Mrs. Donatella

During my time at the U.S. Department of Prominence, I held the position of a telecommunication specialist, working on the shift from 3:00 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. The communication center was predominantly male, but there were also six women, including myself, working on different shifts. This meant that there were always two women working alongside the men during my shift. One of my colleagues was Ms. Donatella, a kind and quiet woman who always seemed to be tired, walked at a slow pace, and had puffy under-eye bags.

On a regular night, as we tackled our workload, both Ms. Donatella and I hoped that our strict supervisor wouldn’t criticize our efforts. At one point, Ms. Donatella took her scheduled 15-minute break, leaving me to handle the queries and tasks that came our way. I diligently worked, answering colleagues’ questions, scanning cables for errors, and transmitting them between machines. The workload was heavy, so I was fully occupied. However, Ms. Donatella didn’t return from her break until an hour later, which left me feeling frustrated. Despite my anger, I didn’t show it to her. She apologized for being late. I noticed that she looked tired.

Another time, during her 45-minute dinner break, Ms. Donatella returned in a rush, appearing disoriented. As expected, our supervisor berated her for being late.

Then, one day, Ms. Donatella didn’t show up for work at all. Our supervisor went on a rampage, questioning everyone if she had informed anyone about her absence. Additionally, our boss complained about Ms. Donatella’s lack of productivity to anyone who would listen. Finally, at 11:00 p.m. thirty minutes before our shift ended, Ms. Donatella called in to inform us that she needed to take sick leave. Our uncouth supervisor revealed that Ms. Donatella had overslept.

During our office holiday party, Ms. Donatella was assigned to bring a macaroni and cheese hors d’oeuvre. Everyone was excited to indulge in the cheese bites, as mac and cheese is known for its abundance of cheese. However, when we tasted Ms. Donatella’s dish, we couldn’t find any cheese in it. She explained that she had forgotten to buy the cheese.

One day, as I arrived at work a few minutes before my shift, I stopped by the ladies' room to freshen up. To my surprise, I found Ms. Donatella fast asleep on the large sofa in the lounge area. I woke her up and asked if she was all right, to which she assured me she was fine.

On another evening, while working next to Ms. Donatella on a telecommunications machine, I noticed her nodding off to sleep. In that moment, the machine’s alarms went off because she had entered the wrong security code on an official electronic document. She was in trouble with our strict supervisor, and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her.

Rumors began to circulate throughout the communications center that our supervisor had reassigned Ms. Donatella to an office setting.

Finally, the truth came out about why Ms. Donatella was always late from her breaks, why she overslept, why she looked tired, and why she struggled to focus on her work. It turned out that Ms. Donatella had narcolepsy.

“Narcolepsy is a neurological disorder characterized by the brain’s inability to control its sleep/wakefulness cycle. People with narcolepsy suffer from chronic daytime sleepiness and episodes in which they fall asleep unexpectedly during the day. These sleep attacks can occur at any time, during the day.”

Reference: Alaska Sleep Clinic, an Alaska International, Inc. Company. www.alaskasleep.com (Google).

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(Copyright Dana Esposito. All rights reserved.)