Category: I can’t sleep

I don’t know how much of this will even make sense, ’cause y’all, I am so tired. Which is pretty much my standard complaint, ’cause after all, I can’t sleep, despite the sleep aid I am hopelessly addicted to. But this morning I am doubly tired, because for two days in a row, in the early morning, I’ve had nightmares.

Or Morningmares. Whatever you want to call them! Bad dreams. Dreams like you kids come to your bed in the middle of the night crying their eyes out over. Yesterday morning I woke myself up thrashing around twice -in my dream I was trying to run away and couldn’t run. (I had the same dream twice, woke myself up thrashing both times.) Then, just a couple of hours ago, after Bobby and Joshua had already left for work and school, I had another real winner, and was screaming in the dream, and I woke up covered in sweat, thinking I had heard my mother yelling my name. I even jumped up and threw open my bedroom door, thinking she was just outside (she wasn’t – but she does have a house key! It could’ve happened!)

So anyways. I’m tired! And apparently my subconscious is feeling a little tortured these mornings.

Who’s got a cure for what ails me?

The past three nights I have slept very lightly, which used to be the norm, but since I’ve been drugging myself, is a rarity. I’m not sure why this is occurring, but I’d like to go back to my drug-induced coma thankyouverymuch. This morning about 4 a.m. when Joshua crawled into our bed, I was unable to go back to sleep. Usually I barely even notice when he does this thanks to good old Ambien CR, but for some reason it’s taken a break from leaving me blissfully drooling away while my kindergartener steps on my head. NOT COOL, Ambien CR, NOT COOL.

I lay in bed for awhile observing things I have forgotten during my brief respite from being constantly awake in the middle of the night. For instance, we have a security light in our backyard that is triggered by movement. So if Joe Burglar decides to come in the back door, he is going to get a really bright light in his FACE and hopefully run away scared. Since our bedroom faces the back of the house, I would often see the light come on at night. I’d forgotten that. I saw it come on several times this morning, on and off, on and off, each flip of the bulb taking me by surprise. This is not because Joe Burglar was prowling around, but because we got critters, y’all. City critters. Our yard is home to many squirrels during the day, and sometimes a cute bunny rabbit or two, but at night hosts some skeerry creatures such as hardened city possum and street raccoons. I am pretty sure they have gang wars over our trash can. Said creatures’ attempt to get to our trash dumpster all night long (there’s nothing good in there, I swear!) leads to the fantastic light show I once again got to witness this morning.

Side note: the trash dudes broke the handle on our trash dumpster. As we now have a new mayor since the elections on Tuesday, I think his first order of biz-niss should be gettin’ me a new dumpster. That’s right, Gary Leitzell, I am talkin’ to you. I voted for change! Now change my dumpsta! Ok, I’ll be honest. I voted for you because you were not your challenger, and so far as I have seen, you don’t wear weird hats or assymetrical glasses like she does. But please can I have a new trash can anyways?

And some SLEEP? Can I have some sleep please? Because this train wreck of a post is what happens when I get none!

It’s been a few weeks since I have written about my sleeping issues. I know, how can I deprive my dear readers of such scintillating posts? I know you were just dying to know what’s been going on with me in the middle of the night (eew.)

I got my sleep study results on October 5th, and the main reason I haven’t written anything about it since then, is that the results were discouraging. The sleep test was “negative” which means I apparently don’t have any diagnosable sleeping problems. They didn’t see anything abnormal. All those wires they hooked up to me were for naught.

This was not what I wanted to hear. I wanted to be diagnosed with an easily-treatable sleep disorder.

My sleep doctor, for lack of an easy solution to my problems (perhaps he thinks they’re all in my mind?), offered to keep refilling my Ambien CR (which does help.)

“Well, I kind of feel like I can’t live without it, and that makes me uncomfortable,” I said to him. (What I was trying to say, was “I don’t want to be a drug addict.”)

He looked at me and gave me a little shrug. As if to say, “Well, that’s your best option.” or perhaps he meant, “Well, not my problem.” I don’t know WHAT he meant. Maybe he just thinks, there are worse things to be addicted to.

So if you see Emily ambushing me on an episode of A&E’s Intervention, you’ll know why.

But anyhoo, I don’t wanna go to rehab! So about a week ago, I took a friend’s advice, and started taking a Melatonin tablet at night. It’s a naturally-occurring hormone and you can get it at any drugstore. And, it’s much cheaper than Ambien CR. AND, it seems to be helping! I am definitely sleeping much more soundly now. I am still taking the Ambien, but it is my goal within the next couple of weeks to get out the ol’ pill splitter and start weaning myself off of it. We shall see. I think at this point in my life, I gotta do what I gotta do to sleep, but if I can do it without being dependent on a prescription drug, I would sure like to. If not, I’ll just have to accept that at some point.

So, that’s my deal. Although I realize a stint in rehab would make for a much better blog post, I’m going to try and avoid that at all costs!