Something incredible happened this week!
I think it was Tuesday night when I went to bed in my home-away-from-home here in Virginia Beach at my son Doug’s house.
I SLEPT ALL NIGHT!
Now I know that I’m down here taking care of my grandson and we get excited whenever a baby sleeps all night, but anyone with chronic pain can relate to my excitement.
I don’t think I’ve slept all night since the Reagan years!
My friend Bruce posted on Facebook this week, “Sleep is overrated. (Say all insomniacs and people who have chronic pain issues). Keep smiling and live the life.”
I don’t usually sleep all night. I’ll get comfortable on my right side and then wake up a couple hours later because my shoulder hurts so I roll over onto the left side until that hurts. Then there’s the occasional knee pain and a new one in my right heel. Yeah, that’s my newest adventure. I like to call them adventures because calling it my latest “problem” seems so negative.
One comment on Bruce’s post said, “Painsomnia… insomnia due to pain is real and it gets worse with less sleep. I hate it!”
She’s right. If you Google “painsomnia” there are a number of medical sights that write about it.
I think Bruce and I have a similar mindset. If you notice, his post ended with, “Keep smiling and live the life.” My thoughts are: “It is what it is, make the most of it. You can let it dominate and ruin your life, or keep moving forward and enjoy what you can.”
My nightime routine includes taking my meds. That includes an anti-inflammatory and a Flexorall for the pain. It makes me drowsy so I usually take it, then read for awhile until my eyes start to close and I read the same paragraph over and over. Then comes the toss and turn routine.
That’s why the other night was so unusual and fantastic! My alarm went off at 6:30 a.m. and I just stayed there for a minute because I couldn’t believe it was morning already. I hadn’t woken up 3 or 4 times! What’s the deal? It only lasted that one night unfortunately. The next night I was back to my usual routine.
Why do I think it happened? Can I do it again? Maybe.
The only thing I can think of is that taking care of my grandson Liam is fun but that little guy keeps me busy. He doesn’t crawl yet but we just go from one thing to another and he just takes a half hour or 45-minute nap. That day I also stopped for groceries on the way back to Doug’s house. I was busy guy.
I guess that’s the answer: Wear yourself out, then rest will come. Actually it might have been a combination of many things. Barometric pressure being one. I believe the weather has a huge impact on our joints. Plus whatever we had for dinner that night had an impact and how much time I spent on screens before bed, either my tablet or phone.
I could become obsessed over this but then I’m sure I would lose sleep trying to figure it out. For now, I’ll just enjoy it for what it was: a good night’s sleep.
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