Woman Sleeps For 22 Hours a Day for Six Months

A young woman’s rare condition called ‘Sleeping Beauty Syndrome’ has left her sleeping for 22 hours a day for six months after she was diagnosed with Sleeping Beauty Syndrome.

Beth Goodier, now 22, from Stockport, Cheshire, should have finished university and started her training as a child psychologist. However, in the run-up to her 17th birthday in November five years ago, Beth fell asleep “” and for six months, she kept sleeping for 22 hours a day, and only waking in a dream-like trance to take a little food and drink and go to the toilet.

Her mother, Janine, 48, says that her daughter has been asleep 75 per cent of the time.

Beth is now one of over 100 young people in Britain diagnosed with Kleine-Levin Syndrome (KLS) “” known as Sleeping Beauty Syndrome.

She said that Beth first began to feel exhausted when she was 16 years old and Janine thought it was part of being a normal teenager. However, one evening, Beth fell asleep on the couch and wouldn’t wake up. Janine tried to rouse her daughter, who could only babble incoherently in the voice of a five-year-old.

Horrified, Janine assumed Beth had a brain tumour or haemorrhage, so she took her to hospital, but all tests came out clear. Even medical staff were baffled by her condition until a doctor remembered a colleague who had dealt with a similar case.

At the time, Beth had just recovered from tonsillitis, and her medical team suspects the illness was the trigger. Researchers believe an infection could set off inflammation in the brain in people with a genetic predisposition, and this may damage the thalamus and hypothalamus, the areas responsible for sleep and sensory input.

Since her diagnosis, Beth has been asleep more than she has been awake, and when she wakes up, she has could not remember she was ill or a realisation that time has moved on.

There is not much information about what triggers the sleep disorder and nor its cure. What is only known is that it mainly strikes teenagers, mostly at 16 years of age, and lasts around 13 years.

Dr Guy Leschziner, a consultant neurologist at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Trust, one of the leading experts on the condition says that the number of cases of KLS, which was named after the doctors who identified the syndrome a century ago, seems to be increasing as more young people are diagnosed. “In the past, milder cases were blamed on teens being lazy and swinging the lead. Otherwise, they were viewed as psychiatric cases or having symptoms of a bipolar disorder,” he said.

Dr Leschziner adds that apart from sleeping for up to 22 hours a day, this sleep disorder makes young people experience personality changes.

“They feel as if they are in a dream-like state very separate from the world around them. It has a massive impact on their lives. When they wake up and realise what they’ve missed, they may be depressed and anxious.

“While it’s not terminal, young people with KLS can see their lives slipping away in their most formative and important years,” he said.

So her life has been spent in pyjamas in bed or asleep on the sofa. On the rare occasions she leaves her home, to see a doctor, she must be pushed in a wheelchair because she is too tired to walk.

At the moment, Beth is two-and-a half months into another deep sleep episode, and nothing will wake her.

Now, all Janine can do is sit and wait desperately for the ‘on’ switch to flick back in her daughter’s head.

“It is like night and day. She might wake up tomorrow and then it’s a race against time to live the life she should have had. She rushes off to catch up with her friends and get her hair done. But no one knows when she might fall asleep again,” Janine said.

Source: Dailymail.co.uk