.... still awake ...

It's 5 am. I haven't even so much as had a nap.

I wouldn't say I'm wide awake. My body hurts, my eyes hurt, but my brain won't give up for the night and let me go to sleep.

So I came out to the computer ... and ended up having to do a complete system restore to fix whatever eldest dd did to my computer that fried three programs, including Firefox. Child is SO in trouble. This, after losing her cell phone for the SECOND time, because she has no concept of limited minutes. Grrrrrrr.

I hurt. I'm sick and tired of hurting. I know the stupid abcess didn't help, and that it made my nerve block wear off, but geeze .... a few months go by, and I forget how miserable I was before the last nerve block.

And as more time goes by, the symptoms of course get worse, and the blinding brain spike headaches get more frequent, and I reach the point where my head constantly hurts to at least some degree and there's pretty much no relief to be found. And I have to wait until the 7th for my next nerve block -- though I may call this morning and see if they have a cancellation for tomorrow to squeeze me in earlier.

.... and can someone tell me why my "ferocious" Corgi "guardmutt" has decided that the squeaking of my ceiling fan is evil and must be barked at at 4 am? I had to turn the fan OFF to calm her down.

Oh. Look. Shiny!

Insomnia Zombie

It was past 7 am this morning when I finally fell asleep. That was WITH medication assistance. I won't admit to how much I had to take to finally pass out, however, for the paranoid, I know well my own medication limits (and how my body does or doesn't to it, with my effed up brain chemistry), but it hasn't taken that much in a long time.

Out of that, I got less than 7 hours sleep. Probably closer to 6.

Haven't had a cycle quite this bad in a long time. Sure, I go through the phases, but with chronic insomnia, it tends to sneak up on you, and you don't realize just how bad it is until you have nights like last night, or the 48 hour days. I've gone more than 72 hours solid without a single hour of sleep before. And I ACHE from the lack of real sleep. Both brain and body hurt, and I feel like I'm in a fog.

On Insomnia.

There's multiple ways in which insomnia affects people. There's the "can't go to sleep" folks (sleep onset insomnia) that can lay in bed for hours without passing out. I'm one of those. There's the "early wakers" (sleep maintenance insomnia) who go to bed with no problem, then will suddenly snap wide awake well before they've gotten enough sleep. Occasionally I have this problem as well, but I'm lucky enough that if I don't move, usually I can drift back off.

But then there's a third problem, and it's very common to those with fibromyalgia, RSD, and other chronic pain disorders, as well as those suffering from depression. REM disturbance (REM rebound, excessive dreaming, where the body leaps right into REM instead of going through the stages). Or rather, in my case, Too Damn Much REM sleep.

I am a Stage 5 sleeper. I go from Stage 1, which instead lasts at least an hour or longer when I finally start to drift, to Stage 5. Stage 3/4 damn near doesn't exist.

Active sleep. I wake up TIRED, because my brain is active all night.

And I've been doing this for 25 years. Are we having fun yet?

Ruminations of an Insomniac

Stray thoughts ahead. You were warned.

Why is the library or a bookstore so amazingly sexy? What is it about real paper, about the scent of the pages, the sound they make when turned or ruffled, that makes electronic media feel so flat?

I'm a book junkie, I admit it.

I have an intense predilection for hardbacks. They just feel so right, they read more comfortably: after all, you have no risk of bending the covers, they're easier to support during the process of devouring the book. Paperbacks are a weak and poor shadow of the reading pleasure, and yet my budget hardly allows me to buy hardcovers. The library makes a nearly acceptable substitute, and even though I won't own the books that way, there's always the joy of renewing what I've checked out previously.

Chronicles of the Lensmen: E.E."Doc" Smith. For hard sci-fi started in 1948, they still manage to hold my rapt attention, and I can see reflections of it in many more current works.

The bookcase purchased for my birthday is a black leviathan near my bed. A blank slate, shelves awaiting books, and the sides like a 2001 obelisk begging to be painted. Sorcha suggested silver knotwork, and I think it might just be the way I go unless there are other creative suggestions. The unrelieved BLACKNESS of it is so very formal, but it's crying out for More.

Of course, it's hardly a bookcase. That would be a misnomer of grand proportions. What it truly is, or rather has become, is a Dedicated Feline Napping Appliance. I've found cats happily sleeping on three of the deep shelves. I fear the bottom shelf lost forever to the four-legged interlopers.

Candle flames and lava lamps, the light of the laptop monitor, with old old X Files rumbling on the TV in the background as my only light. An oversized feline curled tightly against my leg as I type, purring like a motorboat and gently pawing at my leg for attention, then more insistently until I have to stop typing and adore him before the claws come out in a Demand For Attention NOW.

Rambling onwards. Uh-Oh Oreos. Uh-oh is right, the damned things are temptation enough for me, who isn't supposed to partake of the evils of refined sugar, but denying them is impossible. Damn you, DG. Now bring me more. Or better yet, cinnamon glazed almonds, which I have found a lovely online source for and will be begging to order quite soon, oh yes.

I want to kidnap my Trained Attack Wenches and run away for the weekend. Or a week. Just get away with the girls for a while. It doesn't matter if we do anything, if we just lie around, or if we pile into the car and aim for a random road trip. So what if it's more like "Thelma and Louise" meets "The Blues Brothers." We can do this. We must do this. I need the relief, I need my wenches, I need to get away and escape.

Am I escaping from something in particular, or just from myself? I don't think it matters. I'm pushing 40 with a stick now, I've lost all the horrible weight that dragged me down, and it's time I remembered how to live again.

Spent Saturday with my aunt and uncle. My aunt, sister to the Momster from Hell, and so totally different in every way possible. To know that she also has difficulties with the Momster was quite refreshing and comforting, to discover that I'm not the only one that thinks the woman is not only the poster child for Valium, but a dreadfully neurotic prude "in serious need of a good fuck," end quote. Endless wave pool, skinny dipping with my hippy relatives (who also pointed out the locations of all the N TX nudist colonies) in their indoor endless wave pool, or outdoors in the hot tub. This was the first time in many many years I've been able to spend time with them without the Momster around, and I think we were all a little nervous at first, wondering if we could just relax and be ourselves. It didn't take long to find many mutually compatible areas, and everyone relaxed and enjoyed themselves.

It wasn't a complete escape, but for a while it was another world.

A sound in the background, a guitar singing away, surprisingly melodic, to look up and see little tiny Thing 2 perched in a chair before the Wall of Guitars (including the ones signed by B.B. King and ... was it Eric Clapton, DG?), guitar in her arms. It was my 8 year old playing. DG got a few pics with his camera phone, but the Luddite has yet to figure out how to get them from the phone to anything else so they can be shared. My uncle also sent her home with two new sets of drumsticks. Yes, music runs deep in this family.

Some nights, I don't think there's enough Ambien in the world to still my mind and put me to sleep. I've been out of sleep aids for months, and for a chronic insomniac with 20 + years experience in the utter lack of sleep, I suppose it isn't so bad to go back to the dramatic cycles of sleeplessness, but damn what I wouldn't give for a night or two of perfectly normal sleep patterns. Such is my life, which at least I'm not sleeping through.

Found a vanilla scented candle that isn't disgusting. I didn't think they existed, and fake vanilla smells make me gag, all plasticy and unnatural. This is rather mellow with a whisper of cigar store vanilla pipe tobacco smoothness, instead of sharp and biting, and is missing the cloying sweetness of other vanilla attempts. I suppose I'm as pleased as I can be, but of course they were on dramatic clearance and will probably be impossible to find after this.

Damn Illuminations anyway. First they go and candle the Sacred Spaces candles that I utterly adored, then they discontinued my Tomato Vine candles, and now they've bloody well gone too far by pulling Every Single Illuminations Store out of the state of TX. You people are FIRED! The young Empress to Be is as displeased as her Mama. Bastards.

Wild Cherry Diet Pepsi is my friend, but the evil Pepsi company that does not provide said cold tasty beverage in a convenient 6 pack of BOTTLES instead of cans needs to be soundly thrashed. I don't do cans. I can TASTE the metal, and it's foul. And then there's the nose thing, which provides friends and family alike with a great deal of entertainment as Pooka comes away with a bruised schnoze because the Irish nose just isn't designed to be slugging any beverage out of a can.

You can all stop laughing now, thank you. I have stale pistachios, and I'm not afraid to use them.

Yep, I've got the 3 am blues.

Are we there yet?

So, am I the only totally sick fuck up this late?

Apparently so. None of the other journals seem to have been updated recently, while I was busily off writing the great American novel: "How to Fuck Up Your Kid's Life in Twenty Moves or Less."

I feel like I'm a total failure at everything, heavy thoughts for 6 am when you haven't been able to go to sleep and all those little skeletons keep nagging at you. My eldest child is a neurotic, delicate wreck. The youngest is a sociapathic future Playmate looking for a clock tower.

Where the fuck can you go RIGHT with that? Talk about troubles finding a middle ground, it's the classic scenario: perfect victim, perfect victimizer. The baby is a bully, her sister cries. No, she bawls, loudly, like a cow with colic. It gets old, because it's not a matter of her not wanting to defend herself, she simply can't.

And I'm so tired, so tired of everything, so tired of being in charge of everyone else, tired of having to be responsible for everyone, tired of being sick, tired of feeling guilty, tired of the whining and crying and bitching and moaning that it's impossible to feel sympathy. I don't care about fair. I don't care about hurt. All I want is some fucking peace and quiet.

I might as well talk to myself. No one else around here listens to me.

My house is a disaster of Biblical proportions. My health is bad enough that the process of repeatedly bending down to pick up and put away various haphazardly strewn items relocated to such a position by Hurricanes 1 and 2 causes immediate waves of dizziness, followed by spiraling levels of sheer pain. Up and down and up and down are meant for roller coasters and carousels, not my ears

When, in some self-abusive burst of energy, I get totally sick of it and do a massive whirlwind attack before seeping into unconsciousness, it lasts all of an hour before WHAM. I'm giving them credit, usually it takes the amount of time for me to turn around before it's a mess again.

Thing 1, the delicate weeping flower, bawls and heehaws and moans when asked to clean up. You'd have thought we'd asked her to cut out her own liver for dinner instead of pick up her freakin mess. Thing 1 has perfected the Eeyore face, and has moping down to an art form.

Thing 2 looks at us like we're stupid, then wanders off to do whatever the fuck Thing 2 wants to do. Thing 2 has decided she will only respond to frantic screams. Everything else is totally ignored.

It goes something like this: Point child to toy. Explain to child that toy must be removed. Explain to child where toy must go. Explain to child why toy must go. Point child and toy to room. Make child pick up toy. Pick up toy, put toy in child's hand. Child drops toy. Child walks off. Repeat. Repeat again. Threaten to beat child. Repeat. Threaten to send child to room. Watch child walk happily off into her room, having decided that was where she wanted to go in the first place. Pick up toy. Put toy in room. Pull out last remaining strands of now-grey hair.

So, as I sit here writing the great American novel and wondering how many people are going to get ticked off for my verbosity ....

"Oh, MOMMY! You ugwy! Your nose all screwed up!"

Thaaaaaank you, Thing 2.

Stop growing up already.

For Mommy?

Please?