Who Needs Sleep?

There's so much joy in life,
so many pleasures all around
But the pleasure of insomnia
is one I've never found
With all life has to offer,
There's so much to be enjoyed
But the pleasures of insomnia
are ones I can't avoid

Lids down, I count sheep
I count heartbeatsT
he only thing that counts is
that I won't sleep
I countdown, I look around

Hala Hala Hala...

Who needs sleep?
(well you're never gonna get it)
Who needs sleep?
(tell me what's that for)
Who needs sleep?
(be happy with what you're getting
There's a guy who's been awakesince the Second World War)
--Barenaked Ladies “Who Needs Sleep”

Insomnia… my lifelong foe

I’ve had a lifelong battle with the elusive beast you call a good night’s sleep. I think in the 30+ years I have been on this planet I have never experienced a “good” night’s sleep. I don’t lay down and fall asleep, I lay awake. I don’t awake refreshed in the morning, I fight through the fog.

I toss, I turn, I sweat, I snore, I flail, I even call out, but peace is something I cannot achieve in my sleep. My teen through grad school years capitalized on my insomnia by using the wee hours of the evening for brainstorming. I was a master planner while I laid awake in my bed. The morning would find me groggy on just a few hours of patched together sleep, but in the shower I would reassemble my plans from the night before and write, do my homework, housework, what have you. My plan would push me through the fog.

Ironically, every sleep expert says that all that bedtime thinking intensifies the insomnia. So I started trying to turn it off. Instead of the plans that brought me peace that all my to do would in fact get done, I would lie awake going “don’t think…shh… relax…” I’ve come to the conclusion that telling myself to relax is tantamount to flipping a panic switch deep inside my psyche. Somewhere my skeptical brain hears “relax” and thinks “sabotage!” and all my inner alarms go off – like “Why do I need to relax? What is wrong?” and the next thing I know I’ve given myself a lovely panic-induced asthma attack. Let me tell you how that doesn’t help me relax and fall asleep.

So I changed again, I tried giving myself little daydreams. Substituting myself in for whatever great television or movie character I had recently seen or appreciated, bending the plotline to my will. Unfortunately, my favorite genres are thrillers and action movies, so inserting myself into the lead role where I have Jackie Chan skills, usually means an action sequence is playing out in my head – and that means I tend to wake up more than relax – because really, how do you fall asleep when you are kicking so much ass?

But all the experts say to do this, and do that, and set a routine, and get the right mattress and the right pillow, and the right temperature, and whatever. I’ve tried every fancy pillow. Let me tell you how much my dogs love them. Because the fancy ones eventually (sometimes almost immediately) annoy me and then the dogs claim them for makeshift doggie beds. The beagle is a big fan of tempur-pedic.

And a few years back I even read enough expert material to think I might have sleep apnea, and my doctor agreed. So off I went for a sleep study test. I was hooked up to machines from head to toe (literally) and monitored throughout the night. I don’t have apnea. I do snore. I do get up to go to the bathroom. They said I woke up 63 times from my own damn snoring. I spent 4% of the night in REM sleep (that’s the good stuff folks), and you are supposed to spend 25% in REM. Clearly, I am not getting what I need. So what do the experts tell me? Stop snoring.

So I went to an ENT (ear, nose, throat) doctor who said there was nothing wrong with my nasal passages, change the angle of my head, use snore strips, use a humidifier, and try to stop snoring. There’s a whole fucking industry devoted to stopping snoring and guess what? People still snore.

But somehow I started to work it out. Somehow I found my rhythm. I figured out the temperature I needed for the room. I figured out how to get it dark enough. I changed pillows. I got a new mattress. I got a new humidifier. And I got on a schedule. It took months, but I was on a schedule and probably getting 5-6 hrs of sleep a night. Not consecutively, mind you, I was still getting up a few times, but it was still a huge improvement.

And then something AMAZING happened. I got laid off. I had no job. So I didn’t have to get up at some artificial time. I let my body completely dictate when I went to bed and when I got up. When my body told me it was ready to fall over, I went to bed, and not before. I held out for exhaustion. And then I slept until I was ready to get up. I was probably going to bed at 2 and getting up around 9 and it was working pretty well for me. Probably the best sleep I had in my life.

Then, I had to work again. I forced myself back to my good habits, and it was back to about 5 hrs a night. Sure, I was spending 8 in the bedroom, but only about 5 of those were asleep. But I was making it work.

Last fall it all went to hell.

Last fall I started traveling for work. This has destroyed every good sleep accomplishment I have made. Every success has become undone. There are days I leave for the airport at 5 AM, which means I am up at 3:30 AM to shower, get dressed, and do any last minute packing. Then there are the hotels, with the beds of all qualities, and their pillows. Most are completely mushy, and I have to stack them – completely the opposite of my home pillow.

And of course, I am alone, in a smaller bed. I don’t fight for the covers. I don’t have dogs snuggling (or pushing as the case may be). The whole dynamic changes. Then I come home, and I have to readjust to having a person and horde of dogs in the bed and all the heat they all generate. It is madness.

I wind up throwing off my sleep schedule on a daily basis; it isn’t even fair to call it a schedule anymore. I generally want to be up at 6 for the days that I am in the office. The other day I woke up at 2 AM wide awake, ready to get to work. It took me an hour to get back to sleep. Then I woke again at 4. I finally got up at 5. AM. We weren’t leaving the house till 7:30 AM, but there I was, showered and on the computer, sending work email by 5:30 AM.

One of my clients said to me, “I get email from you at all hours of the day and night. Are you a night owl or a morning person?”

“I guess both, but not really by choice.”

“Aren’t you tired?”

“You get used to it,” I lied. You can tell your friends and family, but you can’t tell your clients that the real answer is “always – I am always tired”.

I’m afraid that insomnia is a foe I shall never vanquish.

Who needs sleep?
(well you're never gonna get it)
Who needs sleep?
(tell me what's that for)
Who needs sleep?
(be happy with what you're getting
There's a guy who's been awakesince the Second World War)