I slept badly last night, I don’t know why but my brain was filled with rubbish, a combination of my personal history and stories it was inventing to pin around them, not dreams, as I wasn’t asleep, but just as odd and just as vivid. I slept OK until just before midnight when something woke me, just long enough to look at the clock, then ten minutes later, I looked at the clock again to find it was 3am. This time I got up and probably made the mistake of going into the kitchen for a cigarette or two, the next 3 hours were spent on the edge of sleep, but never quite getting there, I knew the time without looking. If my body hadn’t been screaming for sleep I would have just gotten up them and started my day as I have done a million times before but that wasn’t going to happy, I just wanted sleep. I heard Adam moving around as some point, he too headed for the kitchen but being a none smoker for a year now, his visit was to put the tumble dryer on, I guess he woke a realised he hadn’t set the timer. I waited until it finished, made one more visit to the kitchen, then left all the doors open wide open as I headed back to bed, so the heat from our one heater in the hall, could combine with the warm air in the kitchen, spreading it around the house. An hour and a half later and it was time to get up, from a night I don’t think served much purpose other than to leave me rested and with a plan to do what I have thought about for years, to buy a sleep mask and ear plugs. I heard so many cars passing last night that I was at the point of counting them and working out if I could get away with blowing them up. Oddly I don’t feel that bad, probably because I stuck to my guns and I stayed in bed motionless, making the most at least of the chance to rest my body, if not my brain.
It did though, when not creating a world where logic and reality didn’t exist, allowed me to put a little thought into what I am going to do that will allow me to more time to rest. One thing I have learned over the years is that sitting watching TV doesn’t count as rest at all, no matter what you do, you are always doing something, even if that something is just lifting a glass or e-cig. To rest I have to be in my bed, it is the only place where I can stay for hours doing nothing without finding some reason to be doing something, no matter how small, every few minutes. My thoughts of the sleep mask and ear plugs, wasn’t really just for the odd bad night, they were for me to use during the day to see if they would make the difference I require to actually ensure that I am not disturbed or irritated during my daytime nap. Although I always call it a nap, the truth is that at least a couple of times a week I get no sleep, there are just too many thing that interrupt me and I often get out of bed feeling worse due to my frustration with the world, than I did before I went there. I really don’t want to add more time to my night, if there is any possible way of using the time I can free up during the day to sleep, well it wins hands down as I don’t want my time with Adam reduced any further. I know that without huge changes, I can if I try free up another hour of my day, it is just about working smarter and making sure that as much as is humanly possible, that I stick to the task at hand and not wonder off to do other unnecessary searches and distractions. So OK, with my lack of control over my concentration levels, it may prove not as easy as I like to think it will be, but I have to give it a try at least. I am going to use the next couple of weeks just to test different things and see how it goes. I know that cutting back and still sitting here playing games or what ever isn’t the true answer, I have to detach myself from the world and let my body really rest.
One thing that isn’t so easy is how to cut out the pain levels when I lie down. I haven’t actually lain flat to sleep now for over a year, as I found when I did my breathing was more difficult and the pain levels were higher. Sleeping with the top of the bed raised seemed to make a huge difference for a long time, but I am now in more pain even in that position than I was when I first tried it. I am reasonably sure that part of my current exhaustion is down to not being in as deep a sleep as I think I am, the pain has to be disturbing me, even if it isn’t always waking me. If I can somehow improve the quality of my sleep, I know without a doubt that I will feel better for it. My first step is I am going to try different levels of incline on the bed, to see if there is a better angle, even possibly flat again that works for me. I am also hoping that sleeping with the ear plugs in at night, might mean I am not disturbed by the neighbours, something that happens quite a lot as they get up at 5:30am. They are all small changes and I have my fingers well and truly crossed that somewhere in there will be the answer I am looking for and that I won’t have to be tacking an extra hour onto my already extended night time.
Please read my blog from 2 years ago today – 20/12/12 – Pain Clinic or notÂ
Two Rooms Plus Utilities 