From Truman Show Delusions to Sleep Coach: A Manic Episode Born of Sleep Deprivation
For eight days, Tommy Graves didn’t sleep. What began as an ambitious project for a homeless charity spiralled into a profound psychotic episode, blurring the lines between reality and a Hollywood blockbuster. Now 32, Mr Graves, originally from Bermondsey in London, recounts his harrowing experience of believing his life was a live broadcast, akin to Jim Carrey’s character in The Truman Show.
“My family sent me to a mental health hospital in an ambulance because they knew something had gone wrong,” Mr Graves explained. “I was extremely coherent but I was not making sense. I had a plan to end racism, end sexism, end wars, cure cancer – all of these amazing things. By this point I didn’t even know where I was. I thought I was in a television studio, like The Truman Show.”
The genesis of his delusion lay in an overwhelming enthusiasm for a fundraising event he was organising. “There were going to be musicians, actors and performers,” he recalled. “I just got really excited about it and worked tirelessly on it. The more I worked on it the more stressed I became, the more ideas came into my head and the harder I found it to sleep. I couldn’t get to sleep at all as much as I tried because my brain wouldn’t switch off.”
As the sleepless nights accumulated, Mr Graves’s ambitions amplified. “By day six of not sleeping the idea had gone from raising £100 to raising £66 million,” he stated. It was at this point, deep in the throes of severe sleep deprivation, that he was admitted to a mental health facility.
A Performance for an Imaginary Audience
During his four-week stay in the hospital, Mr Graves remained convinced he was on a television set. His belief in being broadcast led him to perform for what he perceived as a global audience. He sang, danced, and executed cartwheels, all in the fervent hope of receiving an Oscar for his “performance.”
“One of the nurses told me I would get an Oscar if I carried on like this,” he recounted. “Most people would have seen that as sarcasm, but I thought, ‘I’d love to get an Oscar’.”
Doctors diagnosed Mr Graves with a manic episode accompanied by psychosis. The subsequent weeks were a slow, arduous journey back to reality. “I completely left planet Earth; I had no sense of what reality was. I was hearing and thinking and seeing things that were not real,” he described. His hospital room became his stage, and the nurses, his unwitting audience. “I was performing to these cameras at the mental health hospital and I was trying to engage and entertain the audience. There was singing, dancing, cartwheels, running up walls. I leapt over a nurse.”
It was only through a cocktail of medications that he was finally able to achieve sleep. “They managed to finally put me to sleep after giving me all sorts of medication,” he said. “I spent the next four weeks in the mental health hospital coming back to the real world.”
The Road to Recovery and a New Mission
The experience left Mr Graves’s life in disarray and instilled in him a profound respect for the power of sleep. “When I was discharged, I felt so sad. My life had just been blown to bits. I was incredibly embarrassed,” he admitted. His doctor’s stark warning – that he needed to learn to sleep or risk losing his grip on reality again – became a powerful catalyst for change.
“As soon as I learned to sleep better, my brain started working, my productivity got higher; I experienced what life feels like when you’re fully rested,” he explained.
Over the next two years, Mr Graves dedicated himself to understanding and mastering the art of sleep. This journey culminated in his qualification as a sleep coach in April 2025.
Making Bedtime Cool Again
Now, Mr Graves advocates for a radical shift in societal attitudes towards sleep. He has adopted a strict sleep schedule himself, foregoing late nights for a consistent bedtime and wake-up time. His new mission is to make having a regular bedtime “cool” and to combat the pervasive culture of exhaustion he observed in the UK.
“The experience I had of being a lad living in the UK, it is the norm for weekends to be dedicated to late nights and for weekdays to be more early mornings,” he observed. “You end up in this vicious cycle of exhaustion – you’re trying to get over the late nights from the weekend and you go into a week of early mornings, and then it’s back to the late nights again.”
He highlighted the prevalence of sleep issues, noting that “around one in three people suffer from insomnia in the UK.” For Mr Graves, “Having a consistent bed time and wake time is pivotal; that is the most important thing you can do.” He likens the disruption of inconsistent sleep schedules to “social jet lag,” equating it to “flying two to three hours every week.”
Mr Graves is actively running workshops for businesses and communities, educating people on the critical importance of sleep and practical strategies for achieving it. “I’m on a mission to make it cool to have a bedtime,” he declared. “I’ll go out at midday and stay out until 9pm. Might as well make the most of the day. It’s not about having less fun, it’s about doing it at a time that doesn’t make you exhausted.”
He firmly believes in the interconnectedness of sleep and mental well-being. “I want to spread awareness that sleep is connected to every main mental health condition, either making symptoms worse or being a key driver in the problem existing in the first place.”
The link between poor sleep and various health issues, including cancer, stroke, and infertility, is well-documented. While occasional awakenings during the night are common, persistent difficulties can indicate insomnia, a condition affecting millions. Factors such as stress, anxiety, caffeine, alcohol, noise, shift work, and jet lag can all contribute to sleep disturbances. Improving sleep hygiene, through consistent sleep hours, daytime activity, and a restful sleep environment, remains a cornerstone of good health.
