DEBS
"Things aren’t so bad. It’s just that sometimes, you just don’t like it, living, you don’t feel like living, you would like to hit snooze on yourself for a day and erase the you that exists between today’s and tomorrow’s alarm. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?"
Like all of the characters in this play, we don't know much about Debs. Here are a few clues:
1. She likes to watch movies with female protagonists and genres ranging from rom-coms to mystery thrillers. many of the films she references have realistic plotlines, but with touches of surrealism added in. The movies she references in the play are here: Click one!
2. She struggles with insomnia. At 5 AM, she takes an Advil PM to, which is effective for roughly 4-6 hours (sleepiness may last longer). It contains diphenhydramine, a sedating antihistamine. It blocks acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter in your brain that plays a role in REM sleep (the phase involving dreams). This increases phases of light sleep at the expense of deeper sleep, leading to higher chances of next-day sedation.
"the sleep train has left the station and it’s not stopping anytime soon. You’re not dreaming, your sleep is clinical, harsh and antiseptic, stripped of any neural activity."
- 7 AM
The next section discusses the science of dissociation, how it feels, and references (w/o details) trauma associated with the phenomenon. It's about 3 paragraphs long with 3 infographics. There's nothing past this section, so if you'd like to not engage with this content, feel free to mosey on to another page of the site.