Exploring The Cause Of Psychological Disorders In Sleepwalk With Me

The movie that this student chose to watch was “Sleepwalk With Me” the movie was written and directed by comedian Mike Birbiglia, the movie tells the story of Mike Birbiglia and how suffers from rapid eye movement behavior disorder (REM), which is a sleep disorder that involves abnormal behavior during the sleep period. The person often walks, talks and interacts while dreaming, the client will often act out his or her dreams, and in some cases, this disorder can result in injury to self or to others. One of the causes of this disorder is feelings of anxiety that go unexpressed, and that is the case with Mike, he is a unsuccessful stand up comic who works at a bartender at a comedy club because he is not a successful comedian, but he is also in a long time relationship with his girlfriend who he lives with. They have been together for eight years, and with the wedding of his younger sister fast approaching, he is feeling pressured that maybe he should be getting married as well. He is feeling pressured because his girlfriend have talked to him about it, his parents also are pressuring him into getting married. Although, Mike have been suffering with REM for a long time, the episodes are now more frequent, and much more intense. The
movie does not have counselor who is helping him, but his dad is encouraging him to see a sleep disorder specialist, especially after a few incidents where Mike have gotten hurt during some of his episodes. Mike's dad also gives him an audio book from a psychologist who is an expert in sleeping disorders, and throughout the movie, Mike listen to the tapes in his car, and while he is listening, he pictures the psychologist in the car with him, as they discuss his sleep disorder. So there is a counselor helping him through the tapes, and he perceives that the counselor is sitting next to him in the car. The counselor's voice is very monotonous, almost robotic at times, and since Mike listen to the tapes while he is driving in the middle of the night, and at times he even gets bored and sleepy while listening. The tapes, with the counselor speaking, seems to be from a sleep disorder expert, Mike's father refer to the doctor in the tape as a sleep disorder expert. The doctor offers techniques that will help Mike to improve. But Mike's dad also makes appointments for him at the hospital so they may do x-ray exams of his brain and try to help him. Towards the end of the movie, when so much seems to be going wrong for Mike, he decides to finally go to the hospital, where they do further studies in his brain. The movies does go into details as to what exactly the x-rays are for, but there is a team of doctors, and they do seem to be doing everything ethically. Eventually, in the end of the movie, we see that Mike have made some changes to the way he goes to sleep. The movie is not clear if those changes were made based on what the doctors suggested, or if it was Mike's idea, but one of the things that Mike begins to do is to sleep inside a sleeping bag, all zipped up, with gloves on, so that he cannot open his sleeping bag, therefore, preventing him from sleepwalking. Mike is portrayed in the movie as an unsuccessful comedian, who really cares for his girlfriend but does not want to commit to marriage, and since that is something that she wants to do, he is feeling pressured to either marry her or end their relationship. Although the movie is funny at times, it does not minimize the dangers of sleepwalking or anxiety, in fact, it shows how this disorder has affected his relationship with his girlfriend and even with his parents. Mike does not seem to know of anyone else who suffers from the same diagnose as him, he does not have a support group of others who have experience some of what he have experience. The movie depicts the issue of denial, Mike keeps denying that he needs help with his sleep disorder, but he also never deals with what is causing it to happen.
He is suffering from anxiety, which he never talks about, the anxiety over his stalled career and the outside pressure to marry his longtime girlfriend pushes Mike, who is commitment-shy person to sleepwalk. He is unable to talk to his girlfriend about his true feelings, what really is bothering him, and that is also having a negative impact in his relationship. For viewers of this movie, they might see the danger of sleepwalking, and how it can harm you if left untreated, they can also see the some of the consequences of suffering from anxiety and not do anything about
it. From this student personal reflection and Christian world-view, this movie have a significant meaning, this student suffered from sleepwalking for most of his life, and at times there were some incidents that were almost as serious as some portrayed in the movie. The student have never seem a counselor or any specialist about it, and it seems that it is genetic, since at least three of his other siblings also suffered from this disorder. This student had instances where he woke up in places he did not recognize, or once woke up taking a shower without realizing what he was doing, just like Mike did once in the movie. As a Christian, this student have learned to pray every night before going to sleep, and that seems to help, another strategy that have seem to work is not going to sleep too early, making sure that he is tired enough, even if he have to do some physical exercises at night before going to sleep. As a counselor, this student will perhaps be more sympathetic and understanding of those who also suffer from sleep disorders, and will be able to relate to some of the unique experiences associated with that. From a Christian perspective, and from personal experience, this student believes that stress, anxiety and even anger are some contributor factors that increases the occurrences of sleepwalking, therefore, prayer and devotion are very important in helping the client. But there are also medicines and treatments that can help control this incidents, in the end of the movie, Mike is seen sleeping zipped up in his sleeping bag, wearing mitten gloves, from this student's personal experiences, that never worked, perhaps for some people that could help. But this student have seen that although he occasionally sleepwalks still, it is not as severe as when he was a teenager and a young adult. Perhaps circumstances, diet, sleep deprivation and stress plays a bigger part in causing this disorder than people might think.