03:45 No SleepOk, I wasn't up this early, but not too far after it either.
I'm a borderline insomniac. I have been for the last decade. Five hours a night of sleep for me is not uncommon - and rare if it is five hours in a row. Oddly enough, I'm not too bad with it. At the very least, I've learned to cope with it.
I can fall asleep in a heartbeat - I just can't stay asleep.
This awake time should be used for something more productive, but it isn't. Actually, for the ten years or so I've been like this, you think I would have adapted to what my body does - or doesn't do, in this case.
Here is what I do. My alarm is always set, on the off-chance I over sleep. I'm not sure I've heard it go off too many times. Most of the time it is on after I get out of the shower, change and eat breakfast.
Here is also what I do. I wake up at 04:30 and there I lie. I think of things I have to do - usually at work. I think horrible thoughts of 'what if Denton dies before I do'. I think maybe I'll go back to sleep. It is especially that last one that baffles me. I don't go back to sleep, not really. Maybe for a 10 minute eyes closed kind of thing, but I'm never truly back to sleep, yet I can't drag my sorry ass out of bed.
First - I don't want to wake Denton. Secondly - I don't want to disturb the cats. They sleep right next to me, on either side. They seemingly need me there and what would happen if I were to move? Thirdly - what would I do? TV? No. Wash dishes - probably not. The gym isn't open that early and I'd have to deactivate the alarm to get out the door, which would wake up the firstly and secondly feature of this paragraph.
So I lay there.
I am hoping (or I think Denton is) that my new exercise routine will change my sleep patterns. It would be nice I guess. I do not seem any worse for the wear, but that might be delusional on my part. And I'm not alone. CNN says folks in the U.S. are getting less and less sleep: 6.7 hours a night as an average. I should be so lucky! And I am bringing down that average.
Tonite (well, tomorrow morning actually) we set our clocks one hour ahead. Yay for me! One less hour of sleep!
Song by: the Cardigans
3 comments:
I have the same malady. This week has been great though, knock on wood.
I always count backwards from 100 - have never once made it to zero without conking out.
Someone I work with says they get back to sleep using animal visualization. You are supposed to visualize animals one after the other, but in the wrong color, like blue sheep, yellow monkey, etc. Sounds totally dumb to me, but they swear by it....
Hmmm... (Rebecca's friend in DC here). I have the same malady. Of course, mine developed in a converse relationship to my ebbing levels of girl hormones. I keep a split 4:30 AM schedule of surrendering and getting up for the day or reading something really boring until I manage to drift off. (Keep those credit card offers with their backpage of fine print!) Maybe all this was why the nap was invented?
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