Rise and Shine

I suck at getting out of the bed in the morning. 

When I was getting up and going to work in the morning, I did it. But now, that I don’t have to leave the house, don’t have the commitment nor the responsibility to be “there” for others, getting up hasn’t been near as easy. 

It doesn’t help that my sleep cycle has been completely out of whack either. 

I knew I needed to work on changing things: getting to sleep before 3 am, waking up motivated and staying that way, getting myself on a schedule again. 

When the email from my acupuncturist’s (Janine) office popped up in my inbox promoting a webinar on setting a morning routine, I thought it must be kismet. I immediately responded attending.

I had to wonder if it was somehow my fault when the appointed time of the webinar came and passed and no webinar. Technical issues had prevented it from happening. 

Not one to give up, Janine quickly emailed out a Power Point presentation for all of us who had registered. 

I eagerly opened it up and read through her ideas. 

Some I had tried before, but some I had not. 

I had been making lists for myself, something I had done years ago, but I was finding a difficult time completing them as of late. One of Janine’s tips was about lists, so I decided to keep that for sure, and commit myself to working on checking each item off. I added a couple different things to my planned morning routine and went to bed eager to start the next morning. I knew I could do this; I’ve done it before with no problem, and not even 6 months ago! 

I spent the next 6 hours tossing, turning, and attempting to shut off my brain. 

I’ve always been an insomniac, but lately, if I managed to fall asleep before 2 am, I would consider it a win. 

I spend most nights in a pretty typical routine. I take sleep supplements. I smoke weed. I have a special “night night time” play list complete with delta wave music. I smoke more weed. I go to the bathroom. I’m up so might as well try more weed. I start getting desperate for sleep as I watch the white numbers on the Alexa Show click closer and closer to morning. Of course, this whole time, the hubs is sound asleep next to me, Vader mask on and still snoring. I vape some weed. Eventually, usually between 2 am and 4 am, I fall asleep. 

This particularly night, I fell asleep around 3:30. I know because – Fitbit. I had planned to be up at 6:30 to start my new morning routine. Besides, three hours wasn’t much less than my average four.

Only I didn’t get three hours, I got an hour and a half, because at 5 am the hubs called, and his car had broken down. Long story short, by the time I got back home, it was after 9 am, I was exhausted, and the rest of my day was shot.

Ya think I would be able to fall asleep pretty easy after that. 

Nope.

That night, I repeated my routine. 

This time, at 1:00 am in the morning, the feral cat I had been helping out, showed up in a panic. I got him inside and settled into his room for the night. He was injured, and I decided it was time, whether he liked it or not, he was going to the vet the next day. 

Needless to say, I couldn’t sleep.  

I was stressed out because I knew his tail had been bit and I was concerned at what the outcome would be. The next day and $800 later, I was the proud owner of a feral cat under rabies observation for the next ten days. 

This sleep and schedule thing weren’t working out quite like I had been hoping.  I would make my list, set my plans up, crawl into bed, and still I couldn’t sleep. When I would make in the morning, something would go wrong from sleeping through my alarm, to sick grandkids, to the passing of a family member.  

My two weeks attempt at setting a morning routine had resulted in zero days of completing my planned routine. At this point, I really don’t know if a morning routine is the thing for me or not. But I decided, maybe I needed to start broader. So, I’m starting with a weekly routine instead. If I can manage to start getting certain tasks done on certain days, at least I have narrowed it down a bit and given myself a win instead of constant losses.

I’m not lowering my sights, but I am giving myself a step up instead of going for the full leap. I’m not in a race, I have no timed finish line. Maybe it will take a few more months for me to figure out a set morning routine, or maybe, I never will. But for right now, trying to set a routine as been far more counter-productive than if I had left well enough alone. 

Sometimes what we want to do, may not be what the cards have in store for us. Now when I can’t sleep, instead of lying in my bed staring at the ceiling or playing a game on my phone I either pick up a book and read or get out of bed and write. 

I’m still not sleeping, but at least I’m finally getting something done.