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As an individual that deals with DSPS (Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome) for so many years, I can positively affirm with authority, knowledge and personal experience how hard can be for someone to live with such a condition. In its most severe and inflexible form, it’s considered a permanent disability. Sleep disorders are irreversible, doesn’t have a cure, and people who are forced to live with such debilitating conditions – like this one, or others of a similar category, like Non-24 (Non-24-hour sleep–wake disorder) – certainly deal with a great amount of consternation and despondency, given the fact that all aspects of their lives – social, personal and professional – are invariably affected and compromised by a deficient level of accomplishments, and an inefficient ability to perform daily tasks. This came as invariable consequences of these conditions, which has, as main symptoms, chronic fatigue, excessive daytime sleepiness, tiredness, headaches and cognitive disorders (a deterioration in the capacities of memory, attention and concentration), to name just a few. And everything becomes progressively worse as time pass by. People who suffer from such a terrible dysfunction are invariably affected by a permanent process of physical and mental deterioration.
Like the Non-24-hour sleep–wake disorder, the Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome can be described as a disturbance on the circadian rhythm of the biological clock. In healthy persons, the circadian rhythm has twenty four hours (the length period of a day), and is completely submissive to the day and night cycle. In individuals who suffer from such disabilities, the biological clock, besides having an intrinsic period that is probably longer than twenty four hours, is primarily desynchronized with the day and night cycle, so the biological clock steps out of its regular compass, developing its own independent anomalous schedule. So, as an example, it’s normal for people suffering from the most severe form of the dysfunction to feel sleepy only by five in the morning. They will obviously have trouble in getting up early to start their daily activities, even if they use several alarm clocks in their attempts to wake up. To fulfill the demands of a regular day job, from 8 am to 17:30 pm, is certainly an enormous and troublesome challenge. After some time, it’s very common for individuals who deal with this condition to be classified as nocturnal, while it is also normal for them to develop a distinct aversion to sunlight, the blue color of the sky, and everything related to the daylight as well, which comes as a progression to the symptoms of the dysfunction.
Like the Non-24-hour sleep–wake disorder, the Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome can be described as a disturbance on the circadian rhythm of the biological clock. In healthy persons, the circadian rhythm has twenty four hours (the length period of a day), and is completely submissive to the day and night cycle. In individuals who suffer from such disabilities, the biological clock, besides having an intrinsic period that is probably longer than twenty four hours, is primarily desynchronized with the day and night cycle, so the biological clock steps out of its regular compass, developing its own independent anomalous schedule. So, as an example, it’s normal for people suffering from the most severe form of the dysfunction to feel sleepy only by five in the morning. They will obviously have trouble in getting up early to start their daily activities, even if they use several alarm clocks in their attempts to wake up. To fulfill the demands of a regular day job, from 8 am to 17:30 pm, is certainly an enormous and troublesome challenge. After some time, it’s very common for individuals who deal with this condition to be classified as nocturnal, while it is also normal for them to develop a distinct aversion to sunlight, the blue color of the sky, and everything related to the daylight as well, which comes as a progression to the symptoms of the dysfunction.
To properly fight DSPS, a good treatment, with the proper medications, is fundamental and mandatory. The rules concerning sleep hygiene can be a major source of help as well. If this is your case, don’t be frustrated, if you feel yourself unable to follow these rules right away. The required discipline necessary to follow these procedures, and to develop the habits concerning sleep hygiene, are abilities difficult to acquire, and their daily maintenance can be a greater challenge, since this revolves around drastic changes that you will have to do, regarding your routine. But remember: you are not alone, and a lot of people in the world fight exactly the same condition, and the same difficulties related to the symptoms, and the treatment adaptation. To admit to yourself that you have an illness, and never be excessively rigid, but to maintain a reasonable, prudent and wise mental attitude is fundamental for your wellbeing.
Without medical help, though, DSPS becomes progressively worse, and an individual suffering from this condition can lose completely the control of his life. If you suffer from this dysfunction – or another sleep disorder, since all of them are equally debilitating – medical treatment is fundamental, besides extremely necessary, for you to have a better quality of life, and to regain, at least relatively – since, being a chronic condition, it is for life, so, there is no cure – the happiness, the normality and the joy of existence.
Wagner
Without medical help, though, DSPS becomes progressively worse, and an individual suffering from this condition can lose completely the control of his life. If you suffer from this dysfunction – or another sleep disorder, since all of them are equally debilitating – medical treatment is fundamental, besides extremely necessary, for you to have a better quality of life, and to regain, at least relatively – since, being a chronic condition, it is for life, so, there is no cure – the happiness, the normality and the joy of existence.
Wagner
