Thursday, September 17, 2009

Better Sleep Through Boredom

Until I stopped working, for approximately the last month and a half, my sleep patterns had degraded to a large degree; partially due to physical discomfort but mostly due to too much thinking, a crime of which I have been accused often. Miraculously, last patient leaves the office on Monday evening, and that night I notice a marked difference in my sleep.

I am dreaming again. As a lucid dreamer since childhood - I have always had 3-4 dreams per night and remembered them all in detail upon awakening - I had not been dreaming with the sleep disruption, because I never had one complete cycle. In the last few nights, even with interruptions from my body and the cat, I have experienced enough of a "normal" sleep cycle to have and remember 2-3 dreams, and I can feel the difference.

This of course, can be counter-balanced by the sense of boredom I have felt in the last two days, without the assumed structure of my work as a Chiropractor. I started maternity leave early less because my body could not handle the strain, but more because in any service and people related industry, your energy goes out toward your clients; particularly as a Doctor I get paid to hear people kvetch and help them feel better. I had arrived at the point where I knew that this energy needed to be directed inward, toward me and baby, toward preparations for the birth.

My Chiropractor implied that I would not give birth before Rosh Hashana, more likely to be next week. I am ready. (In fact, I am ready today...) I would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a Shana Tova UMetukah, and may the next year bring sweet and wonderful events for all of us.