Too Much or Not Enough

I find it interesting that the topic of my last class focused on Medicare and social security.  The topic of my current class has been the brain, stress and this week’s topic on sleep disorders – which I have had my entire life.  Thus I’m making discoveries.  I am also getting the feeling that I need to put my affairs in order and start throwing away mountains of stuff so that Roland and Jenna won’t have to do it in the event I leave this earth.

          I’m not saying that death is around the corner.  It just feels like it in some ways.  Perhaps it’s just the side effects of still trying to heal from bronchitis and still coughing and not breathing right.  I was told at the doctor’s office that my breathing was off.  I don’t think it’s the bronchitis that’s to blame.  My breathing has always been off.  I think more off as I age.  My pipes are small and seem to shrink with each passing year.  No, I don’t have anything to back that up.  Just theory.

          I’ve been reading past memories of mom and dad and their good health somehow shattered.  Dad’s was physical and mom’s was mental.  I think I have a little bit of each going for me right now.  My sleep patterns are horrible.  But they have always been horrible.  Mom said after she gave birth to me, I was always asleep when I was in the hospital.  She said she never saw me awake until she got me home.  I was her first child.  She didn’t know what to expect but thought I ought to be sleeping more than I did.  She said it was as though I had slept in the hospital enough to get me through the next five years. 

          Patrick was the opposite.  He slept the normal hours a baby should.  Mom said he had weird breathing patterns though – or maybe it was just paranoia on her part.  After all, she had dealt with a non-sleeping child for two years before Patrick came along and slept beautifully, but she would have a hard time falling asleep because she wasn’t used to a sleeping baby and would place her hand on top of him to make sure he was still breathing.

         

          I don’t know when I started sleeping in an upright position.  I do sleep better than when I am trying to lay flat.  I still snore though, but perhaps not as loudly.  I don’t know if anyone else in my family snores.  It’s a wonder that any of my family were able to sleep with me in the house.  Though I’ve never heard myself, I understand that I am loud.

          For the most part, whenever I have drifted off in a recliner, I will wake up in the same position in which I fell asleep.  If I try sleeping in bed, I am all over the place along with the sheets and whatever other bedding started out near me.  I rarely ever have blankets on.  Sometimes I may use just one.  But I am usually too hot.

          My feet and ears get cold and I will wear slippers and sometimes a hat or headband.  I usually remove the headwear long before I wake up. 

          This week, as part of my assignment, I am supposed to turn in a sleep schedule which I have yet to create and stick with.  Especially since the bronchitis and antibiotics and cough and phlegm.  I get worn out so easily.  A trip to the mailbox does me in.  I have taken more naps in the last two weeks than I have ever taken in my entire life.  Perhaps it’s wrong to call them naps as I often sleep longer than I do through the night.

          I think the weather may upset my sleeping also.  And I don’t think it would matter where in the country or probably even the entire planet right now.  The weather has been experiencing some violent mood swings.  I like the weather right now.  I want to be a part of it.  I want it to stay where it is.  I don’t want it to warm up again.