I Can’t Work When I’m Tired!
Until I was in about my mid-20s, I used to stay up late all the time and then go into work the next day without having had much sleep. Sure, I was tired all the time, but it seemed so much more doable back then. I was young and living it up.
Over the last few years, though, I’ve found that I can’t function as well as I’d like on less than seven or eight hours’ sleep. I have to get more or I’m pretty much a zombie. And since I am now self-employed and dependent on my brain power to earn a living, I really do need to make sure I get enough sleep.
I’ve sometimes wondered if there is a physiological reason why I seem to need so much more sleep than other people. I tend to do best with nine or ten hours of sleep a night, although lately I’ve been getting only about eight a night. I don’t suffer from insomnia — quite the contrary, I’m practically asleep by the time my head hits the pillow — but I wonder if there is something else keeping me from getting quality sleep.
Since I heard about sleep apnea, I’ve wondered if that is the cause, but my husband swears that I don’t stop breathing in my sleep. It’s too bad, because at least it would be an easy fix — I’d just have to wear a CPAP mask at night to sleep, hooked up to a CPAP machine to keep my airways open.
Of course, since I am a type 1 diabetic, I’ve also wondered if I’m suffering from nocturnal hypoglycemia, a condition where your blood sugar drops too low at night, usually when the person is not aware of it.
Whatever the cause, it is clear that I need plenty of sleep in order to be able to do my work and do it well!
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