Sleep

One of my biggest struggles with Lyme Disease is not sleeping.

My mom's doctor tells her, "If you're not sleeping, you're not healing." For me it's "if you're not sleeping, you're not healing nor are you functioning as a nice, balanced human being," which is why I work so hard at 1) ensuring I get a good night's sleep and 2) well, basically, all there is is 1).

Last week, it was nearly 3 a.m. (though sometimes 4) before I fell asleep. I used that time to do things productive like... blog. And Facebook. And research who I want to breed my German Shepherd to. But you can only do that for so long.

So after a numbness had thoroughly encased my body and mind last weekend from multiple nights in a row of not sleeping and being awakened early (early!!!) by my niece, I claimed a solid 10.5 hours of sleep for myself by taking two over-the-counter sleeping aids and bunking NOT near my niece who favors the 4' o'clock hour. In the morning. I think it was the most delicious 10.5 hours of sleep I'd ever gotten. I woke up the next morning feeling like, well, like a human being. And also thinking that I might never survive infanthood if I ever become a mother.

Since that night, though, we've fallen into the same routine. Me laying awake in bed with my legs pulsating and jumping voluntarily off the bed with muscle spasms, finally falling into a fitful sleep only to be awakened a couple hours later by a fussing little girl.

I've talked about this before. Bedtime is always a routine of strategic proportions. I go through a mental check-list:

* am I tired?
* am I hurting?
* am I hurting enough to need over-the-counter pain relievers?
* am I tired enough to go to sleep on my own?
* so if I don't need pain relievers, am I going to need an over-the-counter sleeping aid?
* if I take the pain relievers, then discover I need the sleeping aid, what then?

Usually I can use my "ninja-like focus" to compartmentalize the pain and figure that sleep is more important.

But last night, I laid on the couch to watch a movie at 10:30 and my eyes were so heavy, I decided that I might actually go to bed at a decent hour.

I laid there for about an-hour-and-a-half and then muttered something like, "This is ridiculous" and hand-felt my way to the bathroom where I took half the sleeping aid dose and went back to bed. Sleep eventually came. And shortly after that, the fussing of a particular little girl.

This will all even out, I tell myself. Everything is cyclical. My pain right now is much less then it has been and pretty soon, it will all shift. I'll be able to sleep; my muscle and joint pain will increase.

Such is life. :)

Update

This probably isn't a fair update since I did just get back from a very long road trip, which always wreaks havoc on my body and makes me think that I am, in fact, 80 years old. Because, if you were to ask my back, hips, knees and elbows, they would say, "yes, we are 80."

But we're not.

So hopefully in the next few days, my joints, muscles and I will even out and return to our pre-road-trip state, which has been fairly well.

My biggest nemesis right now is sleep, or the lack thereof. Oh, and my ears ringing so loud I have to close my eyes and wince till it stops. They've also been super sensitive to sound lately. Take, for example, the new Sun chips biodegradable bag. That's enough to send me through the roof.

My life with Lyme is good.