Sleep is good

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Five for Friday

It IS Friday, right? I am at the point in summer where I have sort of lost track of the days. I have certainly lost track of the ability to write a cohesive blog post on one topic, that’s for sure. (Did I ever really possess that ability????) So let’s do some bullet points. 

1. Sleep Regression: I have become a baby, internet, mixing up my days and my nights. I have trouble sleeping at night, so I end up napping during the day. Which makes me not sleepy at bedtime, so I stay up later than I intend to. Then I am tired the next day, so I take a nap. Lather, rinse, repeat. I am not a fan, and also I’m not really sure how to correct this??? When I try to not nap, I end up nearly falling asleep while driving, so I don’t think that’s the answer. Probably the answer is some combination of better habits and seek professional help, but I don’t feel like doing those things so I’m whining about it instead.

2. Velcro Baby: Speaking of babies, my actual baby (who is a long-limbed pre-teen) stayed home from camp this week to fight a cold. It’s one of those awful coughs, and the doctor basically said there’s nothing they can do about it at this point. Hopefully it goes away soon, I hate hearing my poor kiddo hack away in the middle of the night. It’s been a while since she’s had a sick day, and she was Velcroed to me the entire time, which I think is as good a demonstration as any that she is sick. We watched MANY movies. Having her draped all over me was both lovely – I mean, how much longer is she going to deign to sit on my lap? – and tiresome. She is heavy, now, and has many more elbows and knees than seems possible, and they are all sharp. I kept telling myself to enjoy it; I would have my body and my time back soon enough, and being able to snuggle with her is precious and limited. And yet I just wanted some personal space for the love. I am so used to her being so independent, it’s a little startling how little patience I have for dependency. It reminds me of the toddler years, and how HARD it was, to have someone touching me at all times, to have someone needing me at every second. Big kids bring along their own challenges, but mine at least has not been as physically demanding as she was a few years ago. If you are in the toddler stage, you have my sincere empathy. By the way, having an 11-year-old cough in your face is just as charming as having a three-year-old cough in your face. Some things never change. 

3. Mosquito Prevention: My legs are covered in mosquito bites right now. COVERED. I have a hideous bite on the back of my arm, too – red and angry. It’s unattractive and itchy. I haven’t had bug bites like these since the beginning of the summer. You know why? Because my husband bought this mosquito repellent device and we turn it on anytime we are outside. IT IS MAGIC. We’ve had it outside with us basically all summer, including during our two recent dinner parties and I came away with nary a bite! But then we went to our neighbors’ house for an impromptu BBQ and ended up hanging outside for about 20 minutes, and I got chewed to bits. Maybe I need to buy the neighbors their own mosquito device??? Or start carrying mine with me? 

4. Automotive Technology: Earlier this week, I found myself looking up automotive technology programs at local colleges. Is this the second career I need? Is this a(n over)reaction to too many recalls on my car? Is this a cry for help? I like cars, but I’ve never really been interested in learning how they work. My father would be delighted to help me, I’m sure. (He tried to teach me how to change my own oil back in the late 90s and… I resisted.) But I often find myself wishing I had more automotive knowledge. Mainly when the mechanic is telling me I NEED a part that costs $800. Maybe it would be kind of cool to reinvent myself as an auto mechanic. This is not going to happen, but it’s fun to think about. 

5. Shame Spiral: I am on one (1) group chat, and honestly I don’t know if a group text is the same thing as a group chat, and those two points should really Tell You Something. Anyway, I responded to a message with something that I meant to be silly and fun, and no one responded, and I have been analyzing it backwards and forwards since yesterday afternoon and feeling worse and worse and more and more sure that my (probably former) friends are not only going to cut me out of the group chat, but out of their lives completely. It wasn’t even that BAD, I don’t think; at most it was a) not funny or b) mildly insulting of someone’s relative’s food choice. But nonetheless: SHAME SPIRAL. Also, I am well aware that maybe they didn’t respond simply because it wasn’t response-worthy, or because they went out to dinner or had to deal with a sick child or sat down to watch a movie or or or. I may be a narcissist, but I am aware of it. Anyway, despite all my coping thoughts of narcissism and “people who are your friends will forgive you the occasional dumb comment,” I continue to spiral. I am the most awkward person on the planet and do not deserve friends. Probably at least some of this has to do with me submitting a short story to my critique group and being sure they are texting each other behind my back about the best way to break it to me that the story is not really a story and also sucks balls. But also I haven’t had A Friend Group since college and we didn’t text back then anyway and I don’t know how to be a person or what I’m doing trying. Fretting about how they are texting each other about how to respond to my stupid attempt at humor is what I AM doing. 

There. That’s my Friday morning for you, Internet! What’s up with you?

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You Look Tired

“You look tired.” That has to be one of the most irritating sentences ever uttered, no? I mean, it’s not HELPFUL. And if you ARE tired, which you probably are, it just makes you ALSO feel like you look like a used dishrag, which is not the look anyone is trying to achieve. 

A family member used to say that to me almost every time we got together, to the point that there became a need for A Conversation. Fortunately, the commentary has since stopped.

It’s a good thing we are not planning to see this family member anytime soon, because the commentary would be ACCURATE. These days, I feel like I just look SO TIRED. This is probably because I AM tired, even though there is no real reason for being so tired. I lead a low-stress life; I typically go to bed at a reasonable time and rise for the day at a reasonable time; I should be perky and well-rested. 

The thing is, I am NOT. This is in large part because I am a terrible sleeper, and I am trying to work on that. I read a really fascinating article recently, about why so many of us are waking up at 3:00 am every night. You do this too, right? I do. Whenever I wake up in the middle of the night, I can be pretty sure it will be at 3:00 or 4:30. Sometimes both. The aforementioned article has some insights and potential fixes that I plan to implement, but right now I’m more concerned with the aesthetic impact. 

I have always sported dark undereye circles; that’s just how my face is designed. (This is why the Tula Rose Glow cooling balm is one of my longtime favorite cosmetics.) But lately, I feel like the tired look has become exponentially worse.

For one thing, my eyes are super puffy for the first few hours of the day – like my eyelids have decided to provide their own cozy comforters for the night and are declining to put them away once I wake up. Plus, the crows feet at the sides of my eyes are SO aggressive these days. I keep thinking that they are sleep wrinkles, from pressing my face into one position on the pillow for too long. But… I am beginning to realize they may just be WRINKLE wrinkles. 

Also, I have developed wrinkles across the bridge of my nose, that extend over onto my upper eyelids, like my body is etching its own goggles onto my skin.

Listen, I want very much to be able to wholeheartedly embrace Nicole’s pro-aging philosophy. And in general, I do. But when it comes to whatever is going on with my eye area? I am a fan of NONE of it. Not one thing. 

We live in 2024. There MUST be products that can address these problems and, if not improve them, at least make me feel like I’m Taking Action. (I do wear sunscreen on my face, and I have been moisturizing with Bag Balm, per recommendations from, I think, Birchie and Elisabeth, so I am taking some preventative action already.)

I recently read about these silicone anti-wrinkle patches and they are at a price point that makes me feel pretty strongly about giving them a try. They have options to address forehead wrinkles and mouth wrinkles and undereye wrinkles and hand wrinkles and more, but nothing for the crows feet area. 

From a brief foray into wrinkly eye area remedies, it really sounds like retinol is the best option… but I’ve had Issues with retinol in the past, so I’m reluctant to give it a try. 

I would give some eye masks a go, though. These undereye gel patches get good reviews and have peptides which are supposed to help moisturize and smooth fine lines. Maybe a cooling eye mask would be good, too, especially because I am more self-conscious about my upper-eye puffiness. 

Beyond those things, it looks like the only options are more invasive, like lasers or Botox or fillers. And maybe I need to explore those ideas… but the thought of doing so makes me even more tired. 

What are you doing to keep yourself from looking like you haven’t slept in ten years? Tell me all your secrets – even those that involve retinol or Botox. 

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Weigh-In Wednesday: Sleeping + Waking Incompatibility

Why are the “-able” and “-ible” words so difficult to remember how to spell?

My husband and I have a significant Bedtime Incompatibility. Periodically, it drives me nuts as it is today. It takes the obvious form: each of us has a Preferred Bedtime, and they are different from one another.

I guess you would style me as a Morning Person. I like to wake up early-ish and start my day. To make rising early enjoyable, I like to go to bed at a reasonable time around ten o’clock. Probably, if I didn’t have a child or husband, I would go to bed around nine or nine-thirty. But I DO have a child, whose bedtime (around seven-thirty) combined with my husband’s arrival home from work (around seven) means that I often don’t eat dinner until eight-thirty or nine let alone get into bed at that time. But if left to my own devices, I would go to sleep around ten. And often – yawning and feeling all twitchy in the leg region, which happens when I’m tired – I do part from my husband around ten or ten-thirty, even though he would rather watch another episode of whatever show we’re watching.

My husband is a Night Owl, and would stay up until two or three in the morning if he didn’t have to get up for work. On the weekends, he sometimes DOES stay up that late. Part of it is that he is at work from sixish to sevenish most days, and so he feels that going to bed early means he gets no time to do the things he enjoys (make music, play video games, exercise, watch TV, do puzzles, read). So he has to carve that him-time out of the dark of night. Part of it is that he seems naturally inclined toward night-owlishness. I do think that most people are one or the other, and cannot change without great effort and even discomfort. 

For a long time, I hated this difference in our go-to-sleep habits. I felt like it was important for our marriage to be able to fall asleep together. I missed having his warm body in bed with me. I missed the quiet chats that occur when two people are in the dark, trying to fall asleep. 

But over the years, I’ve come to accept it, if not outright enjoy it. I often have trouble falling asleep, and even more trouble getting back to sleep if I wake up in the night. And on the nights when we do go to bed together, I find that I am more irritated by him than anything. He keeps MOVING the SHEETS and TICKLING my LEGS. Or he will keep his light on even if he is just looking at his phone (which itself is LIT) and the light bothers me. Or he will turn off his light, out of (grudging) deference to me, but then his phone light will bother me. Or he will fall asleep first and then he will BREATHE and it will keep me awake. Do you see how it is better for me to be deeply asleep before he enters the bedroom?

It is a delight to be my spouse. 

All this is to say that I have come around to the fact that we have separate bedtimes. It’s fine.

My husband and I have lived together for nearly twenty years at this point, and we have always had this significant incompatibility. But it’s become more pronounced now that we have child.  

What’s bugging me currently is the mornings. My natural wake-up time – if it’s not 4:00 am – tends to be 7:00 am. That’s when I wake up without an alarm. On the weekends, I usually lie in bed until a) I’m hungry or b) I can hear Carla downstairs, and realize I need to go feed her (i.e. prevent her from eating junk instead of a Healthful Breakfast; I fail most days as she is quite stealthy). My husband has more teenagery sleep habits, and would probably languish in bed until noon if he could. 

But it makes me so irritated!!! See those three exclamation points? I wanted to add ten or twenty, just to illustrate my level of irritation. 

Part of it is that my husband unloads the dishwasher on the weekends; even though it takes literally five minutes out of my day, I do it Every. Other. Day. plus on weekends when he is on call, and having to unload the dishwasher on the weekends as well makes me want to scream. He unloads the dishwasher, and, unsurprisingly, he does so when he feels like doing it, which is NOT on my schedule. I want the dishwasher unloaded FIRST THING so that I can fill it with breakfast dishes and glasses from the night before etc. I try to recognize that this is a Me Thing, and I have never gone so far as to demand that he do this task on my schedule… but it still bugs me. 

Part of it is that I get a break from unloading the dishwasher on weekends, but I don’t get a break from feeding Carla. It would be so nice to just NOT have to make her breakfast. (I suppose I could extend a little autonomy in her direction, but so far it hasn’t worked out that way. I think she just wouldn’t eat, if it were her responsibility.) And “making breakfast” is not as simple as it sounds. It requires in-depth questioning and listing of options and cajoling and reminding about things like “eating meals is important” and “it’s good to eat things that have nutritional value in addition to things that have none.” It is A Process, is what I’m saying.

Part of it is that I feel like my husband gets this long, luxurious rest – and all its associated freedom from breakfast-making and tidying and chiding the child about picking up toys/turning off the TV/cleaning up her dishes. Not that I would choose to sleep longer, if I could! I guess I’m just envious. It does, in some ways, feel like he gets the weekends off from his job while I do not. But… my housewife “job” is so minimal! And fairly easy! While his work is neither of those things! So why do I begrudge him a little extra break?

The other part of it, though, is that we can never DO anything as a family until late. This past Sunday, we planned on a family bike ride. I wanted to leave early, before the heat descended. But we settled on 9:30. And then… my husband slept in until nearly 9:00 and it was ELEVEN O’CLOCK before we got out the door, and I hadn’t eaten any breakfast (because I am a Late Breakfaster, and I figured we would be home from our 9:30 bike ride before I got hungry) and it was hot and I was cranky. Why should I have to wait around doing NOTHING just because I have the audacity to wake up early?! And now half the day has been eaten up by Nothing. Not just Nothing, but resentful, pouty Nothing.

Oh! Here’s a point on my husband’s side of things: We will watch a TV show or two after dinner (or, more likely, while he and I scarf down dinner after we put Carla to bed). I am usually struggling to keep my eyes open by the end of the show, and I feel like I express Very Clearly that I am ready for bed. When the show is over, I will say something along the lines of, “Okay, I’m ready for bed! I’m going to head up now!” and then I go into the kitchen and wash the dishes and clean the counters while my husband flips around the channels, checking on sports scores and catching up on news and weather. 

Then he will finally come into the kitchen – usually right as I am finished – and express surprise that I have done all the dishwashing/cleaning up. He still needs to prep his coffee and get his lunch together for the next day, and sometimes if I am feeling charitable, I will stay in the kitchen with him and chat. But often I am Done with a capital D and I say, “Good night!” At which point he is miffed! Why am I in such a hurry to go to bed? What did he say to me last night – something like, “Well, you didn’t waste any time.” Excuse me? I just did all the dishes! 

Hmm. I am clearly casting this in a Me light rather than a Him light. Try to see it his way. 

I am very curious as to YOUR bedtime/wake-up habits. And if you live with someone, what THEIR habits are, and whether they are compatible with yours (and whether it matters).