Just Call Me Mr. N. Somniac
By Paul Wein
With the insane schedule that I have, I rarely have the ability to get a good night’s sleep. The majority of the time, I go to sleep at around midnight and wake up at 5:30am – so you can forget about eight hours of sleep. But while my body has gotten used to functioning on only five or six hours of sleep – a new problem has emerged. It seems that as of late, I can’t sleep through an entire night without waking up at least a half dozen times throughout the night.
Take last night for instance. I went to sleep at 9:00pm and set my alarm for 5:30am. So that’s eight and a half hours sleep, which to me – is the equivalent of two night’s sleep at once. So I shut off the lights and waited for Mr. Sandman – but instead of falling asleep – I tossed and turned for at least two hours before I finally fell asleep at around 11:00pm. If that’s not bad enough, I woke up at least three times last night. I remember looking at my beeper and seeing the times that I woke up. I remember getting up at 1:30, 3:47, 4:54 and then at 5:30 when my alarm went off. Why is this happening to me?
And of course, as expected, when my alarm went off at 5:30, my body was ready to sleep. Oh sure, when its time to sleep, my body doesn’t want to – but when it’s time to get up – my body wants to sleep – figures.
Hardly sleeping really takes its toll on me. Besides the fact that my eyes look like I was on the losing end of a boxing match, my contacts get all blurry, I get cranky, I can’t concentrate – and at night when I hang out with my friends – I fall asleep on them. So what am I supposed to do?
I have tried sleeping pills, but no thanks. Did you ever see that commercial where the woman wakes up at 2:30am and can’t sleep, so she takes a sleeping pill and wakes up at 7:00am fresh as a daisy – yeah, right. If I took a sleeping pill at 2:30 in the morning – it would take affect around 11:00am the next day and I would get caught sleeping at my desk – and that would be really bad.
So I have decided that if I can’t combat my sleeplessness on my own – then I have no choice but to go see a specialist that deals with insomnia.
I’m sure he has night hours.