Chapter Thirty-Three

This is my second week back to work part time and the insomnia is starting again. Well OK, maybe i'm exaggerating, the "I can't get to sleep and I'm laying here coming up with everything that can go wrong scenarios" is back. Or at least it was last night. Nightmares too. I had to revert to old tricks to get to sleep. No, not Ambien, not ever again on that. Deep breathing, breathe in through the nose two three four, breathe out through your mouth two three four. There is an old camp song that I sing over and over in my head, I have no idea why it works "oh i'd rather suck a lemon drop than try my luck with a lollipop, cause a lollipop falls off the stick and it gets all over icky ew icky icky icky. I've tried and tried, but still I can't find...A lollipop that is half way divine, so i'd rather suck a lemon drop" etc etc repeat as many times as necessary. Usually that will at least stop the scenarios from building and replaying. I have no idea why that song works, but it does. Once my brain is calmer, I can start basic meditation. Once I get to this stage it takes up to two hours sometimes to get to sleep, but at least I'm not spinning down the rabbit hole.

Now nightmares, those just sneak up on you and get you by the throat. Usually I reach out and touch Ken, feel that he is real. Ken said I told him I loved him a lot last night. I don't remember that though. Most of my nightmares are just me walking and something is behind me, or in front of me, or beside me, that is going to hurt me. I don't exactly hear the JAWS soundtrack, but that's the feeling. Just impending doom. There is a Stephen King book, I don't remember which one exactly, where a little boy disappears in the first chapter and then he is never mentioned again. I didn't particularly care for the book, it was tediously long and I thought over worked, but I had to read the whole stupid thing because of that one little kid. The whole time all these awful things were happening to people and my heart and my brain worked overtime with what the heck Stephen was doing to that little boy. Somewhere towards the end of the book, he just appears again. My nightmares are like that. Just awful. Something is wrong, or someone is missing, and that heavy heart, stomach in knots, arms hurt, dread fills me. I can go back to sleep pretty quickly after one, but I have several of them a night.

All that to say that the doctor is only letting me go back six hours a day next week. Then back to full 10 hour days, four days a week the week after that. She thought perhaps jumping back in to full time might be a bit premature. I did make it through today without having to take a panic pill. I did knit half of a scarf while I was there though. That does help me so much. So far there hasn't been any blow back about the knitting. I'm taking my full share of calls and emails so work is getting done. And scarves aren't all that involved, I can put them down and pick them up again without having to do a lot of "what the heck was I doing here."

My short term memory has shown some improvement. Of course as I say that I look outside and my car door is standing open as I forgot to go back out and get my lunchbox. Jake the dog has his paws up on my dash looking for food. My callers at work are being very patient as I ask them fourteen times "who am I talking too again?" I'm sure it just fills them with confidence that I'm actually going to get their issues down right. Interestingly enough my long term memory is just fine. Work related fixes and things like that pop right in, I just can't remember who I was just talking too on the phone, or what he called about. I'm learning to take notes on everything.

I am laughing again. Not my full on, full throat-ed laugh of old, but a good belly laugh from time to time has erupted and taken me by surprise. Usually brought on my Lillian, but I've even laughed at work. So slowly I am coming back into myself. Which is good, because I really do like me.