I like my sleep. I mean, I really like my sleep. REALLY. I wish the hours of the day were reversed and that it would be acceptable to spend 8 hours a day awake and spend the rest of my time out cold. I truly hate waking up. No matter what time I wake up, I would advise people not to speak to me until at least - at LEAST - 10:30am and not until I have had at least - at LEAST - 2 Diet Cokes. Even my kids know that they should tread lightly around me in the mornings and anything I do or say should be verified with Dad before being taken too seriously. I've stopped making apologies for it too. It is what it is and I am what I am. Which is not a morning person.
This problem is often compounded by the fact that I am a Mom. Which means that I haven't had a solid sleep-through-the-night night of sleep in the past 12 years. And if you are a Mom, you know what I mean. All it takes is a whimper, a bed spring sproinging, a floor board creaking, a light switch clicking, or let's face it, the sound of a child's breathing that gets any closer to my ear than their bed. And I'm awake. On full alert. Wondering why the child is awake, up, moving. And this is directly followed by wondering what sort of mayhem will ensue that I will discover in the morning and have to rectify. And what's really weird is I can tell from my bed which child it is that is awake. Little Diva has a delicate, barely detectable pitter-pat and always closes her bedroom door behind her when she leaves her room in the middle of the night, lest the dog escape and dare to try and sleep somewhere other than her room. Big Dude has your standard, basic 12 year old foot fall. Little Dude, however, is my stomper. He doesn't mean to. In fact, he's still asleep 98.54% time when he gets up in the middle of the night and has no clue that he is plodding down the hallway in a manner that would make Bigfoot look like a dainty, ballerina. And I KNOW he's asleep because of the things he does and has no memory of. Like trying to shower...with his clothes on. Or attempting to leave the house out the front door, or through the garage. Or perhaps trying to pee...with his eyes closed...while still dreaming about being someplace other than a bathroom...and actually peeing all over all 4 walls of the bathroom and the underside of the toilet. Yes, the underside of the toilet.
So its pretty easy to know which kid is up and moving, and intercede accordingly as necessary. With Little Diva, I'm pretty sure its gonna be something along the lines of helping her retrieve some stuffed animal that has fallen off the bed or is wedged between the bed and the wall. Thank GOD we are out of the "You need to help me go to the bathroom." phase, which always involved me standing in the doorway of the bathroom watching her go to the bathroom and walking her back to her room where I turned off the light and shut the door. Yes, I'm pretty sure my assistance was invaluable and absolutely necessary! With Big Dude, I can just roll over because unless he has had a bad dream and comes to the side of my bed for some reassurances, he can handle his own shiznit. With Little Dude, all bets are off. He might simply use the bathroom and return to bed, which is the best possible outcome for all of us. He may leave a bunch of lights on, in which case, I just have to turn them off (including the one in his room). Or, he could need to be forcibly removed from the shower, or redirected back to his bedroom from whatever quest he might be on (to escape the house, to watch TV in the living room, to do...something...in the basement, to pee in the corner of the dining room that he thinks is a public urinal, etc). But my biggest fear is that he will need me to stand next to him gently tapping his cheek, poking his shoulder, and screaming at him to "Wake up! Open your eyes! Watch what you are doing! AIM! Get it in the toilet!" while he is sleep-peeing, and then spending an hour or 2 in the middle of the night cleaning and disinfecting the bathroom. This shit definitely puts a damper on the smooth-nights-sleep thing.
Of course, it doesn't help to sleep next to a snore-er-er-er. Its not his fault and I have never even one time told him he needed to sleep on the couch. If it gets to be too much, I'll go to the couch. But the fact of the matter is that I can't sleep with snoring. So I try really, really, REALLY hard to fall asleep in the 46 seconds between me asking him to roll over because he's snoring, and the beginning of his next round of snoring. This very rarely happens. So I do a bit of tossing and turning until there is a long enough break for me to actually fall asleep. And you add an uncooperative mattress to the equation, and Mama ain't gonna be a'smilin' when the sun comes up. I realize I am probably in the smallest minority of all mattress-owners when I say this, but Tempurpedic has done me NO favors for the last 2.5 years. I know, I know...they are the greatest thing since sliced bread, and they solve every sleep issue known to man, and they will cure all aches and pains associated with sleeping discomfort. Except for me. Because I NEVER had back pain, or hip pain, or trouble getting comfortable, or issues tossing and turning through the night, until we got this mattress. I was told "You have to give it awhile to get used to it. It'll take some time but once your body is used to it, you are gonna love it!" Um, yeah, not so much. I am not sure, but I really don't think it should take 2 years and 4 months (and counting...) to get "used to" sleeping on a new mattress before you can expect a good nights sleep. Usually I sleep on one side until that shoulder and hip are numb or aching. Then I roll over to the other side until the same thing happens. Sometimes at this point I will try to sleep on my back, but I grind my teeth and this position results in me waking up with a raging jaw ache. So then its back to side #1 again. Lather, rinse and repeat, as the shampoo bottle says. All night long. And don't even get me started on how my crazy, whacky dreaming can mess with a good nights sleep........
So I think today will be a nap day. Although I know this will only make it harder to fall asleep tonight. Which means I really should just make everyone suffer right along with me, and deal with my cranky, overtired ass all friggin' day and then I should make all the little minions go to bed early (bitch at me for making you go to bed early tonight...go ahead, I dare you.) And hope to fall asleep early. It would really be in everyone's best interest if this could happen. Cuz if it doesn't, there won't even be anything Diet Coke can do to help. And that's saying a lot. Because I think an ice cold Diet Coke can pretty much solve anything. Especially if it has some Jack in it.
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