Zombie diaries (pt. 1)

It's almost 5:30 a.m. and I can't get back to sleep.  After an exhausting week of packing, moving, being sick, unpacking, and a family reunion, I was pretty much done for sometime around 10:30 last night.  I thought I'd be able to sleep for a while, but no such luck because I've been up since about 1:30 a.m.

This madness has to end.
 

This is me.  I call it Sleep, Interrupted.

Could it be insomnia?  Maybe.  Here's how the Mayo Clinic defines insomnia:

Insomnia includes having trouble falling or staying asleep. It's one of the most common medical complaints. With insomnia, you usually awaken feeling unrefreshed, which takes a toll on your ability to function during the day. Insomnia can sap not only your energy level and mood, but also your health, work performance and quality of life

Symptoms Include (from Google Health):

• Difficulty falling asleep on most nights
• Feeling tired during the day or falling asleep during the day
• Not feeling refreshed when you wake up
• Waking up several times during sleep

Check, check and check.  All those symptoms apply to me.  I find that I drift off to sleep easily.  Rarely am I relaxed before sleeping; I usually have to wait until I'm exhausted and just "pass out".  When I do sleep, it's only for a couple hours.  I used to brag that I was the queen of naps, but that title doesn't really have a lot of power attached to it.  Inadequate sleep messes with everything.  My mood isn't very pleasant, I have trouble concentrating, I get jitters something awful and sometimes I get bad headaches.

The risk factors vary, and I'm wrestling with quite a few.  Turns out pretty much everything, even gender, can have an affect on one's sleep health.

Luckily there are some simple home remedies I can try out before seeking a doctor for more advanced testing and treatment.  Cutting out daytime naps and changing my eating habits (i.e. eating at regular times each day) will be difficult, but I'm willing to give it a shot.  Now that I've settled in a bit more since moving, I hope to get my evening walks going again.  That should help a great bit.

Now, after I figure out how to sleep, what to do about when I sleep?  That's the other issue -- I'm a night owl.  Ever since I can remember, it felt more natural for me to sleep during the day and be up at night.  That doesn't work so well in the real world.  Most don't believe me, but my body clock is wonky!

Some features of the human circadian biological clock (click here for more info)

It may appear to some that I'd rather loaf around all day and let the world pass me by, but in actuality, the sleep I do get during the day is very limited compared to when I'm awake.  Also, the sleep I get is often unsatisfying. Going back to work this week will help develop a better sleep schedule, but I know there will be a few nights a weeks where I'll want to be up past my desired bedtime (11:30 pm).  I'm going to work on actually sleeping for longer than a few hours at a time and hope to later adjust based on the time of day.

I'm done with this post and still feeling restless.  Oh and look, it's 6:30 a.m. and the sun is coming up!  Going to take this slowly.  I'll post updates.

Night Night (yeah, right).