I have been trying to learn how to sleep in the middle of the bed.
I slept in a twin bed until I was 28. When I graduated with my Ph.D., a "big" bed was one of the three presents I bought myself. It is GREEN, of course, an iron full-sized bed.
With Kashi being one of the other presents, perhaps my learning to sleep in the middle of the bed was doomed. Many a night I found myself sleeping on the barest sliver of mattress because that small dog leaned against me until I moved over and over and over once more. Still, for the 16 years I have had the bed, I have either slept on the right or the left, depending on what side I had my lamp and sleepmate and asthma drugs. However, it would be wrong to blame my beloved buttercup. He was not the reason I never took full advantage of my new mattress.
In truth, trying to learn such a thing has been difficult. In fact, it is not going all that well for someone wanting to learn this thing. As hard as I try, I find myself over on the edge again. As if something within me will not allow me to have more than the sliver of mattress. Perhaps I believe I am not worthy of an entire mattress? Or is it that I have stuffed myself in small spaces when I am frightened since I was a small child and the edge of the bed is like a small space to me?
[When in the dorm at college, undergrad and grad school, with the bed attached to the wall, I slept in the corner, my back pressed against the wall.]
Plus, there is the pain.
Lying in bed hurts, you see. Lying on my back hurts, especially with my knees and elbows flat. If I am on my back, I put pillows beneath my joints so they are not straight. Even so, the pressure on my lower back become unbearable to me. It is better to lie on my side, but when I do, the pressure on a nerve in my arm makes my hand eventually go numb. Even though I can hardly move it and the surface is numb, the "numbness" is actually excruciating. The right side is better than the left. I tuck pillows against my back so I can sort of lean against them to take the pressure off my arms, but they eventually fall off the side of the bed. I roll back over. The pain awakes me.
For reasons unknown to me, I cannot sleep on my stomach. I cannot lie on my stomach. Whenever I do, I have great pain. It is just something I ignore...and avoid.
And, when I was a freshman in college, I torn a muscle in my neck when I dropped an old metal iron on it. [Laugh. Get it out of your system. The emergency medical personnel surely did.] Ever since then, I have to have a pillow tucked securely beneath my neck. If it is not fully supported, lying on my back or side either way, then I struggle with painful muscle spasms and nerve pain.
Finally, there is the asthma. I sleep better propped up. Even so, I oft awake coughing and gasping for air.
Since I have lost all that weight, I can now bend over without pain in my abdomen. [I sort of figured that the fat was squishing my organs since I carried much of my girth in my midsection.] At night, now, I often sleep with one or both of my knees tucked up nearly against my chest. This straightens out my lower back and eases the pain there. But then I have to try and avoid the pain in my hands. Even before all this foolishness with the middle of the bed, sleeping has been difficult at best.
Amos has been confounded by my attempts to learn to sleep in the middle of the bed in the midst of trying to lessen the pain, prevent more pain, and breathe easier. He still snoozes with his neck tucked against mine as I read my book at night; he still starts off the night curled atop my pillow. Sleeping with his back against mine has been harder. This is because the most success I have had is to sleep across the bed sideways. Curled up like I start off when I am awake, I do fit sideways. Only, eventually, I find myself against the edge once more.
The night mares and night terrors I face make sleeping hard, but the pain even more so. I...just...hurt so very much when I sleep. I move about and lose my helpful pillows off the side of the bed and awake. Sometimes, I fall myself. Amos is probably afraid of falling off the side of the bed. I worry myself I shall send him tumbling in the middle of the night. I think we would both be safer were I able to accomplish this lesson.
If only...if only such was actually possible. Of that I have no confidence, if truth be told. Still, I am trying.
I cannot say why I decided it was time I learn to sleep in the middle of the bed. For one, right now is actually not the best time to take up another battle. Only...well...a part of me wonders if I can learn this, then perhaps I can learn other things that I am needing to know. Things I should have learned along time ago...an undoing of wrong lessons...finally understanding how God meant for life to be.
I am Yours, Lord. Save me!
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4 comments:
How in the world did you manage to drop an iron on your neck? Were you ironing while pretending you were conducting Beethoven's Seventh?
It was one of those old metal irons that are now just cheap plastic ones that leak. It was my grandmothers. And I kept it on a shelf in the closet. I reached up for it, missed, and dropped it on my neck, tearing the muscle. You cannot fathom the pain of a torn muscle holding up the weight of your head. I screamed bloody murder. No one heard me, though, because I was in the closet of my dorm room. I dragged myself to the desk and pulled the phone down by the cord. I started dialing numbers, but no one was home. I finally got a hold of this guy I barely knew from church. He kept hanging up on me because I was screaming into the phone, but he finally understood I was in trouble. He came flying into the room with the dorm mother following him, beating him about the head and shoulders with a newspaper (it was an all girls dorm). The emergency personnel kept laughing at how I hurt myself, even to the point of delaying care because there were giggles and guffaws bursting forth. I was in a neck brace for months.
I could make some sort of insensitive remark such as, "well, since you didn't have the weight of a very large brain in your head, the pain shouldn't have been so bad." But since, as you know, I am so sensitive and empathetic to those in distress, I would never even think of saying such a thing. :-)
Too funny!
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