Sleeping Musings
May. 20th, 2007 02:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sparkindarknessMy sleeping has gone all weird lately. I’ve tried drinking less coffee, drinking more coffee, drinking alcohol, drinking less alcohol but it’s still weird. I’m not sure whether to be worried or not - any sleep experts out there?
Normally I need 7-9 hours of sleep a night, preferably 9 - I’m a VERY light sleeper so those 9 hours will always be interrupted. Normally by the time Friday comes round I’m pretty worn out (because getting 9 hours of sleep on a weekday is just not possible) and I hibernate on the weekends to recover. Yeah, I know, probably not the most healthy sleep pattern in the world, but it’s worked for about a decade or so now, so I didn’t really expect it to change until I’m old and wrinkly and falling a sleep in a chair with my pipe and slippers (I don’t smoke and never will, and avoid wearing footwear as much as possible - I hate shoes - but I’m going to have a pipe and slippers, damn it!).
But it’s all going weird now. For the past 2-3 weeks I’ve been sleeping DEEEPLY. I NEVER sleep deeply. Not even as a tiny baby (as my dear mother will tell me how I never slept 3 hours together until I was 5 years old. She will tell me this at length, with much grumbling and the time she nearly throttled my father when he said “sleep when he does” and she replied [screamed] “HE NEVER DOES!!!!”) I digress.. Anyway I am sleeping like a comatose ZOMBIE. I’ve actually scared Beloved more than once because he COULDN’T wake me. We’re talking bounding up and down on the bed screaming, couldn’t wake me (and no, he wasn’t doing THAT to wake me. Minds out of the gutter people. Or at least invite me).
My pattern for the past 2 weeks? Steadily decreasing sleep. Last night I had 4 hours, same as the night before. Before that I don’t think I had more than 5 hours - but I’m not even slightly tired. Frankly I’m kind of freaked, I know how my body works and it doesn’t work like this. I keep thinking I’m tired and my body’s just hiding it. Beloved also reports that I’m no longer holding my breath when I sleep (an annoying habit also from being a little baby - many a night mum rushed through to my room thinking I’d stopped breathing only for me to start again. Yes, I‘m amazed she didn‘t smother me as a child) which he likes since he no longer feels the need to check my pulse when I sleep (and wake me up).
Apart from the worrying lack of sleep my main problem is “waking dreams.” I did have these as a kid, about 11-15. I’d seem to wake up... but not. I’d still be dreaming, still in a weird place in my head and not seeing the room or where I was - kind of like sleep walking - but you can talk to me and have a conversation with me. A surreal one, but I still interact - just not rationally or according to the reality in my dreams rather than the real world. The next morning? I do not remember a thing, not as a teenager and not now. In fact it could be a weird conspiracy between my parents and Beloved to make me think I’m insane.
Needless to say this FREAKS Beloved, especially since whatever I am seeing in the night is apparently pretty scary - more a waking nightmare than a waking dream.
Can I keep the deep super-sleep but drop the scary beloved freaking?
Normally I need 7-9 hours of sleep a night, preferably 9 - I’m a VERY light sleeper so those 9 hours will always be interrupted. Normally by the time Friday comes round I’m pretty worn out (because getting 9 hours of sleep on a weekday is just not possible) and I hibernate on the weekends to recover. Yeah, I know, probably not the most healthy sleep pattern in the world, but it’s worked for about a decade or so now, so I didn’t really expect it to change until I’m old and wrinkly and falling a sleep in a chair with my pipe and slippers (I don’t smoke and never will, and avoid wearing footwear as much as possible - I hate shoes - but I’m going to have a pipe and slippers, damn it!).
But it’s all going weird now. For the past 2-3 weeks I’ve been sleeping DEEEPLY. I NEVER sleep deeply. Not even as a tiny baby (as my dear mother will tell me how I never slept 3 hours together until I was 5 years old. She will tell me this at length, with much grumbling and the time she nearly throttled my father when he said “sleep when he does” and she replied [screamed] “HE NEVER DOES!!!!”) I digress.. Anyway I am sleeping like a comatose ZOMBIE. I’ve actually scared Beloved more than once because he COULDN’T wake me. We’re talking bounding up and down on the bed screaming, couldn’t wake me (and no, he wasn’t doing THAT to wake me. Minds out of the gutter people. Or at least invite me).
My pattern for the past 2 weeks? Steadily decreasing sleep. Last night I had 4 hours, same as the night before. Before that I don’t think I had more than 5 hours - but I’m not even slightly tired. Frankly I’m kind of freaked, I know how my body works and it doesn’t work like this. I keep thinking I’m tired and my body’s just hiding it. Beloved also reports that I’m no longer holding my breath when I sleep (an annoying habit also from being a little baby - many a night mum rushed through to my room thinking I’d stopped breathing only for me to start again. Yes, I‘m amazed she didn‘t smother me as a child) which he likes since he no longer feels the need to check my pulse when I sleep (and wake me up).
Apart from the worrying lack of sleep my main problem is “waking dreams.” I did have these as a kid, about 11-15. I’d seem to wake up... but not. I’d still be dreaming, still in a weird place in my head and not seeing the room or where I was - kind of like sleep walking - but you can talk to me and have a conversation with me. A surreal one, but I still interact - just not rationally or according to the reality in my dreams rather than the real world. The next morning? I do not remember a thing, not as a teenager and not now. In fact it could be a weird conspiracy between my parents and Beloved to make me think I’m insane.
Needless to say this FREAKS Beloved, especially since whatever I am seeing in the night is apparently pretty scary - more a waking nightmare than a waking dream.
Can I keep the deep super-sleep but drop the scary beloved freaking?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-23 12:36 am (UTC)the waking nightmare thing sounds like stress and/or anxiety about something. w tends to do that sort of thing, and i have to be careful waking him.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-05-23 01:04 am (UTC)I can imagine he wakes up very disorientated and acting weird and scary - and not good weird and scary either