Sleep Hygiene - Bah Humbug!

Sleep....or should I say the lack thereof. I just have to say that the me "before" and the me "now" have very different sleeping schedules.

I will say I suffer from a really screwed up sleeping schedule now. I have numerous nights of insomnia. I don't know why I feel shame about this when speaking to my healthcare providers. It's ridiculous to feel shame for something I am unable to control. Yet they speak about "sleep diaries" and "good sleep hygiene" and then tell me I should try to "avoid naps during the day". This became such a toilsome burden to me to get back to a sense of "normalcy" and be able to report back to them that I was a good girl and doing what I should be doing to make myself well.....to make my brain well.

I really believe we live sometimes daily and sometimes moment to moment with the stages of grief. Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. The denial is there bc I could blame the meds, my injuries, and my vitals getting taken when I was trying to sleep, all kinds of things - the kids being home, feeling "flooded and overwhelmed" causing me to fall asleep when I didn't FEEL sleepy (and yes in the middle of the day no matter where I was at). I was angry at my body for acting differently. Sometimes this still crops up. I would bargain with myself (and still do at times). Just one more thing to try to stay awake...setting what I now realize were unrealistic goals for myself; or on the other side, begging myself to fall asleep bc I knew I had early moring therapies scheduled - yet nothing. I jusst wasn't tired....and couldn't sleep. I had acquired this new pattern of crazy sleep habits that I developed Depression over. Sometimes, I am up for a full 24 hours with no sleep and am not tired. Some days I can sleep all night and all day and all night again and still not feel "rested". Nothing is consistent in my sleep world, or this new world in general except that I am always tired, always fatigued and never get enough sleep and tired of sleeping so much, at the same time. Sometimes I didn't even realized I fell asleep. Like in the middle of a conversation, or reading a book to my child, or during a therapy appointment - usually Speech Therapy.

Then finally I said to myself "fuck it I am tired I need to sleep" (yep even in the middle of the day and sometimes more than once a day) or "you know what, I am not tired so I am staying awake".....and NOT feel guilt about it. Then Depression again bc who is going to hire someone who randomly falls asleep? Denial again, because maybe I am not as different as I really know that I am. Then bargainig again. If I just do things differently....or....or....or....or.....then anger bc I know it just isn't possible yet. Then back to acceptance. To move forward I have to accept where I am at. This is all so complicated and so exhausting. Just thinking about it makes me tired. But no, I have to much to accomplish. Life doesn't stop.....it goes on....unless I am sleeping...lol