Sleep, where art thou?

I’ve often wondered, half in jest, if you could die from lack of sleep. I’m sure insanity would precede death and you might be able to make the case that I have reached the insanity state, because I have not slept well for over a week and I’m beginning to feel it in nearly everything I do.

A couple of weeks ago I had 3 good nights in a row (unheard of for me). I was amazed at the energy, the ability to think and speak, the speed of mental connections after sleeping well. I am equally stunned now at the physical and mental sluggishness that accompany a lack of sleep.

I wear CPAP at night. If I don’t wear it, I feel awful in the morning; tired, crabby, even sick. But it’s not always a great sleeping experience with CPAP. I’ve had it for over 5 years, so I’m accustomed to it, but there are nights where no matter what I do, I can’t get the mask to sit right, or seal right. If I perspire, the silicone mask slides all around. Over-tightening the straps is as bad and under-tightening; but even a mask that fits one day mysteriously changes fit overnight.

I have a little bump on my nose (we’ve always called it the Cirillo bump. The respiratory therapist called it a significant bump. Thanks, buddy) that makes it difficult to seal the mask. Another alternative to a nasal mask is a mask that covers mouth and nose, but the bump is still an issue, and at high pressure, a full face mask will not seal. There are “nasal pillows” which go into your nostrils. Have you ever really looked at your nostrils? They can be rounded or slotted. Rounded works best for nasal pillows. I have slotted nostrils and nasal pillows don’t work for me.

Then there is the headgear. Straps behind and on top of your head, with clips to take the mask on and off. I have a small head and have to use a variety of fasteners and old knee-his to make the headgear small enough to fit me properly. It looks ridiculous.

The masks also have an outflow valve, so in addition to air blowing in your nose, you have air blowing out from your mask. My mask blows the air down, which is very considerate for your sleep partner. My hubby’s mask, unfortunately, blows straight out, at me. If you’re a side sleeper, like me, you have to arrange yourself-mask-tubing to keep the outflow air from blowing into your pillow because that’s really, really loud.

So, if I get the CPAP squared away, I still have to contend with pillow comfort and cats. The pillows are going to do me in one day. I’ve tried soft, hard, contoured, buckwheat, CPAP pillows…. You name it, I’ve tried it. I wake up most days with a sore neck because I can’t get comfy with pillows. The soft pillow is nice but the CPAP mask blows into it and makes noise. The buckwheat pillow is great for non-contact with the mask but sometimes I feel as if I’m sleeping on rocks. One pillow, two pillows, red pillows, blue pillows…not really, but I’ve tried different combinations to no avail. What works one night is miserable the next night. 

Then there’s Nicky the cat. She feels it necessary to maintain contact with a human being as much as possible. She also believes that said human being must accept her being wrapped around their feet, and will nip at feet that object and try to push her away. Once we’re deeply asleep she will try to creep up and sleep right between us, like a little kid. If Ken is away on business, she always ends up pillowed next to my head. And she snores.

Other annoyances include being hot, being cold (all within 5 minutes), having to get up to use the bathroom 12 times a night, sweating, drooling (gross, I know) and trying to find my glasses in the middle of the night. Is it any wonder I can’t sleep? I’m getting tired just writing about it!

Bit the Bullet, Again, Sort Of

Had a doctor's appointment today. He demands I see one them every few months and holds my medications hostage if I don't offer up my co-pay and several tubes of blood.

I've been worried about this appointment because I've been afraid of being diagnosed with diabetes. My dad had it and I've been overweight and flirting with type-2 diabetes for years. It was with much relief that I learned that my A1C, while higher than it should be, is not in diabetes territory yet. My fasting blood sugar is within a few points of the danger zone, and for the first time ever my cholesterol is an issue. No meds, thankfully, but it's time for me to man up and change my eating and exercise habits.

I used to be a jock. In college I swam and jogged. I was thin until I was about 27 years old. My wedding dress was a size 10. I loved to exercise. Then at age 20 I developed two hernias and had to have urgent surgery. Thanks to complications I was unable to exercise for a long time (who ever heard of being allergic to silk? I learned that if you are, and you're stitched up under the skin with silk sutures, your body will do whatever it can to spit them out). It was 18 months before I was given the all clear, and by then I was a senior at Lehigh, carrying 21 credits a semester, with no time or inclination to exercise. After I graduated from college I spent 2 more years in nursing school, year-round, and never got back into an exercise groove. Then came marriage, first job, and in 2 years, first baby. And first weight problem. I gained 50 lbs with baby #1 and although I lost it all, I had 3 more pregnancies (only one went to full term) in a short amount of time. When baby #2 was a few months old I started to feel simply horrible. No energy. Skin dry. Hair dull and dry. And then one night while reading in bed, I felt like I was choking. I looked in the mirror and saw a swelling in my throat and being a good little nurse, immediately assumed I had cancer. It turned out to be hypothyroidism, triggered by all those pregnancy hormones. I have it to this day and doctors like to keep hypothyroid patients at "low normal" which is good for blood pressure and your heart but bad for your metabolism.

And I do have big bones. Really.

Anyway, I have a hard time losing weight, with all those factors. Throw in a bad back, an arthritic ankle, a full-time job and low energy...exercise, while good for me, is the last thing on my to-do list. Yes all of you exercise nuts, I know the mantra. Exercise will give me energy. Exercise will make me feel good. Exercise will boost my metabolism (actually, it won't, thanks to the low normal thing). All exercise does for me these days is cause me pain, and make me sweat. And I hate sweating.

But now I have this lingering fear; I bit the bullet this time, sort of, but I'm dangerously close to diabetes and hypercholesterolemia. Time to watch the diet. And maybe add some exercise.

I want a cookie.

What Not To Wear

My daughter and I spent a few hours at a local pool yesterday. Let me start with a disclaimer- I am absolutely nothing to look at in a swimsuit. I am overweight and I know it. I wear a "skirt" suit with a top, which hopefully covers up the worst of the worst; but short of wearing a 1920's bathing costume, there's no way to cover it all up.

The key is, I know what I look like in a swim suit. I'm not trying to pretend that I have a good figure. There are a LOT of women who wear bikinis long past the time when they should have stopped. And I'm not talking about obese women. There were plenty of two-piece swimsuits in evidence on bodies that should never, ever be in a two-piece again.

First is the woman who's had a couple of kids. Maybe she lost all her baby weight, but her body shape is definitely not what it used to be. In a one-piece, no one would notice the sagging or pouchy areas. In a two-piece they're on display for everyone to see. Little lops of flesh and fat spill over the sides of the bottom piece, or perhaps the front of the top rides a little low while the straps across the back creep upward toward the neck.

Then there's the woman who is a little older than that, maybe late forties, early fifties, who probably looks great in her clothes. I am reminded of a time in high school, when I was given the opportunity to model fall clothing for a fashion show sponsored by the Mother's Auxiliary. That was back in the days when I was thin and fit. And oh so young. It was to be a "mother-daughter" show but my mother was too busy running the luncheon, so I was paired up with another mom. She was lovely and thin and looked great in the clothes. We ended up next to each other at the end, allowing me to witness what happened when she took off her body shaper. I have never seen skin actually fall like that before. She was still thin but her body parts were several inches lower, along with her stomach skin (she'd had 6 kids. That's a lot of stretching). These older women in bikinis are much the same. They may wear a size 4 or 6 in clothing, but in a bikini, all you see is saggy skin. Again, a tasteful one-piece (with a built-in bra) would look lovely.

Now we come to the adolescent who is still growing and still has some baby fat. Please dear ones, until you have a distinct waist, stick to the one-piece. And if you look down and your stomach sticks out further than your boobs, stick to the one-piece.

And lastly, I turn to my fellow chubettes. Ladies, I am not advocating a full-on circa 1920's bathing costume, but I am advocating something more than a traditional one piece or tankini. The tops of our thighs are areas that should never see the light of day, and certainly not in public. I wear a skirt bottom tankini with a long top, but you can also get a one-piece skirted suit, or swim trunks that go over the traditional one-piece.

My final word, again to my sister chubbies- please, when you're at the pool, don't bend over with your behind in the air. Squat down. Please.

I don't write this to be offensive. Remember, I know what I am and I am not at a pool to display my body. I'm there to enjoy the sun and the water. Too many ladies (and some men, but I'm not qualified to discuss men's swimsuits) bring an element of voyeurship to the pool, making it fair game.

Frustrated Writer

I am a frustrated writer. Not that I can't write- I think I can, and others have told me I can. I enjoy writing "next chapters" or "missing details" from novels I have read; however, I don't seem to have the imagination to come up with a storyline on my own. Given an idea, I can follow it and maybe make something out of it, but I am unable to create any ideas of my own. I'll read a book and think, "what a great idea." Or "what a great concept." Why can't I come up with some good concepts?

Am I too old? Am I losing my imagination along with my short-term memory? Is this just another example of the losses that come with getting older? When I was a kid I used to write and draw books. Most of them involved nurses (duh) and I distinctly remember writing and drawing a story about a worm who happened to be a nurse. My nurse worm (I can't remember what I named her) lived and worked in a vast underground complex with wards and individual rooms and lots of other nurse worms and patient worms.

While I don't especially think that worm stories are appealing, at least I know that I had an imagination at one time.

People have told me I should write about my family. I won't, for two reasons. First of all, everyone in it will hate me. And second, while there are some really funny stories (and some bizarre and some sad stories), I have no idea how to weave them all into a book that someone would want to read.

My daughter and i attended a workshop on writing, hoping to pick up some pointers about creativity and ideas. Instead, it was more about how to get your completed material published. I blog, I write my extra chapters and missing details, but all the while I keep thinking that I could be doing so much more.

The Tyranny of the Left Lane Squatter

I am the left lane squatter. I sit in the left lane and refuse to cede my spot. I exist primarily to annoy those of you who want to get to someplace as quickly as possible.

I love two-lane highways, especially ones with trucks and lots of cars in the right lane. That way, I can stay in my spot and look in my rear view mirror to see the long, long line of cars behind me that I am forcing to go at my speed. Such power! It gives me a thrill. Sure, I could pull over into the right lane at any time, but I get a certain satisfaction in knowing that in one small act, I am impacting so many lives.

I have to admit, though, that trucks do frighten me. That's why I stay in the left lane and refuse to pass them. And I like hanging right on the corners of other cars, to keep an eye out for people who are trying to move around me. It's my job to keep them in line.

After all the speed limit is 55, right? I'm doing 55, and I'm saving all of you speeders from a ticket. You should thank me. It's not MY fault that you're in a hurry. I'm a citizen, and this is my road. I pay taxes, too, and I'm not breaking any laws. In fact, I'm enforcing laws. I am a hero.

Mouse (plural, mice)

When you put "mouse" into Google's search window, the mammal "mouse" doesn't show up until the 3rd return. Computer mice, it seems, are more important to us than the poor little rodents.

Why am I writing about mice? Actually I'm writing about mouse, a mouse, the mouse that my cats caught and played with and eventually hid somewhere in my house. I am less than thrilled at the prospect of coming across mouse remains.

The common house mouse (Mus musculus) is one of the most successful mammalian genera in existence, mostly due to its environmental adaptability. A newborn mouse is called a pup, and is full grown and ready to breed by 50 days of age. The little furries breed year round. A mouse in captivity can live up to four years, but mice in the wild rarely make it to a year due to predation.

Why do I care? I don't, really, except I have mice on my brain because if there was one mouse to be caught in my house, there are other mice lurking somewhere. The mouse in question was found in an open vent- the vent is open because it is also the pathway for our TV cable, which comes into the room from the basement. I'm certain that other mice are happily breeding in our basement somewhere. They're kind of cute, if you can get past their rodent-ness, and I was amazed to watch this mouse play dead when one of the cats dropped it. When she tried to play with it, it took off and hid behind our Tyler water bottles. Have you ever seen a cat try to climb over water bottles? It's pretty funny.

Which brings me to my next point. My cats are lazy and too well-fed. If there are mice in the house, then the 3 felines are falling down on their job. I don't ask for much. I feed them regularly and clean their litter boxes, provide toys and soft beds, and provide hours of ear scritching on demand. The least the cats could do is take care of the rodents in an efficient and silent way, so that I don't have to think about mice. Don't you agree?

It's been awhile

It's been a very long time since I blogged. In fact, the last time was after the most disastrous Christmas of my life. Lots has happened since then, so let's play catch-up.

The bad stuff that happened Christmas has pretty much been put aside. Nothing was resolved or dealt with but that's the best way, in this case. All the parties involved have agreed to move on without rehashing the issue to death.

Dan has been overseas and back, and is deep in wedding preparation. Caitie is continuing to love her job with an advertising company. Ken is still trekking back and forth to Cleveland every week. And I continue to be very happy with my job at a software company. I went on my very first business trip, to a Clinical Documentation Specialist convention in Orlando. I took and passed the Clinical Documentation Specialist certification exam in May. We bought a "bleather" sectional sofa for our living room (blended leather).

the "big thing" coming up in our lives is, of course, the wedding. The clothes have been purchased, the gifts bought, vast amounts of money spent, and in less than 2 months my son will be a married man. Time does, indeed, fly.