Scientists say that sleep is the best medicine that saves people from a lot of stress, illness, and helps relieve fatigue. The normal sleep duration for a healthy person is 8 hours. However, sometimes the line between normal sleep and sleep caused by stress is so thin that it gives rise to lethargy - a painful condition that is very similar to sleep, and is characterized by the absence of reactions and all external signs of life, immobility, a decrease in metabolic processes, and superficial and imperceptible breathing.
Scientists have not yet been able to establish the exact reasons that cause lethargic sleep, but they note that lethargy can occur as a result of severe hysterical seizures, stress, excitement, as well as depletion of the body.
Lethargic sleep can be light or heavy. In a severe form, a person is very much like a dead person, since the skin turns pale and cold, the eyes do not react to light, breathing becomes shallow, almost imperceptible, the pulse is almost not palpable. The physiological state of a person is deteriorating.
With mild lethargy, the changes are less radical: despite the fact that a person is motionless and relaxed, he partially perceives the world and maintains even breathing.
It is impossible to predict the beginning and end of this state, just like determining its duration. Modern doctors have learned to distinguish an imaginary death from a real one, but they are not yet able to find any remedy for lethargic sleep.
Lethargic sleep is sometimes compared to a coma. Indeed, certain properties of these two phenomena are similar. Coma occurs as a result of physical injury and damage. At the same time, the nervous system is depressed, and physical life is supported by artificial life support devices. A person does not respond to external stimuli, as in lethargy. You can get out of a coma on your own, as well as from lethargic sleep, however, more often this happens with the help of treatment and therapy.
People are afraid of lethargy because they are afraid of being buried alive. In reality, there is very little chance of being buried by mistake. Modern science knows ways to determine whether a person has really died.
If doctors have even the slightest suspicion that a person is in a state of lethargic sleep, they must do an electroencephalogram and an electrocardiogram, which record cardiac activity and the activity of the brain. In the event that a person is alive, such procedures will give results. Next, doctors carefully examine the patient's body to look for signs of death: obvious organ damage, rigor mortis, cadaveric spots. In addition, a person is in the morgue for one to two days, during which signs of death should appear.
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If in doubt, a small incision is also made to check for capillary bleeding, and a blood chemistry test is performed. Doctors also analyze the general picture of a person's condition in order to identify factors that could provoke lethargic sleep - hysterical seizures, weight loss, complaints of weakness and headaches, a decrease in blood pressure.
Lethargy has been known since ancient times. Even the Bible contains many examples of this mysterious disease. People were very afraid of her, and there were good reasons for that. In the Middle Ages, people were buried in mass graves, which were opened every time it was necessary to bury someone. Sometimes people noticed with horror that those who were buried earlier ended up in completely different positions than those that were given to them during burial.
All these fears became the reason that the Duke of Mecklenburg in 1772 announced that people should not be buried in his possession until the third day after his death. Soon, a similar measure spread throughout Europe. In the 19th century, undertakers began to make so-called "safe coffins" in which a person, buried alive, could hold out for some time and give a signal for help. In its simplest design, such a coffin was a wooden box, in which there was a tube brought out. A few days after the funeral, the priest always came to the grave, who sniffed at the smell coming from the grave. If there was no smell, the grave had to be opened and checked whether the person really died. In some cases, a bell was hung on the tube,with which a person could signal salvation.
In more complex designs of coffins, devices were provided for supplying water and food. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, a physician from Germany, Adolf Gutsmon, demonstrated his invention. He was buried alive in a coffin, in which he not only spent several hours, but was also able to dine with sausages and beer served with a special device.
But despite all the precautions, people who fell asleep in a lethargic sleep were still mistaken for the dead and buried.
So, the famous poet Petrarch almost fell victim to lethargy. He was seriously ill, and when he was unconscious, doctors took him for dead. The poet came to the next day, when preparations for the funeral were already in full swing. Interestingly, Petrarch's health has improved significantly. And after that he lived for another three decades.
In 1773, in Germany, a pregnant woman was dug up from a grave from where the screams were heard, who was buried the day before. The struggle for life provoked childbirth, and the child suffocated with his mother.
In 1838 an interesting and incredible incident happened in England. During the funeral, when the coffin was already buried in the grave, an indistinct sound came from it. The cemetery workers were very frightened, but by the time they came to their senses and excavated the grave, it was already too late - under the lid of the coffin, they saw a face with a mask of horror frozen on it. And his hands with abrasions and a torn shroud testified that the man was alive at the time he was buried.
Sometimes those who were buried alive were rescued by thieves who dug up graves in search of profit. The fact that cases of burial alive was quite a frequent occurrence is also evidenced by special homes for the dead, in which they collected basic necessities for those who might be resurrected so that they would not die of starvation and cold.
Not only ordinary people, but also famous personalities were afraid of being buried alive. After a real epidemic of lethargy began in Europe in 1910-1930, the fear of being buried alive was called taphophobia. The first President of the United States, George Washington, suffered from this disease. He constantly asked his family to bury him no earlier than a few days after his death. The famous Russian poet Marina Tsvetaeva and inventor Alfred Nobel felt the same fear. But perhaps the most famous person who was susceptible to taphophobia was the writer Nikolai Gogol. It should be noted that the writer had certain grounds for this. In his younger years, Gogol suffered from malarial encephalitis. Then, throughout life, the disease made itself felt by periodic loss of consciousness and subsequent sleep. The writer was afraid that during one of these faints he would be mistaken for dead and buried. And in the last years of his life, this fear became so strong that Nikolai Vasilyevich even preferred to sleep while sitting, so that the sleep was more sensitive. According to rumors, the writer's fears were justified, and he was indeed buried alive. Later, when the grave was opened for reburial, they found the body of the writer lying in an unnatural position with his head turned to one side. However, modern experts have found a completely logical explanation for this: they say, the coffin boards rot unevenly and fall through, which leads to a violation of the position of the skeleton. According to rumors, the writer's fears were justified, and he was indeed buried alive. Later, when the grave was opened for reburial, they found the body of the writer lying in an unnatural position with his head turned to one side. However, modern experts have found a completely logical explanation for this: they say, the coffin boards rot unevenly and fall through, which leads to a violation of the position of the skeleton. According to rumors, the writer's fears were justified, and he was indeed buried alive. Later, when the grave was opened for reburial, they found the body of the writer lying in an unnatural position with his head turned to one side. However, modern experts have found a completely logical explanation for this: they say, the coffin boards rot unevenly and fall through, which leads to a violation of the position of the skeleton.
Where does lethargic sleep come from? What factors are the impetus for the body to fall into a state of deep oblivion? According to some experts, lethargic sleep can be caused by severe stress: when the body is faced with experiences that it cannot bear, then a protective reaction is activated, which manifests itself in the form of lethargic sleep.
According to another hypothesis, a virus can cause lethargic sleep. It is the presence of the virus that some scientists explain the frequent cases of lethargy in Europe at the beginning of the last century.
In addition, scientists discovered another very interesting pattern: in most cases of lethargy, people who often had sore throats in the past were susceptible. This gave rise to a third theory, according to which lethargic sleep is caused by staphylococcus, which mutated and invaded the brain tissue.
Whether there is a correct one among these versions, or are they all wrong, science has yet to figure out. In the meantime, people can only hope that lethargy will bypass them. Or, in the event that a person is in a state of lethargic sleep, he will not be buried alive or there will be a chance for salvation. For example, in England to this day there is a law according to which in all refrigerators of the morgue there is a bell with a rope in case the "dead" comes to his senses. And in Slovakia they went even further: they put a mobile phone in the grave with the deceased.
Be that as it may, but modern medicine is sufficiently developed in order not to confuse a sleeping person with a deceased. But if there is no trust in medicine, you can protect yourself on your own, because the best guarantee against lethargic sleep is the absence of stress and a calm life.