Tag: insomnia

Insomnia Blues

Insomnia is a fairly common and most aggravating condition. We’ve all had bouts of it.

In my case, insomnia seems to be entirely held in sway by my brain. I am a ruminator. My mind latches on to things and won’t let go.

It may be an idea I am trying to process. Or plans for a room I am eager to decorate. Or a relationship problem I can’t seem to satisfactorily resolve. I feel stuck so I try to think my way out of the problem.

That is sort of what insomnia is. Getting stuck in wake mode. (I said wake not woke, not that there is anything wrong with that except it is a whole other blog post.)

I try all of my trusty “go-to” solutions. I eat a banana. Something about ingesting carbs at bedtime helps you sleep? Or I warm a cup of milk. If at hand, I throw in a little vanilla and nutmeg to jazz up the taste. In milk, I believe, is an enzyme called L-tryptophan and it aids sleep.

Maybe I just made that up. I know for sure there is L-tryptophan in turkey. You know that, too, if a huge turkey dinner has sent you off to la-la land for an hour or two. Even if you don’t sleep, you are hardly likely to jump tall buildings in a single bound.

Some families have deep and disturbing memories of Uncle Frank’s drifting off into sonorous snoozing at the holiday dinner table just after the dessert course. And the liqueurs.

Other tried and true methods include watching TV (preferably some unbearably predictable serial cop show where the plot is so formulaic, you can be put to – or called to – sleep without even starting the episode.)

Reading is another favorite insomnia slayer. If I’m lucky. It depends on the book. I usually select an interesting but not too riveting novel of some sort. Page by page, I feel my eyes getting heavier and heavier.

When I am at the point where I can barely keep them awake, it is time to close up the book and put it away. The novel’s work with me is done for the night.

I also play meditation videos but with only the sound on. I darken the computer screen. I slip on a stereo headband, zero in on some sleep meditation that will introduce me to my spirit guides or instantly cure my anxiety.

Tall orders. I have yet to meet any spirit guides personally and my anxiety is usually generated by my inability to get to sleep. So if a meditation video eventually does put me to sleep, problem solved. The anxiety gone.

So I faced that last night. Went through my mental Rolodex (remember those?) of quick and easy fixes. Warm milk? Check. Banana? Check. Reading a not-too-interesting novel? Also check.

They were moderately successful. The only evidence I have, of course, is that I did finally slip into sleep and have awoken feeling fairly refreshed and well-rested ready to face the day.

Take that, insomnia!

We have girded our loins and are ready, willing and able to do battle with you. And at any time you care to announce and intrude with your irritating – and blessedly infrequent in my case – presence.

Who Knew Department

This may be something. It may be nothing.

When I find something that makes sense to me, I want to try it and I want to share it. And I will.

So here is something about bay leaves that I never knew. Now I do. And so do you.

Did you know this? I didn’t know either:

Many women add bay leaf to their foods, especially on red meat and wild game meat.

Without knowing the reason for adding bay leaves to food, when you ask a woman why, she tells you: to add taste and flavor to the food.

This is wrong because if you boil bay leaves in a cup of water and taste them, you won’t find any taste .

Why do you put bay leaves on meat?

Adding bay leaves to meat converts triglycerides to less fat to test and confirm this.

Cut one chicken in half and cook each half in a pot, put one bay leaf and the second without the bay leaf, and note the amount of fat in the two pots.

Helps to get rid of many health problems and dangerous diseases

Among the benefits of bay leaf:

Bay leaf cures digestive disorders and bay leaf helps to get rid of bloating.

Heartburn.

Acidity.

Constipation.

Antibiotic.

Anti-parasitic.

Digestivo.

Stimulators.

Sedative.

Regulate bowel movement by drinking hot tea.

It lowers blood sugar and bay leaf is an antioxidant.

It allows the body to produce insulin by eating it in food or drinking bay tea for a month.

Eliminates harmful cholesterol and frees the body of triglycerides.

It is very useful in treating colds, flu and severe cough, because it is a rich source of vitamin C. You can boil the leaves and inhale the steam to eliminate the cough and reduce the severity of the cough.

Bay leaf protects the heart from attacks and also protects against strokes because it contains compounds that protect the heart and blood vessels.

Rich in acids such as caffeic acid, quercetin, egonol and parthenolids, which are substances that prevent cancer cells from forming in the body.

Eliminates insomnia and anxiety if taken before bed, and helps you relax and sleep peacefully.

Drinking a cup of boiled bay twice a day melts kidney stones and cures infections.

After Midnight

Can’t sleep. Or, more accurately, woke up from a sound sleep to face the mid-morning dark and stillness.

I am not afraid of the dark. In fact, I rather enjoy it. That wasn’t always so.

I was afraid of the dark when I did not understand my own inner demons.

Pesky buggers, demons. For a long time, I didn’t understand them but I acknowledged them.

Acknowledging them, it turns out, was the most effective way to deal with them. By seeing them and calling them out for what they were, I was already on a healing path. But overcoming and actual healing from the damage they did took years. Still a work in progress, if I’m honest.

I had no healthy outlets for addressing my pain for many years. Society permits us to express and manage our pain only in prescribed and “socially acceptable” ways. Drinking is one of them. As are many other addictions: shopaholism, workaholism, workout-aholism. Not that that last one is even a word but you get what I mean.

I am intrigued by people who reportedly struggle with inner demons but claim to have no idea what those demons are or where they came from.

I never had that problem. My demons had human faces and clear memories of their inhuman acts. Still, it is common for the abused to not vividly remember the face of their abuser. It’s a protective device, denial.

That memory and the identity of their demons may be well hidden from the abuser’s consciousness until the psyche can handle and fully process what it knows. It is why that people who seem to have finally arrived at a safe place in life feel their difficult memories most vividly.

I have been fascinated all my life by what society determines right and wrong or good and evil. Those designations can vary from culture to culture.

The taboo against murder is pretty universal but there was a time when human sacrifice was the prescribed method for “appeasing the gods.”

Almost unimaginable in most of our cultures today, but once upon a time, the practice was common.

All to say, it is not past demons that woke me up in the middle of the night. Not scary and threatening ones at any rate. I was awakened by task overwhelm. I am juggling too many responsibilities and activities in a limited timeframe. I sometimes forget to remind myself that the pressure I am feeling, I am creating.

Guess my psyche decided to wake me up at 3 o’clock in the morning to deal with all of it. Silly psyche. I don’t want to be the one to tell it there is precious little that can be done about any of what I need to deal with at an ungodly hour.

For one thing, the tasks I am facing require people’s help. And oddly, I cannot count on them at 3 o’clock in the morning.

I have few other options at this point but to try and return fitfully to sleep. I can add to my “to do” list, so I do. I can imagine the ideal outcome I am striving for, which is, I realize, unrealistic. I can imagine a better night’s sleep eventually. But at the moment, I am stuck.

So I’ll hang on until morning. The perseverance strategy got me through many sleepless nights when the demons were very real and had real human faces. Blessedly, most of the worst of them are well behind me.

Whatever else it was that has decided to wake me up in the middle of the morning, I know I can at least stare it down and deal with it. Eventually.