Sleeping Awake

I look... like a trainwreck every day because I can't seem to sleep right.

I"ve been waking up every night around 3:30 or 4:00 and want to cry, but admit defeat, walk to the kitchen, consume about 40 ounces of water, and then climb back in bed, easily drifting back to sleep three minutes later. I asked my acupuncturist about this and she mentioned that the hours of 3:00 to 5:00am are ruled by the lungs - which govern feelings of grief. Makes sense.


Despite the short wake-up in the middle of the night, it still appears I am not sleeping soundly or fully. We're talking, giant bags under the eyes - and don't be surprised if I leave my hair exactly as I slept on it, and barely brush out the ends from sheer exhaustion of not wanting to get up a mere 20 minutes earlier to shower.

I'm not sure if my sleep is punishing me because true to form, I have had a lot going on lately, and I haven't so much taken the time to stress out during the day, or this is just some sick and twisted part in getting older and I just need to grow up and accept it.

Enter all of my extremely lucid dreams about all the small things that I should be worrying about the next day. For example - my alarm went off this morning around eight and I dreamt I picked up the phone and looked at the time: 8:49am.

"Great, I'm late. Oh wait, I'm too tired to care."

Then I reasoned with myself -- nooo... it can only be five after eight at the latest. I checked my phone: 8:06.

That's one of 50 things. You can also add to that really violent dreams. Something about going to stay at a bed and breakfast in Seattle, not getting the room we requested, running into a friend that was horribly mean to me and sent me home crying. Then another with blood and murder and all the other fun stuff.

Has anyone ever gone through this? I'm not so much surprised at the violence making an appearance, but the real-life sleep-awake stuff is really creeping me out and I really don't want to look like i'm 57 every morning.