Most university students might count themselves lucky if they manage a few decent hours of sleep every night, but they probably haven’t met Jake Bacon. Literally not sleeping at all on most nights, it’s a rare occasion if he even manages a few hours of sleep per week. Ridiculous studyload? Not quite – Jake is an insomniac.
Though seemingly a vastly exhausting condition, Jake insists that it’s not as draining as it seems.
“I do get a little bit tired, but it gets to this stage where you just get used to it,” he explains. “I can sometimes drift off for a few hours if I’ve had a huge day, but when I wake up, I end up feeling more tired than when I don’t sleep at all.”
Typically spending most nights with a bass guitar, laptop and recording microphone, Jake hones and develops extended, complex pieces of music while the rest of the world sleeps. His dark, brooding compositions are reflective of the otherwise silent midnight setting he crafts them in. He has written over two hundred.
“I can’t really make anything too loud, or it’ll wake people up,” he says.
His insomnia, however, is only one part of his wider condition – Jake suffers from Tourette’s Syndrome, a disorder causing frequent involuntary body twitches and spasms, or ‘tics,’ as they are more properly known. It was these tics, he reveals, that originally sparked his passion for creating music.
“A lot of people with Tourette’s turn to music to help them deal with it - the tics don’t come as often when you’re concentrating on something, so I decided to buy a bass guitar one day, and haven’t looked back since.”
His tics, though, have not always been so productively dealt with. Describing them as a source of embarrassment and shame in his younger years, Jake initially battled self esteem issues as he struggled to manage his twitches in social situations.
“It massively affected my confidence for ages… I had trouble looking people in the eye because I thought it would hide my tics,” he remembers. “I had trouble meeting new people and was really introverted.”
A considerable portion of his embarrassment, he explains, stemmed from the social stigma normally associated with the disorder.
“It’s a really negative stereotype. People associate it with swearing and yelling, and something to be ridiculed,” he says, then adds with a tired smile, “Especially if they’ve watched that South Park episode about it.”
Despite this, Jake has gradually grown to embrace his disorder as just another part of his identity, and accordingly, has found a much stronger sense of self confidence. This change, he says, was one that was strongly encouraged by the unwavering support of his close family and friends.
“My family and friends have always been fantastic about it, even though I can be annoying to sit around and watch TV with – I’m always moving around in the corner of everyone’s eyes,” he says. “I even feel comfortable enough to make jokes about it sometimes.”
Jake now finds himself largely grateful for his condition, something most would consider an enormous burden – not only for the important lessons it has taught him about self-acceptance, but for the enormous impact it has had on his passion for creating music.
“I’ve even started to show people some of the songs I’ve written, and they’ve actually really enjoyed them!” he says enthusiastically. “I guess I have my Tourette’s to thank for that, for sparking my love for music and creative expression. I’m actually glad for it.”
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