I’m 80 years old. How long will it take to get over myself

Doing stupid things keeps me young.

I’m happy to report I’m not dying.

Well, I am. We all are. But in my case, not as soon as I expected last week. Nor do I have dementia, though you wouldn’t have guessed it a few days ago. Nor sleep apnea. In order, they were my next diagnoses, when I embarked on my latest scientific medical investigation.

You see, I’ve been putting up a brave front. I didn’t know how to break the news of my impending death to my peeps, so I just carried on. And continued sleeping 20 hours a day.

Oh, I knew that wasn’t normal. At least for me, so you can understand my alarm.

Not one to put my head in the sand, I suppose I’ll slip off the coil at some point. But maybe this was the first step. You just start sleeping your bloody head off. I laughed out loud when that thought popped into my brain.

My mother had once told me a story about my brother Frank, furious as a very young kid that the mosquitoes in their Bronx home were “eating me alive while Rita sleeps her bloody head off.”

I didn’t know until then the extent of sibling rivalry in my family. Since they all seemed adults when I came along, I thought I was the only disgruntled Cassidy. But that’s another story. Note for future research: If you can make yourself laugh on the terlit (see Bronx roots and the dialect that seeps in during musings about childhood), are you in imminent danger of dying?

Moving on, I tried to take a reasonable approach to my symptoms. It occurred to me that sleep disorders often announce various forms of dementia and snap. I wasn’t at death’s door. Brain deterioration was the reason I couldn’t stay awake more than a few hours at a time. Unless I crawled into bed at my usual time and examined every crack in my ceiling for several hours.

I’ve often joked about losing my mind-see tennis reference below. But it later occurred to me that if I had dementia, why wasn’t I putting my shoes in the refrigerator? I not only remembered where my keys were but what they were for, so I scotched that diagnosis. For the moment.

That’s when it occurred to me that maybe I had a sleep disorder! Why didn’t I think of that before? Days and days of preparing me for death or worse, and I wasn’t looking at the symptom right in front of my nose, which was probably snoring during lunch.

I did an online search and found daytime sleepiness and boom! There it was.

All I needed was one of those contraptions slapped over my face at night, and I’d be back in business.

As soon as I roused myself for the few minutes I could function during the day, I looked up my medical group and sure enough, they had a sleep disorder clinic. But imagine my despair when I called to make an appointment and learned they’d closed down the year before.

Perhaps, they’d put everybody to sleep.

Well, my only recourse was to call my doctor and make an appointment. as soon as I was able to keep my eyes open.

How embarrassing. The whole world was struggling with insomnia, and I couldn’t stay awake.

I began to count the problems my conditions would exacerbate. High on the list was my upcoming getaway with my daughter and her dog, Jack, whom I’ve memorialized in a haiku.

She’s been planning this for months and found a hotel that accommodates dogs. Carmel, our destination, is “super dog-friendly” she told me, skipping over the fact that Jack gets anxiety attacks if he’s 50 feet out of his comfort zone. So a two-hour drive into unknown territory would be “interesting” and sure to keep me awake.

But OMFG, I said to myself. Suppose I nodded off during dinner or in stores while it was my job to keep an eye on the Lab’s huge wagging tail near the expensive knickknacks?

Now I added anxiety to my list of disorders. In short order, I had become a high-functioning octogenarian that had crumpled into a somnolent, disfunctioning mess.

What of my writing and editing career? Could I continue to live independently with the new and disturbing disorder? I’d have to think of it later because I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I had to take a nap, perhaps not to wake until the morrow.

I suffered through the week, the weekend, losing track of the days. Monday came, and I realized I viewed my bed as the enemy. I refused to allow myself to give into my crippling sleepiness and stay at my computer. That’s how I found myself nodding over my keys, a severe crick in my neck.

Tuesday is my day to dogsit with Jack, and I made it through the day with only a short nap on the couch. I smiled courageously through dinner, not mentioning my malady to my daughter or her hubs.

Wednesday, I had a coffee date with a friend. I made it to the cafe and we chatted away, drinking our drinks and gossiping our gossip. Though she’s a close friend, I knew I couldn’t worry her with my condition.

It was then that it hit me. A whole day had gone by without even the hint of a yawn, a desire for sleep. Was I cured, or was it a temporary remission?

And like a whack on the head, I recalled my day in Sonoma when both a friend and I complained of having a mild bug. Nothing severe, we were just very tired all the time.

Like embarrassing evidence at a trial, the verdict hit me. I wasn’t dying, at least not that day. I didn’t have sleep apnea or a brain disorder. No more so than usual.

I had a virus, my sleeping sickness, I call it. Since my heart surgery seven years ago, I no longer get colds and flu and typical respiratory infections. My doctor said the surgery has helped rebuild my immune system. Great, I’ll take it. I do get little bug now and then and mostly I just sleep for a bit, a day or two and I’m fine.

This time, the sleeping condition wiped out my recollection of previous occasions and sent me into a panic. But no harm, no foul. Nobody knew.

I’ve been doing stupid things all my life, jeven when I was young. A classic example was the time I took up tennis. For realz, folks. Lessons before work by Stanford’s tennis team’s coach and all. Since I was all in, I treated myself to a new racquet. My daughter, 15 at the time, and my best friend were in my smallish kitchen with me when I unwrapped it.

Would have been great if I’d stopped there, but I proceeded to show off my new serve. Up and over my head. with the brand new racquet. Right into the light fixture. Everyone ducked as shattered glass covered every surface and startled head. So yeah, I’m not new to stupid. It’s like my fountain of youth.

But this time, by keeping quiet about my sleep disorder and suffering in silence, I’d saved myself the embarrassment of having to admit this particular occasion of stupidity.

Except.

My daughter and I embarked on our getaway with Jack this weekend and a good time was had by all. Except for the nonstop whining of Jack when he realized we’d passed the driveway, then the BART station and were well out of his comfort zone.

Ever been in a small car with an 85-pound lab pacing in the back seat and crying like a spoiled gangster’s starlet who didn’t get her diamond bracelet on time?

And you had one hour and fifty minutes ETA?

Yeah, like that. So to make conversation to cover up Jack’s distress (no dogs were harmed during this trip. He eventually had a blast), I said (what was I thinking?), “You’ll never guess what I did last week. I thought I was dying.”

My designated driver, who’s been down this road with me before, metaphorically speaking, this was our first road trip with Jack, said, “I know you used to make appointments for patients in a medical office, Mom, but I don’t think they awarded you a medical degree for that. Next time? Call. The. Doctor.”

And then she made it all about her by talking about shoes for the next hundred miles.

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