Why am I so sleepy?

I wonder if it's the weather. Or traveling. Sometimes traveling makes me tired. All I want to do is nap, and I can nap. I can actually lie down and fall asleep for an hour and then be fine, but within 3 hours I'm tired again. It could be the Celexa or even the Abilify. Though I figure the side effects should have worn off by now. It's been a month. And it's only random tiredness. Some days I'm fine. But I'm tired more often than not.

But, of course, I can't sleep at night. I mean, I sleep, but it takes me hours to fall asleep. In the middle of the day I'm out like a light, but at night I just lie there and think. Perhaps that's the real reason I'm tired when I get up. And of course, I've messed up my entire sleep system now. Sigh.

It's insomnia night!

Well, this hasn't happened in a few weeks. I'm up, it's midnight, and I can't seem to go to sleep. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I've been trying since 9:30 and have been constantly getting texts. No one loves me unless I'm trying to sleep. Or maybe I'm always trying to sleep and so people just text when they feel like it.

Somethings I've been thinking about: Julie mentioned something about our sessions ending in April, so I think that's when her semester is over (she's a student therapist). I suppose I'll have to go without or try to convince the center to give me someone for the summer semester, if they have a person. I wonder how their process works.

I see the doc next week, and I think he's going to take away my Abiify. I'm appalled at the thought. I can't imagine being without the antipsychotic. It's what got me out of a depression last year, and what got me free this time, too. If it's a crutch I don't care- I need it. But how am I supposed to have it? Well, I'm not going to worry about affording it. There are a bunch of folks who've taken up the cause d'Anne and said they would help pay for my meds. I think that sucks, but if it's the reason I can still go to interviews and function, then so be it.

Jesus, I need some sleep. Ugh.

Sleep calls

It's 7:30 and I'm in my pjs, waiting to go to bed. Is that pathetic? I feel pathetic. I have a lot to do tomorrow, including work and meet up with some people, so one wasted day isn't too much to cry over. I did go to my cousins house and Home Depot, so I got out of the house. I never made it for a run, despite being in my running clothes.

Big sigh. Can I go to bed yet? Apparently the floor guys are coming at 8am, so I have to be up by 7 and dressed and ready to go by 8. I think that means I can go to bed early. This is ridiculously early, though....

A little nap will do ya

I feel so stuck right now. I don't know what to do with myself. I have all that stuff in storage that needs to be gone through and sold. I have all sorts of stuff here that needs to be categorized in boxes and then moved to storage. I have job opportunities and I want to house hunt, but I don't even know where to look or in what price range.

As usual, I'm getting ahead of myself. It's all so overwhelming. So what do I want to do? I want to take a nap. I have this overwhelming urge to sleep right now. I just can't handle all the chaos that's going on around me. It's too much to think about, so I want to sleep.

Maybe just a little nap....

Pharma sleep

It's too late for pharmaceutically enhanced sleep. Or, maybe it's too early for it. Either way, I'm not going to get a lot of sleep tonight. My stomach hurts and it's keeping me up. That's right, I ate too much (I think it was the pickled vegetables) and so I have a stomach ache. So what did I just do? I ate again. Yep. Because sometimes eating makes a stomach ache go away. It's counter-intuitive, but it works, sometimes. I can't tell yet if it worked this time.

I have to be up in a couple of hours to go to work and work out. I'm going to do it this time. I mean workout. I always go to work. My cousin Roger told my dad I was the hardest working person he knew. I don't know where he gets that from: he works two jobs and has a two year old. I give him mad props.

Ok, I'm going to lie down and see what happens this time....

Follow that rabbit

I'm never late to anything. In fact, I'm one of those people who shows up a half an hour early to everything, waiting in your driveway with my radio on, killing time. I leave room for error when going to new places, and old. Waiting is my specialty.

And then this week happened. I've been late to work every day this week, sometimes by as much as half an hour. And my commute is literally 10 floors of a building. There is no excuse except for the near catatonia I've been in during sleep lately. I've been completely zonked out, but I wake up knowing I was dreaming; something was happening in a story line.

I wish I could remember my dreams, but I know they're troubling. I don't wake up refreshed and ready to go. I wake up confused, late, and panicking. I don't like that feeling one bit.

Sleep the day away

Lying there in my near catatonic state the other night, I heard my dad come in to my room, lean over, and turn off the light by my bed. I knew he was there, but there was no way I could have the energy to say thank you. I woke up late the next day, dashing out of my room to get to work, and there he was, still sitting in his recliner. The poor man has insomnia.

He's been awake for three days on around 5 hours of sleep. He sits in his recliner and reads the paper or watches old movies on the movie channel. He waits for sleep to come and it never does.

On the other side of the apartment there's me with hypersomnia. All I can do is sleep. I wake up only to feed, and then I'm back down, sunk into my comforter.

Both insomnia and hypersomnia have nasty side effects, from heart disease to relationship problems. We're a mess of sleep disorders here at my house. I know mine is med and depression related, but who knows what's wrong with dad.

So now I can sleep

I slept all afternoon and canceled an appointment I had tonight. I came upstairs and by 2 had determined I just couldn't stay awake. I set an alarm for 3 and laid down. At 6 I woke up to a text message and wondered where the hell the time had gone. I suppose my insomnia is cured, but I don't want to be sleeping all the time! I really wanted to go play hockey tonight, but I don't know if I could be upright for it. I just feel like I'm dragging ass.

And I can't stop eating. I'm just constantly shoveling things into my mouth, but it's all been good for me: yogurt, ciabatta bread with a little peanut butter, cheese, a banana. Nothing horrible, but the volume is what counts, I suppose. I can feel my jeans are way too tight already, so let's make a commitment to think more about going to the gym. I don't want to assign myself anything right now for fear that I won't be able to follow through because of the tiredness.

I also feel stuffy in the head. Just like a cotton ball is where my brain is supposed to be, but it's a wet cotton ball: dense. I'm having trouble reading articles that are too long because I just can't concentrate on the words for very long. I keep bookmarking stuff to come back to.

And all I want to do is lie back down. I'm sure I could fall right back to sleep.

Forcefully awake

“'Why do we get out of bed?' Mitch wondered. 'Is there any feeling better than being in bed? What could possibly feel better than this? What is going to happen in the course of my day that will be an improvement over lying on something very soft, underneath something very warm, wearing only underwear, doing absolutely nothing, all by myself?' Every day, Mitch awoke to this line of reasoning: Every day, the first move he made outside his sheets immediately destroyed the only flawless part of his existence." -Chuck Klosterman

My eyelids are drooping. My body feels like lead. I'm dreaming about my nice, warm comforter and all the time I have between now and tomorrow morning to just spend in bed. I'm thinking about a nap. A long, hibernatory nap.

But maybe I shouldn't give in? I can't sleep till 1 when I get off work, and I'm supposed to play hockey tonight at 7, so I could nap before that, but I'm thinking about canceling play and just sleeping through till tomorrow morning. That's unhealthy. I need to develop a schedule and stick to it. No sleeping till after 9pm. That sounds about right, right? 9 is a good time to go to sleep, especially if you get up at 6. That's 9 hours, give or take.

I need to get myself to a meeting today, but I don't think that's going to happen. And my pants feel tighter today than they did yesterday, but I doubt I'm going for a run. But I need to keep myself awake, so both of those things would be the perfect thing to do. Decisions, decisions.

Oh so heavy

I feel like my tongue is dead. A big, useless piece of flesh is resting on the bottom of my mouth between my teeth; just lying there in peace, content to be unresponsive. And the fuzz. Wool has started to grow between my ears. There's a giant cotton ball being fluffed to brain-sized dimensions and spread out like a blanket inside my head.

I couldn't think of the word receipt.

I slept through my alarm.

I'm starving, but I've already eaten. Actually, it's not hunger, it's the need to keep my mouth moving so it doesn't sew itself shut. Each moment I don't open it, the heavy my tongue feels. It's like I can't even open it. My jaw is heavy, too.

As I stand here at the computer, I get the feeling I may topple over. Just lean a little too far to one side and down I'll go, straight down like a tree that's been chopped. It's taking all the effort I have to stay standing - if I sit I know I'm going to curl up in the chair and sleep.

Day 2 of Zyprexa, lithium, and Celexa.

I'm awake: I'm asleep

Called the doc and the secretary told me no more than 50mg of Seroquel, so I took half my 25mg pill and immediately laid down to take a nap. I woke up to Adam calling 3 hours later. He came over and took me out to get a burger (which was tasty), and invited me to come stay with him tonight. "I'm worried about you." Don't worry. I have a plan: Seroquel, sleep, showers, work, meetings. All will keep me busy.

I'm worried about leaving the house. I hate when that happens, because it usually means I'm going to have a panic attack. I get a little phobic of "the world" in general, especially having to function in it, but I'll be just fine. I have to get out and do things. I have to. I can't just sleep till magically drugs start working.

I'm not even making sense in my head. I hope some of that made sense. And I'm having trouble typing. I'm misspelling things and my fingers are all over the keyboard. I hate this. I hate feeling this way and having to take the big guns to make me feel like I can at least partly function. I'm still buzzing, but I'm not crawling out of my skin like I was this morning.

I'm going to go back to bed.

Insomnia is cute

Just a little something cute from me to you.

So we were talking about staying up late in order to be alone, right? Well, it's 3:30am and I'm listening to Tom Petty, surfing the internet, and talking to my dad. Dad, you say? Yep. He's up, too. He's an insomniac, and it's really bad today. He's on the phone with the airlines (he's going somewhere for a week) because one of his flights was canceled. I think he just got through to someone. He came in a minute ago and said he'd been on hold for 18 minutes. When I left the living room last he was drinking chamomile tea and trying to rest. Wonder what happened to trying to go to bed.

And yeah, it's 3:30am and I'm still here, too. I'm wandering around the internet not getting anything done, but getting stuff done all the same. I did find the awesome picture above, which has to count for something.

The power of people

Last week I stayed in and watched my show. This week, I spent 2 days with Adam and went to a meeting. Posts last week: 5. Posts in three days: 15. Hm. Interesting that actually having a life gives me something to write about. It makes me feel better to be around people; to interact. The book says something about a 2's worst day (enneagrams again) is being locked up without human contact. I think that's pretty true of me. I need people. My dad is a loner, so he's no good for human contact. Plus he just talks lately about stuff Glen Beck says, and it's driving me nuts.

Anyway, I need to get out of the house more. I signed up for Meetups on meetup.com. It has some neat groups like running groups, coffee, yoga, young professionals, etc. I did one when I moved out to the other coast and met some nice people. I'd like to start meeting nice people again. I need to cultivate relationships so I'm not dependent on the few I have. I need to learn things you can only learn by getting out there and living. So I signed up. Watch me go, she says sarcastically.

And yes, I'm going to go back to going to meetings. I think if only for the getting to know new people thing it's worth it. And the getting the hell out of the house every now and again. It took having to drink a Red Bull to give me the energy, but now I know I can do it. I can function outside of my pajamas. I can put on my big girl pants and get the hell out of bed to do something. I mean, I knew I could, but it's nice to have proof.

Of course, it's 2am and it's not looking like I'm going to bed any time soon. No big deal, since I didn't get out of bed till 4pm today, but it doesn't bode well for getting out of bed tomorrow before 4pm again. I really need to get the sleep thing in order, but as I told my therapist, it's the only time I feel like I'm alone, and I need alone time. Even just sitting in my room all day doesn't give me the alone feeling, because my door is open and my dad comes in and talks to me. But when he's asleep I have time to think; to be alone.

So I'm going to type more tonight, I'm sure.

Angry birds took my sleep

I totally forgot how satisfying it can be to play video games. Michael turned me on to this game called Angry Birds, and now I just can't stop playing it. It's nice to have something to go to when you can't sleep, and this is just as mindless as drinking but it's only making me frustrated and laugh instead of drunk.

I used to play video games as a kid. I had a Nintendo and would play baseball, Mario, and Bubble Bobble (look it up, it's awesome). I used to come home from school and my mom would be playing, and so I would pick up the other controller and together we would beat different games. It was fun to play, and to bond, and to space out. I suppose you learn all sorts of stuff from video games without knowing it, but I really just like the little puzzles.

I can't sleep. I just tried and laid down for an hour. All I got out of it was the urge to reply to an email I had been avoiding. It was my friend Roberta on the other coast asking me how my love life is. I was helping her plan a second date when she asked. I just didn't feel like replying, "The only person outside my family I ever see is Adam," and she knows the story, there. I replied, and told her I was just going to join a nunnery and live vicariously.

You know I haven't dated anyone in 3 years? It's strange. I've never been single this long. In fact, I was never single from the time of my first boyfriend until I broke up with Adam. And then I only had a few months before Michael and I started dating. But since Michael there's been no one. That's kind of sad.

A little self loving

Like any addiction, love addiction therapy recommends self-care as a tool to healing. Something I'm doing for self-care right now is listening to Christmas music. I love it so much. I can't wait for this time of year. I decorate, make Christmas cookies, listen non-stop to Christmas music, and pray for snow. It really is the most wonderful time of the year for me.

Some other things I'm doing for self-care are eating well, blogging (it's like journaling, which spell-check says is not a word), thinking about exercising (ok, so I did it once this week. Maybe I'll get out there again), and spending quality time with my dad and grandma. I suppose napping is self-care, but not at the rate I do it. I sleep all the time, which is probably a bad thing. I'm just so tired. I can't seem to sleep at night, and then I sleep during the day, almost all day. When I get up I just don't have the energy for anything. I need to fix that before I hit a bad depression.

What else can I do for self-care? I can take a hot shower. I'm freezing in here, and I need to wash my hair. I only do it every 3 days or so, because it's better for colored hair. I have this nice shampoo and conditioner that I treated myself to. It's nice to take a long shower like that. I wonder what else I can do?

I'm so lazy

I went back to bed. When my dad got home from his walk he came in and woke me up. "Anne, you've been in bed all day!" "I know," I said, "But I took that Seroquel." Which is totally true. I've been so sleepy all day. I just want to lie down, still. I should really go for a run. I still have my running clothes on.

Good news! I have an interview in the new year, and a phone interview sometime this or next week (he asked when I was available). The one in the new year is for something I wouldn't be as enthusiastic about, but it's something I've done before and it's a step in the right direction.

There I am getting my hopes up again. I already had 11 interviews and nothing has come from any of them, and now I'm getting my hopes up about 2 little interviews, one just a phone interview. I don't want to get all excited, but they're both here near everyone I want to be close to. I would love the job up north, but one of the jobs here is the same title and more money. So we'll see. Hopefully the new year will bring something great, and soon!

Seroquel

I took some Seroquel last night so I would sleep through the night, and it worked, but now I feel like I need to sleep through the day, too. I'm so tired! It just knocks me down like a tranquilizer. I made the mistake of taking a whole one, too.

So I woke up, put on my running clothes, and am ready to go for a run to wake myself up. Will I do it? Only time will tell. I sure hope so. I put on my indoor running clothes (shorts) cause I'm sure as hell not going back out there in 37 degree weather to run up the hill. I'm not sore or anything, but it gave me that cough I can't seem to rid myself of.

Adam called last night just to talk. He didn't have much to say, just wanted to talk and have someone listen. I like to do that. I like to be able to listen to someone and not have to proffer advice.

Ugh, I can't stop yawning! Time to go back to bed.

Sleep calls to me

Uh oh. I've started to sleep again. I woke up at 2pm today, and only because my dad came in and said, "You're still asleep?" I wasn't really. I was lying there dreaming, which I do when I'm just lying there trying to sleep. But 2pm? I thought it was maybe 10am. I felt like I had just turned off the alarm, which goes off at 8:30am.

Sleep is a total symptom for me. A symptom of depression. I lie in bed, sleeping or not, and just let myself relax. I tune out the world and stop thinking about the things that are bothering me. Mostly, I dream about having a job and living in a neat new place. I dream about living with Adam. I dream about a lot of things, but always in a positive light. My dreams make me happy.

But they lead to depression. Am I getting depressed? I think so. The other night talking with Adam about everything that's going on in life, I almost started crying. I always feel comfortable crying around him, and I seem to do it a lot. I wondered at the time what things I'm shoving down and just not thinking about. I can't seem to bring stuff up with my therapist - I just always think of feeling ok about everything.

I don't think meds will help, either. I feel like the cocktail I'm on is great, and this is just a situational depression. Wouldn't you be a little down by now?

Why is my sleep so funky?

I didn't sleep last night. I kept waking up every hour and staring at the clock. I would fall back asleep only to wake up the next hour and stare at the clock. I talked to my sponsor this morning, and she was saying that something must be up with me. "It'll come to the surface," she said. I just have to go to meetings and talk to people.

Maybe it's the lying to her that's got me up at night. I've been thinking a lot about how much I lie. Remember back a few months ago when Michael said I don't actually lie a lot? He was pretty sure I'm too honest. I can be too honest about a lot of stuff, but not when I want someone to like me. Then I seem to lie more often. I pretend I'm someone I'm not.

So what do I do about it? Do I confess that I haven't been to enough meetings lately? Do I tell her I'm a little uncomfortable having to call her every day? It's getting easier. And they always tell you, of course it's uncomfortable. We're not used to depending on anyone but ourselves. We're not used to getting close to people. So I suppose I just have to keep doing things that make me uncomfortable.

It's time for a run.

Oh, sleep

"Results show that extroverts who were exposed to 12 hours of social interaction were more vulnerable to subsequent sleep deprivation than those who were exposed to an identical period of isolated activity."

I hate going out at night. I usually end up staying up way too late when I get home. I just feel overwhelmed by the energy. I get a lot of energy from hanging out in crowds, some nervous energy, some because I'm an extrovert.

I didn't used to be an extrovert. I was, I think, when I was younger, and I've never been afraid of anything (except cockroaches and silverfish, but not "afraid" just creeped out). I went through a period of really low self-esteem where I was a crazy introvert for a while. But I do have a bubbly kind of personality, and I think I attract interesting people by being outgoing.

So maybe in order to sleep what I need to do is slow down from maybe 9pm on. Just calm down and not go to meetings or hang out with other people. Turn off the tv and read. Maybe that will help.