It never fails. It can be 10
or 11 PM at night & I can’t keep my eyes open. Even if there is a good show
on TV, I’ll be sitting on the couch realizing I just dozed off & missed 30
seconds. So, I get up & go upstairs to bed only to find that I am wide
awake. There is something in my brain that seems to switch on the second my
head hits the pillow. This doesn’t just happen occasionally but almost every
damn night.
My entire adult life I have
rarely fallen asleep quickly or slept all night. Normally, it will take me a
minimum of half an hour to fall asleep, most nights longer. Over the years
I have learned to relax to the extent that even though my mind is whirling
away, my body is totally relaxed & virtually sleeping. I’m sure it isn’t
nearly as good as actual sleep but it seems to work for me.
I have an unwritten rule
I’ve made up that if I’m still awake two hours after going to bed (which
happens more than I would like) I get up for awhile & either read or write.
But there is a silver lining to this sleep pattern. I have found that I do my
best thinking in the middle of the night. It is not unusual that ideas for blog
posts will pop into my head & once that happens, I might as well get up
& write it down. It will surely be long gone by the morning.
Now that I have “retired”
& don’t have to get up early most of the time, I really enjoy my late night
alone time in front of the computer when it’s quiet & peaceful. I have
always appreciated my quiet time with no TV or music or conversation, just me
& my thoughts. Usually, after an hour or more I’m ready to give it another
go & see if I can drift off to sleep.
Back when Darrin was a small
child, I would stay up by myself a couple times a week just to get that “me
time”. All I would do is watch some late night TV or read a bit but I have
always craved the quiet time by myself, although I never minded sharing my
respite with my son once in awhile.
One time when Darrin was
four years old, he woke up & was unable to get back to sleep. It was a weekend &
Saturday Night Live was on so I brought him in on the couch with me. We laid
down & snuggled with the afghan over us. The Mr. Bill skit came on where a
little clay figure gets flattened by something & always goes, “Oh, no!” in
a high pitched voice. Darrin started giggling so hard & couldn’t stop which
got me giggling at the poor little guy getting squashed. Well, that was a fun
trip down memory lane – geez, it was 33 years ago! Where does the time go?
Currently, there are a
couple scenarios that unfortunately alter my peaceful, relaxing awake time in
bed. I have eliminated most caffeine from my diet so when I do have some I feel
it more. Sometimes I forget to use good judgment (or just say, what the hell)
& have some caffeine in the evening. A diet Pepsi or two at dinner out or a
little chocolate for dessert can sometimes wire me up like someone who’s had
four espressos right before bed.
After about five minutes in
bed I can tell that this ain’t gonna work. The deep relaxation is replaced by a
jittery, teeth clenching feeling that pretty much signals me to just get up
right now because I’m not going to sleep anytime soon. In those rare cases, I
just get up, resign myself to a late night, turn on Letterman or Leno &
start typing.
My other sleep shattering
experience feels similar to a “caffeine high” BUT I haven’t had any caffeine.
I’m pretty sure that it is something in food & I’m still trying to figure
out what it might be. I have a feeling that it is an ingredient on the long
list of things included in processed meals. I wrote this on one of those nights at 2:00 AM.
I made a frozen broccoli
& beef with rice meal for dinner. I went in & dug the package out of the
trash to see if I could pinpoint something causing my sleeplessness. The
ingredients seemed pretty basic until I got to the sauce – there must have been
20 different things on the list, many of which I couldn’t pronounce. My guess
is that the culprit was one of those, maybe soy sauce whatever or mono
something or glutamate something.
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