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Sunday, April 26, 2009

Sleep

Last night was an incredibly rough night... probably one of the toughest ones I have had yet. It made me start thinking about how to keep myself safe, how to get sleep at night, and how to start gaining some independence.

My first thought was about eating disorder recovery. I had to protect mealtime, and almost make it a sacred time. There were no arguments allowed. No conflicts. No emotions around the food. I could eat, I could have pleasant conversation, but I wouldn't play with recovery by trying to mix emotions and eating.

I thought of sleep. I have a lot of strange attitudes towards sleep just like I do food. I don't believe I deserve to sleep. I believe if I sleep at all, I am lazy. I feel like I am a better and stronger person if I don't sleep. Those crappy beliefs coupled with the flashbacks, nightmares, and night terrors have done a number on me.

Somehow, I have to protect my sleep time like I have protected mealtimes. I need to force myself to go to bed. I need to do my best to ground myself and make myself feel safe before getting into bed. In bed, I need to make it a positive atmosphere. I don't know how to do all this, but I am trying to remember how CFC helped us. I know they were careful to have a calm schedule from 8 until we went to bed at 10. We also took meds at 9 - which I could do. Lights out at 10:30 - no matter what. I don't know...

I don't have a plan yet, but I will learn to protect my sleep as carefully as I protect my eating.
(UGH!) I feel like such a loser! I don't need sleep. I am being silly. I can handle staying up late. I can handle not sleeping. I can handle whatever it is. I haven't had a bedtime since I was like 8... except for when I was at CFC... and now I am thinking of imposing one on myself?!? (BLAH!)

1 comment:

  1. I have a bedtime. I generally try to be in bed between 10:30 and 11:00. It's really weird because I used to be up all night all the time. Making my bed time sacred has really helped me to overcome my insomnia. I still have bouts of insomnia here and there, but it usually hits if I stay up after my bed time. Sometimes I'll be up until 3, 4 or 5 if I don't get to bed on time. But I've been doing the bed time thing for over a year now and I've actually found that I don't have to be quite as strict anymore. If I stay up a little later then I'm still okay most of the time. I don't know, it's all weird I guess.

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