Losing Sleep

A few days back, Glo Gamat, a new friend of mine, wrote about the importance of sleep in one of her health blogs. According to her article, when we lose sleep, we become "bad-tempered, tearful, forgetful, depressed and clumsy". When I read her article, I just shrugged it off, thinking that I’m not one of those people whose moods and emotions go through a major shake-up the moment they lose on their precious zzz’s. Unknown to me, I was already in the midst of a critical shake-up at that time, due to, of course, lack of sleep. Surprisingly, this condition isn’t new to me. Remember my sleep debt? Looking back now, I've been continuously losing sleep for the past year already!

My sleep problems started in late 2006. While my need for sleep is not really confined to the 8-hour myth, I knew then that I was not getting the quality of sleep I needed. My sleep was either too short, or disturbed that I will wake up feeling groggy in the morning and drag myself to work. And like what Glo said, I am one of those people who try to find lame excuses for not sleeping right. I had deadlines, and I needed to work. I love to work late into the night, when it's quiet and I'm alone. I also read at night and watch late night TV programs, and there are a lot of other reasons why I cut my sleeping time.

And so two weeks ago, all of the sleep neglect I had been consciously doing took its toll on me. At first, I could not explain why I felt so depressed, irritable, and suddenly suicidal. I was hopeless, restless, and unable to focus. I was so distracted! And it all happened several days after the GS launch, when I didn't get enough sleep, enough rest, and my meals are mostly from fastfoods. All the stress, all the bad foods, and lack of rest made me one ill-tempered person. Sadly, the condition almost cost me my partner. But that's another story.

Well, I guess, sleep is something a lot of us forget to value. But then again, our bodies will demand us to get enough of it, in ways that we sometimes have very little control. Believe me, I've been there.

It’s Time

It’s time to update, yes.

The past month was another trying time for me. While it was a highly anticipated month for various reasons, such as NaNoWriMo, and several birthdays (Tatay on the 4th, me - 23; Theresa – 26; and finally, Lilia on the 30th), something else happened (again). *Sigh.*

The birthdays went fine, except mine. But that’s okay. What’s breaking my heart now is missing NaNoWriMo (again) this year. I had a great start, with 17k words already on the 5th, making me swell with pride and confidence that this year could be my NaNoWriMo year. But, no. After three attempts, I realized that the odds are still against me. Don’t get me wrong, please. I’m not making excuses for not finishing my novel this year. I tried. God knows how hard I tried to finish it. I’ve even went to as far as 23,500 words, but something came up that made me stop.

It was on the 16th that something alarming happened. It was a Friday, the end of an unusually stressful week. I was, unfortunately, alone at our office room when an extremely painful headache attack came. It started as a dull pain coming from the lower back of my head, then progressed very fast to the upper part, affecting my vision and making me nauseous. I thought I was only hungry and tried to eat, but the pain became so terrible that I had to ask officemates from a nearby room to rush me to the clinic which is quite far from our building. At the clinic, I was immediately given oxygen support and was told to lie down to rest for a while. They gave me cold and hot compresses to reduce the pain, but to no avail. I had the shock of my life when I learned that my blood pressure rose to a high 160/110! At that time, my hands and feet were numb and very, very cold. And all the time my blood pressure stayed at that reading: 150-160/110. Later on, I was given a very strong painkiller and another drug to lower my BP. Perhaps the combination relaxed me a bit and I dozed off. Half an hour later, I felt woozy when I woke up, but definitely a lot better without the throbbing pain and nausea. Still, my BP was on a high, and to my surprise, what I thought would be a simple consultation lasted three hours!

The following week brought me to three different doctors: an ophthalmologist, a neurologist, and an IM, but all three recommend the same procedures: both MRI and MRA scans. –Gulp.–

My neurologist, Dr. Valencia, suspects that it’s migraine, and so does my IM, Dr. Torres. But Dr. Valencia wants to rule out the possibility that there may be AV malformation, or aneurysms somewhere. *Sigh.* Uh-oh. Aside from the MRI and MRA scans, I was also asked to do a lot of laboratory procedures to check on my cholesterol, sugar, and mineral levels. I will also go through other lab tests to check my thyroid. I had a thyroidectomy three years ago, and Dr. Torres feels it’s about time my thyroid functions get checked again. *Sigh.*

And after all those consultations, and lab tests (I haven’t done the MRI and MRA scans yet), a simple recommendation came from all of them: sleep. Lots of sleep and rest. And sleep I did. Not because it’s recommended, not because I am just a lazy bum finding excuses of not finishing my novel, but because my body commands it. Nowadays, if I am still awake at 11pm, I am lucky. So no more Miami Ink for me now. And no more late night movies too. Aw, crap. Now I can’t wait for the Christmas/New Year break to come so I can fully rest and sort of get a long-needed tune up.

And then hopefully by November next year I will join NaNoWriMo again.