This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Tonya Pinkins: Hi, I'm Tonya Pinkins, and you're listening to my podcast.

[0:02] Tonya Pinkins: You can't say that, the podcast where you can on the Broadway Podcast Network.

[0:11] Tonya Pinkins: I don't know what day this will air, but we're recording it on March 17th in New York City.

[0:17] Tonya Pinkins: It is, I don't know, maybe 30 days, 60 days, depending on where you are in the world, into the corona pandemic.

[0:27] Tonya Pinkins: And this will be the final in-house recording for the Broadway Podcast Network, as we, like everyone else, are shutting down to keep it safe for all of us in New York City and around the globe.

[0:43] Tonya Pinkins: So I am delighted that my guest today is this really funny person, a good person, a brilliant writer who's come to be a friend of mine.

[0:53] Tonya Pinkins: Um every time I share his writing with anyone, they're like, is this guy writing for a TV series?

[0:59] Tonya Pinkins: Uh his first drafts are like, you know, drafts after people have been working on things for five years and um the vagaries of the business.

[1:09] Tonya Pinkins: You have not heard of him because he's just too brilliant to be done.

[1:15] Tonya Pinkins: So sad about our business that sometimes the really good people, you know, the powers that be don't want to work with them because they can't put their hands in it and make it better.

[1:26] Tonya Pinkins: So join me in welcoming my dear friend, Blaine Teamer.

[1:32] Blaine Teamer: Hi, Tonya.

[1:33] Blaine Teamer: How are you?

[1:34] Tonya Pinkins: I am hanging in there.

[1:36] Blaine Teamer: That's an interesting question that I get asked a lot.

[1:39] Blaine Teamer: So uh I'm evolving.

[1:41] Blaine Teamer: That's my new answer.

[1:42] Blaine Teamer: I am evolving.

[1:43] Blaine Teamer: And I really I feel like everything is evolving, and I choose to believe that everything is evolving towards higher levels of good, even when it doesn't look like that to us, that it is actually getting better.

[1:56] Tonya Pinkins: I totally believe that, even when you cannot see it.

[2:00] Blaine Teamer: Yeah.

[2:01] Blaine Teamer: Yeah.

[2:02] Tonya Pinkins: So let's start by talking a little bit about you as a writer before we get on to why I asked you to come on.

[2:08] Tonya Pinkins: But you know, let's talk about you as a writer.

[2:12] Blaine Teamer: Okay.

[2:12] Blaine Teamer: Tell us about your, you know.

[2:16] Blaine Teamer: My writing.

[2:17] Blaine Teamer: Well, um, right now the thing that I'm really excited about is uh I am trying to create my own podcast around uh my theater.

[2:29] Tonya Pinkins: Are you gonna compete with my podcast?

[2:31] Blaine Teamer: Not at all.

[2:32] Blaine Teamer: I mean there's room for all good things.

[2:34] Blaine Teamer: We need more good things.

[2:37] Blaine Teamer: But you know, I have been um I've been writing for a long time, and uh I had the opportunity, a couple opportunities to do um audio recordings.

[2:47] Blaine Teamer: Yes, we did the Parsnip Snip, did a you can listen on the Parsnip Ship, Parsnip Ship to Deadweight, Blaine Teamer's play.

[2:57] Tonya Pinkins: Correct.

[2:58] Blaine Teamer: And then uh starting the beginning of this year, some friends in California.

[3:02] Blaine Teamer: It seems like we always do something in New York, and then I come back to Los Angeles, and I'm like, well, why can't we do that here in Los Angeles?

[3:11] Tonya Pinkins: So some of the people.

[3:12] Blaine Teamer: Because you guys aren't as cool as we are.

[3:14] Tonya Pinkins: We are not as cool.

[3:15] Blaine Teamer: We're on a different time zone, so it takes us longer to get up to speed.

[3:22] Blaine Teamer: Um, but uh some friends we got together and uh we did it like old-fashioned.

[3:28] Blaine Teamer: You re-recorded the show that we recorded here in New York.

[3:31] Blaine Teamer: Correct, correct.

[3:33] Tonya Pinkins: Because you didn't like it so much here.

[3:35] Blaine Teamer: That is not true at all.

[3:37] Blaine Teamer: And I heard your new recordings, and they actually are really cool.

[3:40] Blaine Teamer: I love what you've done with the narration, and if you have some bits of it, you can send it to us and we'll include it on this.

[3:47] Blaine Teamer: We'll include it in this podcast.

[3:49] Blaine Teamer: Because I love the way you've added the sound effects, and I love the character of the narrator that you've added.

[3:54] Blaine Teamer: It's totally different.

[3:55] Blaine Teamer: It's totally different.

[3:56] Blaine Teamer: It's like uh one person doing a version of a song and then someone else doing a different version of a song, but they're both great.

[4:04] Tonya Pinkins: Yeah.

[4:05] Blaine Teamer: So it's just been really fun to kind of uh try to do it like a traditional old radio show.

[4:13] Blaine Teamer: It's been a lot of fun for me to do, especially because I have this time to kind of be home and to do it, uh, and take time to do it.

[4:23] Blaine Teamer: Uh so that is the big thing that I'm really excited about, which I guess will lead into what we're gonna talk about.

[4:31] Tonya Pinkins: Uh well, actually, I you know, because you were talking about the difference between LA and New York, I have been trying to get uh production of Blaine's play, hashtag box seats done for since you wrote it.

[4:42] Tonya Pinkins: What is it like five years ago now?

[4:44] Blaine Teamer: And we've had we've had we had a reading at the National Black Theater with an incredible cast.

[4:50] Blaine Teamer: Uh Peter Kim, Darius De Haas, uh Jennifer Kim, uh James Scrugs, and then we had a reading down at uh Jocelyn Dio.

[4:50] Blaine Teamer: We had a reading at New York Theater Workshop.

[5:01] Blaine Teamer: And I mean, this play just went over like gangbusters here in New York.

[5:06] Blaine Teamer: People were falling out of their seats laughing.

[5:08] Tonya Pinkins: And then two years ago, we did a reading of it in Los Angeles at uh the Jane Fonda Lily Tomlin Center, and the Angelinos do not laugh at themselves.

[5:21] Blaine Teamer: Yeah, they didn't get it.

[5:22] Blaine Teamer: They're like, oh, this is like for real.

[5:24] Blaine Teamer: This is this is what we do.

[5:26] Tonya Pinkins: Whereas we were laughing at this.

[5:27] Blaine Teamer: Yeah, what's so funny?

[5:29] Blaine Teamer: That's that's our life.

[5:30] Tonya Pinkins: That's what we do.

[5:31] Blaine Teamer: You know, I thought it I thought it was gonna be the exact opposite.

[5:35] Blaine Teamer: I thought when you said that you wanted to first do it, because we first did it in Harlem.

[5:41] Tonya Pinkins: Yeah, and they loved it.

[5:42] Blaine Teamer: And they loved it.

[5:43] Blaine Teamer: And I was so freaked out because I'm like, they're not gonna get it in Harlem, they're not gonna get it in New York, they're gonna hate it.

[5:50] Blaine Teamer: I just I don't know what I'm doing.

[5:52] Blaine Teamer: And I was terrified.

[5:53] Blaine Teamer: And then the response was just like I could not believe that they thought it was so funny, like they got it.

[6:01] Tonya Pinkins: Yeah.

[6:02] Blaine Teamer: And uh I think in Los Angeles, it was just like, oh, this is just like everyday life.

[6:09] Blaine Teamer: And they laugh at all the sitcoms that are like so for me, boring everyday life, but they were not having they were not laughing at themselves.

[6:18] Tonya Pinkins: And I actually someone said that that they found it was was homophobic.

[6:21] Blaine Teamer: I was like, what?

[6:22] Blaine Teamer: Homophobic, what?

[6:23] Tonya Pinkins: Oh, I didn't, is that what it was?

[6:25] Blaine Teamer: They thought it was homophobic.

[6:27] Tonya Pinkins: Someone thought it was homophobic.

[6:28] Blaine Teamer: Right.

[6:29] Blaine Teamer: Which was really like I was like, huh?

[6:31] Blaine Teamer: I was like, okay, okay.

[6:33] Blaine Teamer: Uh because you know, as uh, you know, I'm black, I'm gay, I'm I'm married, I've um volunteered for where it was where the reading took place.

[6:43] Blaine Teamer: I've been a volunteer there, I've been a part of that community for 30 years.

[6:50] Blaine Teamer: Um, so I think I'm aware of what's going on and sensitive and involved.

[6:56] Blaine Teamer: And so for that to be the conclusion or the judgment about it was kind of I was taken aback.

[7:05] Tonya Pinkins: Mm-hmm.

[7:06] Blaine Teamer: Me too.

[7:06] Blaine Teamer: A little bit.

[7:07] Blaine Teamer: Yeah.

[7:07] Blaine Teamer: I stood my ground and was like, I I just don't agree.

[7:11] Tonya Pinkins: Right.

[7:11] Blaine Teamer: Especially because, you know, there was uh, you know, it was a primarily a gay audience.

[7:17] Blaine Teamer: But I think another thing too is that I've had to live in so many different environments.

[7:24] Blaine Teamer: So I really kind of adapt my funny based upon different groups of people.

[7:32] Blaine Teamer: So everybody is not gonna get what I'm doing.

[7:36] Blaine Teamer: And I think what was interesting about the one that we did at uh New York Theater Workshop was um, you know, it was a really tight room, and it was interesting how the laughter moved around the room.

[7:48] Blaine Teamer: So, you know, there were I could see where there were young gay people who were getting you know, some of the jokes, and then there were older uh black people who were getting other parts of the jokes, and then so the laughter was just like moving around based upon demographic.

[8:07] Blaine Teamer: So it's great to have, you know, I'm really writing for a multicultural um audience and trying to put something in for everyone, but everyone is not going to get everything.

[8:20] Blaine Teamer: And Jim Nicola stayed awake for the whole thing, and at the end he just told you that it was comedy with content.

[8:27] Tonya Pinkins: Which is I heard that's like a historical thing to have historical, right?

[8:32] Blaine Teamer: Jim stayed awake for the whole reading and talked to us afterwards.

[8:36] Blaine Teamer: We're waiting for that production, Jim Nicola.

[8:38] Blaine Teamer: We're waiting for that New York Theater Workshop production.

[8:41] Blaine Teamer: We're waiting to become usual suspects so we can move in the pipeline to be one of those productions.

[8:47] Tonya Pinkins: Well, hopefully, you know, people will hear the um, you know, I couldn't wait forever.

[8:53] Blaine Teamer: Um, but you know, hopefully people can hear what I'm doing now with trying to just kind of take more control over my own work in regards to creativity and not waiting for someone's kind of acceptance.

[9:08] Blaine Teamer: And I think everything that I've done that um has gotten out has happened that way.

[9:15] Blaine Teamer: Like with the projects that we've done, it's just been like, hey, let's just have fun and do this.

[9:19] Blaine Teamer: And then it's just kind of caught on amongst us, and then somebody else sees it and it goes on from there.

[9:27] Tonya Pinkins: Well, I find that with my own creativity that I'm I I often start by asking a bunch of people to come and let's do this, let's do this, and it just fizzles out and dies.

[9:37] Tonya Pinkins: And then if I actually invest the time and money and get it going and do it on my own, then people will come.

[9:45] Blaine Teamer: If you build it, people will come.

[9:46] Tonya Pinkins: But when you just start off with the idea and ask them to come on, they don't see a vision, they're not coming on.

[9:53] Blaine Teamer: Right.

[9:54] Tonya Pinkins: And then once you're on, they're willing, they're happy to tell you what's wrong with it.

[9:57] Blaine Teamer: And then you have to hold your vision and go, yeah, thank you.

[9:59] Blaine Teamer: But I got this.

[10:06] Tonya Pinkins: So one of the why do you ask why didn't you ask me to participate?

[10:09] Tonya Pinkins: I would have loved to have done that.

[10:11] Blaine Teamer: Like I did ask you, but you didn't remember that.

[10:15] Tonya Pinkins: Right.

[10:15] Blaine Teamer: You didn't return my phone call.

[10:16] Blaine Teamer: You didn't answer the email.

[10:18] Blaine Teamer: I actually, with my movie, I gave it to somebody and asked them to be a producer on it.

[10:23] Blaine Teamer: And and I we had several conversations, and they were like, Well, if you can get someone else to come in with money, I can bring another person in with money and blah, blah, blah, blah.

[10:30] Blaine Teamer: And then like early January, they send me a text.

[10:33] Blaine Teamer: I'm like, I read it.

[10:35] Blaine Teamer: It's really good.

[10:36] Blaine Teamer: Let's go and try to talk to this person.

[10:38] Blaine Teamer: Then that person, like, we shot the movie already.

[10:52] Tonya Pinkins: So I think one of the things beside go ahead. Don't go ahead. But I want to come back to that point where when you said the person, they finally read it. That'll come back up in the theme of what we're gonna talk about.

[11:05] Tonya Pinkins: So one of the really remarkable things, and what I wanted to talk to you about on my podcast is that you do this incredible creativity and incredible writing while also managing a condition that you're gonna have to define. I'm I'm gonna say what I think it is, and if I say it wrong, idiopathic hypersomnia, right?

[11:23] Blaine Teamer: That's it.

[11:24] Tonya Pinkins: I said it correctly. And and what is the medical definition of idiopathic hypersomnia? And then tell me what that looks like on you because what is different for you is it doesn't look like everybody else's, and so they can't figure out what to do for you.

[11:39] Blaine Teamer: Well, uh, idiopathic hypersomnia, it's a neurological disorder, and uh it's primarily characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness, and it's really hard to diagnose, and um there's really no cure for it, and there really hasn't been research is just starting with it, um, but the way I the way I would describe it is is that it's like someone would give you a Xanax right before you're about to do your show, or someone is giving you Xanax throughout the day and you don't know it.

[12:26] Blaine Teamer: So it's it for me, it feels like the feeling when you have the flu and you have that exhaustion and you're just your entire body is just um exhausted. So what's happening to me is that one of the things is that I don't get I'm unable to get restorative sleep. So I will, you know, I've had this for so long, you know. So I will go to bed at a certain time, I'll wake up at a certain time, um, but I will wake up exhausted.

[13:00] Tonya Pinkins: Now is go ahead.

[13:03] Blaine Teamer: No, go ahead.

[13:04] Tonya Pinkins: Is there no REM sleep happening in this?

[13:06] Blaine Teamer: I'm I don't get any REM sleep.

[13:08] Tonya Pinkins: That's it. Which people say is an impossibility that you can't live without getting REM sleep, but you're a proof that it's not an impossibility.

[13:14] Blaine Teamer: It I guess anything is possible. So yeah, so you know, I'm going through these cycles, and I'm in the REM sleep part, um, it's just all out of whack, and they can't, you know. I've had to take um sleep study test, and um uh what's happening, part of what's happening is that there's a stimuli that's happening in my brain that for most people, you may get like five stimuli um during the course of your sleep, and mine will be like a hundred stimuli.

[13:51] Blaine Teamer: So, like it's imagine like a little flashlight going off in your brain like a hundred times, waking you up, so waking you up, but I'm still it it appears that I'm asleep, but I'm not in a deep enough sleep to get restorative sleep. So historically, what has happened is is that I've with this disorder, you usually get it um in your tweens, like around 12, 13.

[14:18] Blaine Teamer: So I recall a beginning during that period, and I would always wonder. You know, I would go to the doctors, they would check me out, and physically I I've always been in good health. So they couldn't find out what why I was having this fatigue problem all the time. And so I would I have recollections of of each stage of my life thinking, well, how am I going to get through high school because I can't, I'm too, I'm so tired, or how am I gonna make it through college because I can't stay awake.

[14:54] Blaine Teamer: And then, you know, coming to California was like, how am I going to work because I'm so I have this fatigue? It's just it's just a deep, deep fatigue. And it would kind of ebb and flow. It wasn't, it was, it could be like low, and then it could be really bad, where I would have like slurred speech, and I just couldn't really function very well. My cognitive ability was off.

[15:19] Blaine Teamer: Um, but there would always be um, I always was able to kind of manage it.

[15:24] Tonya Pinkins: Uh well, I think you beyond managed it. I think that what you're describing, people would have a hard time believing such a thing as possible because you you not only got through high school, you got through college. You then went on and got a degree. You're a psychologist as well, right?

[15:39] Blaine Teamer: Well, I have a I majored in psychology because I wanted to understand what was happening to me from that, because you know, you go through all these stages and you you you meet with people and they go, Oh, well, I'm a psychologist, listening to what you're saying, I think you're depressed, or I'm an acupuncturist and uh you need acupuncture, or I am a foot doctor, and I think if you got your feet worked on, that would cure the problem.

[16:10] Blaine Teamer: So whoever you go to, they're going to suggest that what I'm doing is going to make a difference, and that's gonna make you better. And so uh there was a period where you know it becomes very depressing because you're so exhausted uh through everything. And um, so I went through therapy, and the therapist that I was working with was like, Oh, you would make a really good therapist.

[16:35] Blaine Teamer: And I was like, I really don't feel like listening to other people's problems. I'm too tired. I really don't. And I think people tell me their problems because I'm so tired I can't interrupt.

[16:50] Blaine Teamer: So you just like exhausted and you're just listening, and they just think you're the best listener in the world.

[16:56] Tonya Pinkins: Well, will this stop?

[16:58] Blaine Teamer: So uh uh I'll remember that the next time I'm telling you my problems.

[17:04] Tonya Pinkins: No, I I'm fully alert and aware of all when I'm listening to people. Um, but but I do, I think part of it too is that I really do tune in, and I do have this ability to kind of like take in people's stuff, and I think that's what he was tuning in as well.

[17:20] Blaine Teamer: So um, and I really do kind of process it in a different way, and everybody isn't always prepared to kind of hear what I kind of put out. Like, I think if I was doing therapy, like sessions would be like you would just have one session, that's all you would really need. Because I would be like, This is your problem, and you can just pay with credit card when you're there.

[17:47] Blaine Teamer: And I used to like, I used to do that a lot. And I would like, and people would like stop talking to me. Because it was like I would just hone right into what the issue was. And they would be like, How dare you tell me the truth about who I really am? And uh that would get me in a lot.

[18:07] Tonya Pinkins: So I I really had to kind of like control and like stop doing that. And that's not what therapy is anyway. You know, therapy is a whole different different process.

[18:15] Blaine Teamer: Yeah, it's a relationship and people want it to last a long time. You're not supposed to tell the person, this is what your problem is, this is what you're supposed to do, which is what a lot of people want, even though they're going to ignore it when you tell them.

[18:27] Tonya Pinkins: Um, it's really getting people to come to that conclusion themselves.

[18:31] Blaine Teamer: It's so boring though. Like when you can look at somebody and you can see exactly what's wrong, and now you gotta wait for them to catch up with you.

[18:39] Tonya Pinkins: Yeah, and it and sometimes they don't want to. It's not, you know, they're not ready to catch up. I think that's the same thing I experienced as a as a teacher, is that often I can I can look at a student, I can see what the block is to their creativity, I can see the power they have.

[18:55] Tonya Pinkins: I can even get them to have an experience of it in the moment, but if they psychologically can't have that, then they can't even believe the reality of an experience that everyone else in the room can say, we saw that, we know that, you know.

[19:07] Blaine Teamer: Right, right. And that's so disheartening for me to kind of um experience that because so often I see the potential, the like amazing potential and situations or people, or um, you know, the opportunity, and people can't see it for themselves right and so no matter what you're trying to do to push or pull or to get them there they just they're just not ready to kind of see it so I've really try to pull back on doing that and uh you know if I can be supportive in a different way um that I I try to do that but uh I I just can't get so wrapped up into people being stuck and I think the theme of being stuck is like something that I use in my writing often the theme that I use a lot the idea of just kind of being uh what gets us stuck and unable to kind of move out of that spot.

[20:12] Tonya Pinkins: Well have you thought about that in terms of you're not getting restorative sleep and is there some metaphorical psychological thing behind this theme of the stuckness of this you know of the awakefulness and the exhaustion have has that come up for you know it?

[20:12] Blaine Teamer: Well it has it has because sometimes it feels like well I am in uh purgatory it feels like purgatory because it's it's trying to figure out um like I've had a full cycle loop uh this past year with um deciding to uh uh step away from my job I'm gonna take a medical leave and really focus on I have to get better. Like I want to figure out where I am with this disorder and get better.

[21:07] Blaine Teamer: And then I ended up spending a year going to see like a lesion of like doctors and specialists. And by the end of that year, I realized I think what I knew all along is that you really have to um one, be an advocate for yourself, you have to know your own body.

[21:29] Blaine Teamer: You have to kind of stay grounded in like your truth and what's happening to you because you're going to.

[21:45] Blaine Teamer: Be specific. Tell us the story. Because you've, I mean, I know some of these stories. So in 2018, I like I said, I've had this since I was about 12. And so it feels like you have the flu, because you're just so exhausted. And nobody thought it's like Epstein Bar or Right. So over the years, you know, there have been all of these illnesses related to fatigue that they've kind of put upon me. Like you have Epstein Barr, you have chronic fatigue syndrome, you have you're depressed, you're this or whatever. And so, but there was no kind of solution for it. You know, sometimes they would put me on antidepressant. And, you know, I was really able to discern between a depressing situation and being chronically depressed.

And they're two, you know, they can be two separate things. But no, no one is listening to that when you're telling them that in a in a in a uh in a session. So I finally decided, you know, uh, work was becoming, I wasn't able to manage work that well. And I I was going to take off time and um And um, and when you say you had what was happening that you couldn't manage because you've you've gone to college. Well, what happens is is that in 2015, I was diagnosed with idiopathic hypersomnia. And I was just so happy and relieved that there was a name for it. That I was like, I was like, I don't, I don't care what now that there's a name, I don't care what it's called, there's a name for it. And my doctor was like, and you can take this stimulant called Adderall.

And so I'm like, oh my gosh, there's a pill that you can take, and you feel now up until that point, everyone else had given me sedatives to try to get me to sleep. And that didn't work. So I could take like three ambient or any type of sedative, and it just didn't, it didn't keep me, it didn't put me in a deep enough sleep to get rest. And then the next day I would feel even groggier because I had all those sedatives in my system. So this was the first person that the doctor, he was asleep specialist, he was a pulmonologist, and he said, You have this disorder called IH, it's really severe, and I'm gonna put you on Adderall as a um a stimulant. There is no specific treatment for IH, but we're gonna treat it similar to people who have narcolepsy.

So I started on Adderall, and it was like the Tanya, for the first time, like the the fog was gone. And it was like clarity, and I had like all of this energy, mental entry energy. And so I remember like organizing the closet and like putting like labels on boxes, and you know, everything was in alphabetical order and just going through everything. I was like, I have all this. And as time went on, what happens is that the efficacy of the drug wears off, and you have to take more for it to work. But meantime, I'm still not getting any sleep. So I'm going, going, going, going, going. And it was like my routine was I lived near the rose ball at that time. So I would get up, I would walk our dog around the Rose Bowl, I would get up, I would go to uh to the gym, I would go work my eight hours, I would come back, I would work, walk the dog.

And mentally, my mind was just saying, just go, go, go, go, go. But my body was not getting any rest. And then so then I had to increase the Adderall more, and uh still not getting any sleep. So then my doctor put me on something called sodium oxybate, which um is also for people who have narcolepsy, and that is what was known as the date rape drug. So I was I had to take that in order to try to go to sleep, but you know, I was then going, getting in my car in the morning and having to drive to work to Burbank. So um, and and it still wasn't, I still wasn't feeling rested. So I got off the sodium oxidate, and I was taking the maximum dose of the Adderall to kind of um just get through. Maximum based on what?

I mean, like there's just some rule that's the man lets you take my own. Right. Well, you're not supposed to take more than 60 milligrams because what happens? What's the risk? Well, you know, first of all, it's it's not specifically for people who have IH. So it's very addictive. And um I don't really know why. I do know people, I I am hearing now of people who have taken who have had to take higher doses. And because mine is so extreme, my doctor suggested that I take a higher dose. Um, but I really didn't want to do that. Um, because what would happen is is that first of all, you know, now that I'm so awake with this drug, everything is getting on my nerves. Like I am seeing all of the crazy shit that people are doing, and I'm calling them out on it.

Like it's like it's like I'm awake for the first time and have energy to kind of tell people this is like this is not reality. This is crazy. So that didn't work well at work. That didn't work well around friends, and probably my husband, my spouse, my husband. And so, but it was like the truth. It was like for the first time, it was like this like this is like you're crazy. This is not true. Stop lying. And uh I think that's what I wrote dead weight out of. It's just like the the acts of bad faith and people just being so just saying anything to you and just expecting you to kind of like go along with it. And I just my mind just wouldn't let me do it. I think I live there. Right? I kind of just live there.

I did not live there. I had not visited that place before, and uh I was not welcome there. You did not want to have I'm not welcome there, but I can't get out. So I did what um, and what would happen is is that um I would start getting like body spasms. Um like muscle spasms and um seizures no, they weren't seizures. It was like if I would lay down, like my my leg would just go into spasms. Or if um I was awake and suddenly my body would like my left side would go into spasms. And it's I I mean I I would imagine like it's like taking a a lot of caffeine, you know, where you're where you had that jittery feeling. Did you ever try just doing high doses of caffeine? I mean, I have a lot of friends who just do high doses of caffeine.

Well, the thing about it is that the Adderall is such a high dose. It's like it's so beyond what caffeine is. Got it. So I was on just this high dose of, and even now there are situations where if I know it's going to be a um, if I'm going to be out, or if I have to be out for a long period of time, I have to take more than the 60 milligrams, you know, because it's so it's it's so uneffective now. Like the only thing it really does now is just that it gives me some clarity and it only works for like a uh certain amount of time. So how much did you have to take to do this podcast with me? Um I took 30 milligrams as soon as I woke up and I had to time it because I it probably takes now about an hour for it to kind of kick in.

And um uh and then at a certain point, probably around 11 30, um, if I were to be going out somewhere, um, I would have to take another dose. And then later in the evening, I would probably have to try to take another dose to get now. Now the tricky part about it is is that you know, I've done that and then totally not going to sleep for another 24 hours afterwards. So it's that strange kind of balance of what is it that I have to kind of accomplish? And it's so crazy because I the other crazy thing it does is is that you know, I'll make a like I decide that I okay, I'm I have to do X, and then I'll take the drug, and it makes you so um obsessive that if I see like something else that needs to be done, I'll have to do that.

And then I can't stop doing that until that's finished. So do you think that's the drug or that's you and the drug is bringing out something in you? I mean, I think I know some people who take Adderall and it doesn't make them creative like you are, or like the way you talk about cleaning, they don't it doesn't do that to them. Um, you know what? If I don't take it, I could care less. You know, it's just like I just don't have the energy to um, you know, I do like the, you know, I I I do like being creative. I do like things being I don't think it's I I would say no, it's not the drug. I feel like the drug just makes me alert and awake enough to um to try to get those things done, you know. And I, you know, I do recall like with my writing, it's it's been a thing where it's just like it's almost like for my sanity.

And so I've had really bad bouts of this and just been in bed at a with my laptop just typing stuff up and just writing, you know, um, because that's all, you know, really just kind of propped up in bed, um, writing. Right, but you talked about this thog. Are you saying that when, you know, I mean, I've read a lot of your writing. You're a brilliant writer. Are you writing on Adderall or are you writing from the fog too? This is Tonya Pinkins, and that was part one of my conversation with Blaine Teamer, who's a playwright who is managing idiopathic hypersomnia.