Increasingly, bleary-eyed patients are asking their family doctors for
sleep medications. In the first seven months of 2005 alone, North
American pharmacists filled nearly 25 million prescriptions for sleep
medications. Between 2000 and 2004, the number of adults aged 20 to 44
who took prescription sleep medications doubled, according to a survey
by U.S.-based Medco Health Solutions, a drug benefit management
company. New generation medications such as Ambien CR, Sonata and
Lunesta aren’t as miraculous as their idyllic advertising suggests, but
they’re far superior to traditional — and habit-forming — sleep
inducers such as Halcion and Restoril, which have been proven to leave
people feeling woozy and off-balance.
Insomnia and improperly
administered sleep medication appear to have played a part in one
recent high-profile tragedy. According to the New York City medical
examiner,
Oscar-nominated actor Heath Ledger inadvertently died
of the combined effects of painkillers, anti-anxiety drugs and the
sleep aids Restoril and Unisom. In a November 2007 interview, the
28-year-old Ledger admitted that his recent workload had taken a toll.
“One week, I probably slept an average of two hours a night,” he told
the New York Times. “Suddenly, I couldn’t stop thinking. My body was
exhausted, and my mind was still going.”
There’s something about
the night — the coolness, the mystery, the peacefulness, the absence of
distraction. For better or worse, mystics, artists and deep thinkers
alike frequently burn the midnight oil (see sidebar, opposite page).
Throughout
history, sleep deprivation has often been synonymous with heightened
religious awareness. The Indian mystic and anti-colonial nationalist
Sri Aurobindo claimed to have entirely overcome the need for sleep. He
saw it as a sluggish, lower kind of consciousness that could be
conquered through intense meditation. Ancient Muslim mystics, on the
other hand, guzzled down coffee during all-night devotions,
popularizing the stimulant in many parts of the world. And unlike the
ancient Greeks, who extolled sleep as a sacred salve, early Christian
monks were known to deny themselves slumber.
Scientific
investigations into insomnia do suggest that sleeplessness can promote
creativity, heightened awareness and, ironically, a warm, fuzzy
happiness. During psychosomatic arousal, activity in the brain shifts
regions. Parietal lobes, which play a role in one’s sense of self and
spatial processing, reduce their movements. With less
self-consciousness, people can feel like they are floating, sense a
oneness with their surroundings or the presence of a higher power.
Vivid hallucinations (remember my dancing peppershaker?) can occur
within 48 hours of no sleep.
The question arises: Are the
visions and insights of the deep, sleepless night valid expressions of
spirituality? As much as he treasures the quiet and solitude of the
night, Gailand MacQueen has doubts. He cites Matthew Fox’s 1981 book,
Whee! We, Wee All the Way Home, in which the American Episcopalian
priest looks into natural and artificial ecstasy. Fox favours organic
experiences such as friendships, sex and art over artificial — or what
he calls “tactical” — ecstasies, including sleep deprivation. Says
MacQueen: “There should truly be a loss of ego or social self in an
ecstatic state or altered state of consciousness. The whole problem
with tactical experiences is the process of getting to a higher plane
is very ego-centred. You’re making the choice of trying to manufacture
this experience instead of allowing the experience to come to you.”
Carlile
agrees. “Because we’re not in physical contact with what’s believed to
be the next world, we have these mysteries. It doesn’t look like
science is going to help us solve these yet, so people feel they must
go on some journey in their minds. It may be wonderment and a lovely
episode of goodness. But a quick, material alteration of brain
chemistry is not a valid [metaphysical] experience. . . . Heed the
Buddha’s warning: ‘Don’t waste your time on fruitless practices that
aren’t going to give you real spiritual advancement.’ It’s not very
profitable.” But what about involuntary sleep deprivation? Could it be
that God wants me to stay awake, seeing and hearing things I would
never experience in the light of day?
Sleep deprivation does
seem to open doors of perception, providing me with glimpses of an
arcane universe. And if insomnia is an outlet for connections not made
during my upright hours — a dredging-up process for ideas I didn’t
realize I had in me — then maybe I shouldn’t fight it, at least not so
vehemently.
The truth is, I don’t rejoice in sleep deprivation
and I don’t know many people who do. It seems that any temporary gains
that come my way when I burn the midnight oil are quickly lost when it
becomes a regular habit. Maybe I should do what Carlile suggests: stop
fighting insomnia and start modifying my sleep and waking patterns.
Stop waiting for voices in the dark and start looking for that “a-ha”
experience in the light of day.
Something to sleep on, anyway.
