but it felt like forever. It was like my brain was being shaken and I was in the middle trying to make sense of the jumbled images.

Eventually I opened my eyes and noticed four nurses and my doctor asking me if I knew my name.

Dave…

Whaaat happen…

“Do you know where you are?”

No (I did kind of know where I was but no was easier to say)

Whaat is wrong wiitth mee?

“You had a vasovagal syncope response” said my doctor. “put his head down between his legs”

I feel sick

At this point I start dry heaving uncontrollably and sweating. The sweat in pouring off of me, literally dripping from every pore of my body, and I am puking and feel like I am going to fall over at any second.

This goes on for a minute and they push some god awful burning drug into my shoulder to stop the nausea.

I am still sweating but the puking has slowed down. I feel like crud and can’t open my eyes and start to whimper a bit. I may have cried. I may have been really scared that whatever was going on would never stop and I was going to die right there in that sea green chair next to the bathroom I wanted to pee in.

They took my blood pressure with this cool wrist cuff, pricked my finger and checked my blood sugar. My pressure was low, sugar fine, and I just had to wait it out till it passed enough for me to make it to a room.

Five minutes later I was recovered enough to move.

I was a mess. The floor had a puddle of sweat between my feet that had fallen from my head, I was literally dripping from head to foot.

I was able to make it to the exam room and laid down on the table. The paper cloth was no match for my sweaty back and it disintegrated as I lay there. Eventually I stopped sweating and they gave me some grape juice and a handful of crackers. My doctor and his assistant came in and checked me out and made some comment about how it is always the big guys that are sensitive. He told my wife who had arrived a few minutes later that she married a sensitive guy.

She knows.

Apparently I went out after the second vile was full of blood and the nurse said I started snoring. I told her I had sleep apnea so she should have let me sleep, it was the most I had had all week. I think it scared her, it definitely scared me, and she suggested I tell the next nurse who draws blood that this happened to me.

Um…. pretty sure if this is going to happen to me again I will never have my blood drawn.

Ever.

This week has given me plenty of time to think about my life and more importantly the person I am when pressed. It has been good, unwelcome, but a good experience none the less as I have discovered there is way too much left for me to accomplish this side of the veil to ever be on bed rest again.

Lessons learned

1) Listen to your body. It loves you, it wants you to be healthy, it will kick your but if you don’t.

2) Drink more water. You live in America for heavens sake and peeing feels good.

3) Exercising and strengthening your core, no matter how boring, is much more interesting than lying down against your will wondering if you will ever walk again.

4) Facebook, although captivating, is a terrible substitute for not being able to hold your kid.

5) Second chances are a gift and one that should always be opened.

6) Appreciate everything, even expensive bumpy ambulance rides you have no way to afford, you got to live to write about it.

7) Live in the moment, you may discover you have the ability to make people laugh even when you feel like crying.

And finally:

Remember you have the most amazing wife, children, friends and family around you and your life’s work is to never give them reason to doubt it.

I am doing the Master Cleanser or Lemonade Diet and it really isn’t a diet as much as it is a detox, but saying detox confuses people, so I will call it a diet.

Here is a good video I found that explains the detox:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xurxavBqAjc

I have done detoxes before, but this is the first real extended one I will do. Christmas time is probably not the best time to stop eating… actually, it is the perfect time to stop!

I will let you know how it goes!

I have reached my goal of walking and praying three days this week for an hour at a time.

It was 29 degrees this morning when I started out – but I would not be denied. The temperature dropped all week which made me all the more determined to show myself faithful.

I am not being legalistic about this, I have done that thank your very little, I am actually being quite selfish. My prayer as I walk along the road to “our field” is that God bless me. I want nothing more.

Why?

Because I need it.
God impacted me in such a powerful way last week that it is all I can think about. I guess you could call me a spiritual junkie. I am hooked on His presence and I am willing to do whatever it takes to please Him. Even if I never receive another impartation like the one I experienced on the floor of my church, I just want to please Him.

He is pursuing me, and I think He likes the chase.

The funny thing about all of this is it has taken so little effort on my part. Sure, I have pulled myself out of my warm bed but its more like getting up for Christmas than getting up for the dentist. I guess if I could compare this week to anything it would be like the first week of dating. I have been on my best behavior, worked really hard at anticipating, gone the extra mile, basically presented myself in the best possible light in hopes that my date is impressed.

I am selling myself.

The strange thing about this type of behavior in me is that my date has already bought me. I don’t have to get up and walk in the cold, there is nothing I can do to make Him want me more, love me more, accept me more, sing over me louder, because He is already hopelessly and madly in love with me. I am dating someone that has already said yes in the most dramatic and public of ways and yet He pursues me.

Me!

He greets me each morning like I am the only one getting up and playing hide and go seek in the cold with the God of the universe. He tells me that He loves me like it is the first time He has ever uttered the words. I ravage His heart, not by great words or beautifully sung songs or prose or strong arms, but by simply glancing His way. He is undone by me. The builder of galaxies is undone by me.

I love our mornings together in the cold.

In the stillness of the morning, when I stop to listen, He tells me about the rest of his children. He tells me about you, with passion that burns in my chest and brings me to my knees, He tells me about His extravagant love for you.

He wants you to come out and play, Jesus is pursuing you, and I think He likes the chase.

I wanted to be a forty year old runner. I tried to make it happen last summer and although my heart and lungs were up to the task, my knees and ankles started a mutiny. I was able to regain control after a two week rest but they had formed an unholy alliance with arches, left hip, right ankle and had also successfully lobbied sciatica just to drive the point home.

“Davie no run – we no like six foot two, two hundred fifty pounding – no matter how sexy.”

I gave in like a second grader being pressured by fourth grader for the only swing on the playground.

Winter arrived and everyone was happy with the new Davie. Even Davie was happy for a while until heart and lungs convinced brain that stomach was out of control. Brain recalled Atkins, which immediately got the attention of bowels and prostate. They in turn convinced taste buds and emotions that going down that road again could mean the end of bread.

The reality of losing bread shattered all alliances, Davie like bread.

Once I had the attention of everyone we reasoned together that the best plan was to walk. Legs reminded me that at any point they could call on knees and feet, and since they are the last to get bread, they could live with Atkins just fine thank you. Brain agreed to keep heart and lungs in check for legs if legs promised to get stomach out of bed and into cold.

All that was left was to convince pride that walking was just as sexy as running. In a stunning move, eyes locked onto gut in the mirror.

No one wanted to see that.

Gut was a little chilly and jiggly today on the first walk, but everyone was determined to make him less of an influence in this alliance, no matter what the cost.

Time is an amazing thing.

I remember taking this picture almost 2 years ago walking the shores of the James River trying to make sense of the events of the previous months.

None could be found as life does not reveal secrets because I insist on knowing.

Where we find ourselves is of little concern compared to where we go from there.

And the truth that has been reveled is that no matter the outcome, mo matter the road feet find themselves treading, no matter the heights of joy or depths of sorrow this one thing remains.

We are never alone.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EP_KsoaOxJI

They have many other names like goober pea, monkey nut, groundnut, and earthnut.

I call them “eat me and have the worst night sleep of your life.”

I have been acutely aware that goobers and I have not been getting along lately, but confirmed last night the monkey nut wants to kill me. I remember suffering from sleep apnea last night. It has not been a problem for a while, but last night was a bad night. My wife screaming at the top of her lungs at 2 AM didn’t help matters either.

It doesn’t happen often, but every once in a while my sweetie will start screaming in her sleep. There is nothing worse than waking up that way. A close second is when our kids stand at the side of the bed and stare us to consciousness. We have since told them to knock on the door, as waking up to a ghostly shape in front of you is really mean even if you think you are being polite.

Last nights scream didn’t even sound like my wife, it was very high and very shrill and thankfully very short. There are some nights that I have to wake her up out of her dream but last night she woke herself up after one yelp. I asked her what happened, but she had no clue. Perhaps she has a form of nighttime tourettes.

The bigger issue for me was once I was awake it felt as if my throat was closing in on itself. When this happens to me it makes it increasingly difficult to breath. For the next few hours I would fall asleep and wake up. I wasn’t gasping for air, but I could tell my oxygen level was not good.

Needless to say I woke up this morning with a headache and feeling like I had been hit by a truck. It dawned on me that I had eaten a fair share of earthnuts the night before and suddenly remembered “hey you are allergic to legumes”!?

I can hardly wait for the bowel cramping.

I figure my wife’s screaming last night was God’s way of waking me up before I suffocated in my own histamines.

No more groundnut for this boy.