I never was obsessed about sleep. In fact, I'd call myself specifically NOT obsessed. You can sleep when you're dead, right? Like many twenty-somethings of yesteryear, I spent more than my fair share of nights drinking cranberry vodkas on the dance floor until the wee hours of the morning. I'd wake up the next morning, still in my clothes, with only a slight hangover. After a quick stop at the drive-thru for a breakfast burrito, no one would know I was operating on four hours of sleep. Only my smudged eye makeup lived on to tell the tale. I mean, who cares about sleep when you can catch up the next day?
Enter, motherhood.
I thought I knew a lot of things, but I NEVER KNEW that it was possible to function with so little sleep. I just couldn't believe it. There you are, totally clueless, you aren't sleeping, and you are supposed to take care of another LIVING HUMAN? A BABY human that can't do anything on it's own? What the fuck? What kind of sick joke WAS this?
Luckily, I survived. Now that my youngest daughter is turning two, I am proud to say we are all sleeping pretty well...for the most part. But I am still VERY protective of my sleep. It is my PRECIOUS, PRECIOUS thing that no one should take away from me. I guard it with the same intensity that I guard my first glass of wine. NO ONE EFFING TAKES THIS FROM ME, GOT IT? Yes, you could call me obsessed.
Top Ten Signs You Are Totally Obsessed With Sleep
1. Your nightstand looks like a homeopathic drug store. It is littered with Sound Sleep, Deep Sleep, Midnite, Valerian root as well as the remainder of last night's Sleepytime Tea. You don't always need these wonderful items, but it's nice to know they are there for you. Just waiting. On your bedside table.
2. You can only sleep with ear plugs. Otherwise, every small sound is a little voice calling "Mama!" or your baby gagging in its sleep. Or you hear the silence of SIDS, which is ridiculous, because SIDS is silent, how are you supposed to prevent that? (If you say co-sleep I will slap you.)
3. You sleep with a special deflated pillow. (You must also travel with this pillow.) Once, your husband "fixed" the pillow by swaping it with another, fuller pillow. You didn't sleep for 2 weeks until you finally figured it out in the middle of the night and woke up your husband through clenched teeth, "DID YOU SWITCH MY PILLOW???" and your husband said, "Chill out, you're scaring me." Turns out, he put your pillow in the baby's room. You were so desperate you were willing to risk it all, and you WENT INTO THE BABY'S ROOM AT NIGHT and got the pillow out.
4. You apply special lavendar lotion (which is supposed to relax you and encourage sleep) all over your body before you go to bed. You radiate lavender now, which is kind of cool, because...lavender smell! You know?
5. To you, Ambien is the most awesome, potent, addictive thing out there. After a surgery, you took the prescribed amount of Ambien and felt amazing......aside from the Ambien-induced online shopping (thankfully, you didn't complete the purchases, you just put some ugly-ass clothes in your cart on six different websites.) You treasured the Ambien but were afraid of becoming addicted, so you got a sharp knife and cut the pills into smaller and smaller sizes so you wouldn't "shock" your system by going cold turkey. It worked!!! (Except at the end you were just taking little "flakes" of Ambien, which your husband thought was weird, but he already knows you're crazy, so who cares.
6. Sometimes you dream about Ambien.
7. If someone offered you an Ambien at a party, you would probably leave the party so you could go home and take it and fall into a deep, beautiful slumber.
8. When you plan a vacation, the first thing you think about is "Where will we all sleep? How will we all sleep? What if no one sleeps? Maybe we shouldn't go. I wish I had some Ambien." You go anyway, and it's usually pretty fun, whether or not anyone sleeps.
9. Morning sex is completely out of the question, because if the kids are still sleeping, it's still technically nighttime, and nighttime is for one thing only...sleep!
10. You break into a panic when your friends make dinner reservations for 8pm. Because then you won't get into bed until at least eleven, and less than eight hours of sleep is INSUFFICIENT!!!!!
Anyone else out there totally obsessed with sleep???
