Today I am not in a good mood. I did not sleep well and I am very menopausally tired. That said, I am grateful to not be feeling blue, too. Tired and blue is hard when they land together and I would not wish that on anyone.
One of the hardest things to deal with during the menopausal years is a lack of quality sleep – or any sleep at all. Some suffer more than others and my theory is that your level of coping depends on how well you slept before – in your pre-menopausal life.
I don’t mean how many hours you accrued like a bank account of sleep; I mean whether or not you were a good sleeper. In my opinion, it’s extra hard for a good sleeper to adapt to this non-sleeping lark – to make that switch. It can be nothing short of a nightmare, which is funny, as you have nightmares only when you sleep.
As a highly experienced non-sleeper, the leap to menopausal insomnia has been less dramatic and I am partly grateful for that. But let me be clear: This does not mean that I am happy about it, or that I function well – I am as much of a mess as the next person, the difference being that I am more accustomed to being so.
Human beings are designed to sleep. We are like mobile phones in that if we don’t charge them, they don’t work. And nor do we. Sleep is our healing time and our recharging time, and when we don’t have enough, it is hard to flourish. Our immune system collapses, and we get ill and die.
Drama queen!
Truth told; I am jealous of sleepers.
And people with thick hair.
Sadly, I didn’t know how precious my sleep was until it had gone and it makes me wonder why, as human beings, we must ‘not have’ something in order to appreciate it.
I’ve concluded that life is hard when you’re running on empty and when your battery is charged with no sleep.
It’s not for the mild or the faint-hearted and it’s definitely not for the weak.
And if I could grant myself a wish, this is what it would be.
I would wish for sleep for you.
And I would wish for some for me.
J x
(Shared from my old diaries)
***
ps. I would love you to follow me:
www.facebook.com/menopausalme/
www.instagram.com/menopausal.me/
