Wherein I Complain About Insomnia

Well, it is about 1:30 in the AM, and I am still wide awake. Le sigh.

Last night I did not finally retire until about 5 AM ... it was BAD. Very Very Bad. And now, I am awake and looking at the clock and thinking about how I have to get up at 6:30 tomorrow morning to work from 8:30 until 8:30. Blah.

I have struggled with insomnia on and off for as long as I can remember. The worst part about it (besides the obvious "not being able to sleep and then being a terrible zombie-like person in the morning" part) is the fact that it is very erratic. I can be strolling through life all la-dee-da-dee-da, smelling roses, getting to sleep at night and waking up normal in the morning, when BAM. All of a sudden I am up until 4 AM one night, and I know the next few weeks will be long, lonely nights. I am never prepared for this weirdness, and I never know when it will creep up on me. But here it is again, and I have no idea when it will leave me.

Currently, Jeremy is sleeping beside me, flat on his back, like a dead person. Like he always is. That man only has to blink extra-long and he could be asleep. It is terrible and infuriating.

Knowing that he is asleep and enjoying the luxury of dreams and rest generally makes me unreasonably jealous once it gets past 2 AM. I look over at him and sometimes even think crazy thoughts like, if I have to be awake and miserable, then HE should be awake and miserable too. And I think about poking him. Or "accidentally" elbowing him. At times, I also have wild fantasies that maybe if I wake him up he will rub my back and soothe me to sleep and all my sleeping problems will be solved. I have tried this tact before, but it turns out it only results in a sleepy, still-awake me and a very irritated husband. So ... my husband sleeps and I type.

It is weirdly lonely this late at night (or this early in the morning, whatever.). It is not the same kind of being alone as during the day, what with the sunshine and sounds and other people being awake. And it is not like I can get anything really productive done, because if I get up to do things (which I used to do in the past. Jeremy once woke up at 4 AM because I accidentally dropped something and he wandered out of bed to find me cleaning a closet. True story.) then I am even more awake, and I know there is no hope of me drifting off to sleep when I am grading papers, cleaning grout, or folding laundry. So, I lay in bed, watch TV, read books, drink herbal sleepy-time tea, listen to CDs that play the sounds of the waves, try to hypnotize myself to sleep, and, most importantly, try NOT to think about the fact that I am still awake and should be sleeping.

Okay, if I fall asleep now, I can still get five hours of sleep before my 12-hour workday tomorrow. Here I go ...