I love sleep, I always have. Sleep and I, though, have a tempestuous love affair. You see, I love sleep at inappropriate times. I have always been a night owl. Always. Even in high school I would get involved in a book and stay awake, bleary-eyed, to see what end the heroine would meet.
The problem was always the next morning. It didn't matter what I did, I could not wake myself up. I set my alarm across the room, my mom would try to wake me up but 90% of the time, I was late in waking up and late to school.
In college, my mom encouraged me to schedule my classes first semester so that none started before 11 AM. I was the envy of everyone on my floor. As everyone scurried to be at class at the ungodly hour of 8, I rested peacefully until 10:50 (if my first class started at 11:00). A quick brush of the hair and teeth and some new clothes and I was ready for anything.
The problem became that I kept such irregular hours that I struggled to make it even to my later classes. It was pathetic really, that I couldn't get my butt to a class happening at 2:30 in the afternoon. I would stay up late, my eating habits were awful and so I would spend most of my time feeling sluggish and sleepy.
What killed me worse was the 7:30 AM Theory of Education class I had to take second semester freshman year. Even if I went to bed at 10 the night before (which I never did), I could not keep my eyes open. I loved Dr. Knowles and it pained me to have my head lolling and drool escaping from the corner of my mouth. I also had my friend Chante elbowing me at regular intervals.
Post-college didn't improve things, either. It turns out, living on my own meant I could sleep whenever I wanted and not have anyone to bug me. This was both a benefit and a detriment. I struggled to make it on time to work, I struggled to get in bed early enough and I generally just struggled.
What I find most interesting about my sleep habits is that when they have been at their worst, so has my weight. I have read articles that link lack of sleep to high levels of ghrelin (which causes you to want to sleep) and leptin (which causes you not to be able to stop eating). Put those two together and it's a recipe for disaster.
The one time sleep and I had a civil, appropriate relationship? When I was training for marathons. I had to have a very regimented schedule. I had to be able to go to work, run and have some social life. This meant that I needed to be asleep at a specific time or I would spend the whole day catching up.
Granted, I can't always be training for marathons (although I think that would be awesome). I envy two people when it comes to sleep--Brian and Bekah. Both fall asleep at the drop of a hat. Part of my struggle with sleep is that I tend to toss and turn. I am not one who's wracked with anxiety, I don't review what needs to be done for the day. I just lie there, waiting for my brain to turn off so that I can enjoy some sleep.
The other problem I've consistently had with sleep is bad dreams. I have always had very vivid, very realistic dreams. This means I will wake up a few times some nights, caught in between a dream and reality. I have hit Brian upon waking up, convinced that he's been unfaithful or in some other way a miscreant. It can be wonderful (I've kissed Benicio del Toro) and horrid (I've witnessed murders and other awful events). When I am pregnant, they are worse. Thankfully, right now I'm not.
The last factor that affects my sleep (and the impetus for this entry) is illness. Typically, when I feel under the weather, sleep and I are fast friends. The fly in the ointment this time has been this awfulness I've been fighting since January. One of the symptoms I've been regularly experiencing is a cough. It's exacerbated when I lie down. It's not shocking, then, that sleep has been elusive for me over the past couple of months. Even when I'm exhausted, when my eyes are unable to stay open on their own, I have fought to get more than a couple of hours of sleep at a time.
I only know a handful of people who can survive and thrive on few hours of sleep. I am not one of them. It has been excruciating and frustrating to not be able to sleep, every night, for a reasonable amount of time. I am not myself when I'm not able to sleep. I can't be cheerful. I can't think clearly, make rational decisions, be the most creative when I am working in a sleep deficit.
That being said, I've got to get some rest now.
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