It has been a week, dear readers. After last week’s post about cousin Julie, I’ve struggled to put together the time to gather any thoughts about another of the topics I normally blather on about. I have many thoughts, but they are jumbled and fleeting, and yet they also won’t go away. So here I am lying in bed, having turned off my phone after my evening podcast ritual nearly two hours ago, trying to write something, to stay connected, to keep up the practice.

My schedule has been out of whack this week, routines aren’t being adhered to. I have nearly missed my start time at work multiple days, forgotten to get my coffee or eat breakfast until nearly lunchtime, and ended up working more hours than I intend because of workload and distractions. It is difficult to concentrate and stay on task, which is beginning to feel like the lead up to my episode that caused my disability leave in July/August, though I hope it doesn’t get that bad again.

On the plus side, I haven’t forgotten to feed the dog yet (mainly because she would never let me) and I finished the book I was reading today. Now if I could fix the sleep thing, I think things would straighten themselves out.

I have two possible schedules that allow me to get enough sleep to function and be productive during the day. One is to go to bed around 8pm, sleep for 4-5 hours, wake up (naturally) around 12:30 or 1am for 2-3 hours and then sleep again from 4-7 or 8am. This is my preferred option except that it cuts down on entertainment/couple time in the evening and therefore isn’t sustainable for an entire week at a time. The other, less reliable schedule has me dozing in front of the TV between 9-10pm, awake and productive, usually at the computer until sometime between 12:30-1am and then straight to bed. If I can get to sleep promptly, I can usually stay there until 4-ish and doze until deep sleep comes again. Typically, I’m roused by the sun just in time to log into work by 9am.

But this week has not worked out for sleeping. And sleeping is the basis for everything. So we will see how Friday goes on the rest I’ll get between 2:30-8 or 9. At least the weekend is nigh and I’ll be able to reset again for next week. Wish me luck.