Long Sleeps By Women

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 16, Issue 7, 13 October 1950, Page 5

Long Sleeps By Women

A married woman of 35 died in New York the other day after having since May, 1946. She had never “come out” of an anaesthetic given to her for a minor operation (writes S. E. Tate). Another woman who once slept for 32 years without a break also died recently in Sweden at the age of 88. She was Carolina Karisen. In 1876, when 13, her mother put her to bed in the usual way, thinking she was merely tired. But from that moment onwards Carolina Karisen just slept and slept. She slept right on to 1908, when she was 45 years old.

Miss Karisen’s long period of blissful unconsciousness is beloved to be a record, but her experience is not unique. Periodically similar cases crop up in various parts of the world and the victims seem more often to be women than men.

In 1910, while doctors- and specialists were still trying to account for Miss Karisen’s. long “nap,” a pretty South African brunette named Ana Swanepoel started off on a long sleep. t Miss Swanepoel fell asleep after hearing the news of her lover’s death and she did not wake up until 1941—31 years later. When she went to sleep she was 20 years old and was noted for her good looks. But as she lay in a sanitorium she became thinner and thinner, and dbctors held little hope of her recovery. Today, however, Miss Swanepoel is none the worse and is leading a perfectly normal life.