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03/09/22

My doctor’s appointment was yesterday to get a referral. I visited the family doctor I have had since I was about four years old, and he has heard my complaints about sleep over the years, so he was quick to agree to grant me a referral. He asked me (again) what difficulties I have with sleep, what I have tried so far, and whether we have tried anti-depressants in the past. He asked me about my mental health now, and whether I believe depression could be a factor. Depression has come up in conversation between me and my doctor several times before, and it is always disheartening to hear because while I do have, and have had my various battles with mental health before, the bells of depression have never rung true to me – and it’s difficult to convince someone that you’re not depressed without sounding like you are.  

Especially now though, the shadows of depression have never felt further away. Even just after losing what was undoubtedly the best job I have ever had, depression is the most inaccurate bracket of space that I feel I fill. After all, I was not defeated when my most recent chapter of work came to an abrupt and heartbreaking close. On the way home that day, even while my eyes found endless tears and my chest grew heavy and clogged, I saw the sunshine of opportunity glow over the horizon, and I was intrigued by the paths I could pursue to draw nearer to that sun. Even a week later, worry hasn’t cast shadows and doubt hasn’t dawned on me. Sure, I still feel as though there are missing pieces to the puzzle that placed me here now, and sure, it’s still difficult for me to talk about my loss or revisit the warmer memories, but I do not feel haunted, or broken, or ashamed.  

Especially now, and even with my lingering qualms with my history of enduring verbal, emotional, and sexual abuse – things I would be foolish to deny when discussing this topic – I don’t believe I would be as enamored with and proud of the life I live as I am today if I carried that demon. I have only grown fonder of my character, experiences, and relationships as the years have rolled by, and I have continually created more to be fond of. I am brimmed with passion, love, enthusiasm, and curiosity. I have the best support system of the most loving and caring family, amazing friends that are invested in my happiness, and well-being, and a relationship with a wonderful man who never fails to make me feel cherished and whole. I am always pulled through an ever-evolving stream of new interests and ideas; eager to participate, create, and explore as the list of things I am excited to pursue grows greater with each passing day. I live in a space that I’ve decorated with joy and garnished with capsules of nostalgia, beauty, and motivation. In fact, the only thing burdening my climb to total fulfillment is simply my poor quality of sleep.  

It is always disheartening when my doctor brings depression into the dialogue, but I understand it must be the procedure for this type of thing.  

I was told he would process my referral and that I would be contacted for a consultation, but he said there was no way of knowing how long it will take until I am finally contacted. The uncertainty has already caused me to become impatient. I worry about how long it will take and how many appointments I will have to make space for. I worry about the impact this journey will have on my attendance at my future job with those undetermined appointments. I worry about the financial cost, whether I’ll have benefits, and whether those benefits will be reliable and accepted. I worry about beginning a new job before being able to take my first steps toward a solution for my inadequate sleep.  

In the six days of my unemployment, I have been more awake the days than I had been before because I’ve been able to remain in bed in the mornings – and the mornings are the most likely time for me to experience deeper, fuller sleep. I still am not well-rested by any stretch, but there has been a noticeable improvement, and I worry about how dooming the struggle will be if I must return to waking much earlier when beginning a new job if I don’t first benefit from some foundation of a better sleeping cycle that can adapt to an earlier start to my days. I’ve done it before and I can do it again doesn’t feel applicable when after experiencing it, I know that it is not maintainable. Crawling into bed earlier doesn’t guarantee me a sufficient and satisfying rest, regardless of whenever I must awaken the following morning, and so I am nervous about a new job coming before [at least] a consultation for sleep.  

I don’t even know who is going to be contacting me for the consultation. Like I said before, I began looking into sleep clinics a long while back, and I found one that particularly seemed like a perfect fit for my needs, but my appointment yesterday went so quickly that I didn’t even discuss the research I had done, and my doctor never mentioned who he would be referring me to. This adds to my nerves because aside from the place that attracted me the most, I did find a couple of others that intrigued me, but I also found many that seemed like they would not be a good fit, and they far outnumbered the places that did. I wish it would have occurred to me to say something yesterday, for I fear the obstacles that could arise from being fitted with an improper match and I worry about how much time it could add to finally fixing the problem.  

I hope that I am just thinking too deeply and considering the possibilities too intensely. I can’t wait to discover all that I am capable of after experiencing a long, healthy, and committed relationship with sufficient and proper sleep. 

04/01/22

I still haven’t received a call from a doctor, but I thought I would give a short update because I’ve noticed a significant improvement in the quality of my life through my unemployment, as ironic as that sounds. 

Sure, there is a multitude of ways where my quality of life has plummeted, but when it comes to the topic of sleep, I’ve noticed a drastic change. 

I still don’t sleep well. I was up until 5:30 am just last week, and last night I woke up so frequently that I don’t think I missed experiencing any hour I laid in bed. I could almost argue that I have been sleeping worse than I was when I wrote the last update. However, the benefit that I have been experiencing is my recent ability to sleep in. If I stand any chance of falling into a truly deep sleep during my slumber, it is most likely to happen in the morning, and so over the last few weeks, I have been experiencing a more quality sleep more regularly than I had for the last three or four years. I have felt more awake during the day, and I have regained a functioning memory. I have felt more present, and I have had enough energy to complete all of the tasks I intended to do during the day. At this time, for my website, since losing my job, I have written thirteen Two Minute Reads, two reviews, and three blog posts. On top of that, I have two additional half-complete blog posts in my drafts. I have revamped my entire website, worked to gain momentum on social media platforms, scheduled nearly 100 posts for social media across all platforms, written a monthly newsletter, maintained engagement in all necessary fields, kept my Keep Up With Danika category up-to-date regularly, created more than fifty photos and videos for my website and places I provide updates to my website for, planned out four fiction story ideas, and nearly planned out the next three months of my website’s content. In terms of working on my website, I have done more in this little stint than I honestly ever have before. Sure, you could argue that having the extra time provided aid, and I would certainly stand behind that, but for nearly a year, I wasn’t doing anything. I wasn’t doing anything for the thing that I am the most passionate about, and in a few weeks, I accomplished this much?! Honestly, I’m kind of realizing this entirely in real-time as I write this, because I’m having to look at how much I’ve done to talk about it, and I’m astounded. I genuinely don’t remember the last time I was capable of this much. Further to that – my website isn’t all I’ve been doing. I’ve been handing out resumes, looking for jobs, cleaning, spending time with my cat, my boyfriend, my mom, my friends… In the general landscape of things, let alone my website, I have accomplished more than I have been able to for years. To take it even further, I’ve done it day in and day out, and with each new day, I’m excited and ready to do it again! I haven’t felt burnt out once, and burnout was familiar… Hell, it was normal; it was my resting place.  

Things I had struggled with routinely haven’t existed in this last little while. I’m notorious for losing words just as I’m about to speak them, and as a writer, I bet you can gather how endlessly frustrating that can be. While it happened to me several times a day before, lately, it’s maybe, maybe once or twice a day, and you must understand that it was every third or fourth sentence just a month ago. I’ve been more frequently remembering where I last placed things, remembering plots of movies and even details of movies that are insignificant to the plot the next day. I asked my friends to go to a show with me, and I didn’t feel regret after asking them for the fear of being too extinguished and exhausted the day the show arrives, because I haven’t felt that need to have an escape plan. I know I’ll want to go, and I know I’ll have the energy to be there.  

I’ve been capable of so much on a level that is far too profound and unimaginable for me to be equipped to describe, and that is just with the newly accessible element of being able to sleep in. This leads me to two loud, heavily impactful thoughts that have been an everlasting storm in my brain for the last little while. One, I’m excited for, the other chills me to the core. 

What happens when I get the help I need – how much else will I be capable of? 

What happens when I return to work – how much energy will I lose before I’m able to get help? 

I’m left terrified and excited. I keep hoping that the doctor calls sooner than an employment opportunity, but unless the call from the doctor already happened, I don’t have the means to sustain myself without employment until a doctor calls. This is very unsettling. It feels frustrating and humiliating to ask that I can work to afford life, and have time for my passions, too. 

Another unsettling thing is while I have found an awakened sense of pride, enthusiasm, and gratitude for my recent ability to sleep in, it’s been burdening my boyfriend. Our room is in a location that limits what he can do while I rest, and it’s been an irritant for him and has been causing a growing tension between us. I feel so bad for him, and I’ve been racking my brain for compromise, but I also feel aggravated that I must feel shameful for something that I can’t help. Something that has been diminishing and destroying my life for nearly two-thirds of it. He has been pleading for me to wake around the 10:30 mark, which not only do I find to be more than fair, but it reflects when I would prefer to wake up, anyway. Lately, I’ve been waking up between 11:30 and 12:30. My boyfriend has tried nearly daily to get me out of bed earlier. While my wishes for that 10:30 mark reflect his compromise, when that time comes, I still feel so exhausted that it is excruciatingly difficult for me to get out of bed. (-then) Especially since he is an early riser who is most ambitious to seize the day within the first few hours of its birth, I cannot tell you how guilty and ashamed I feel for not having been able to meet his request. It is a horrible, horrible feeling, and I have held my phone shaking, trying to manifest a doctor’s phone call to have it end. My boyfriend is an amazing man who has been patient with my burdens, understanding of my faults, and encouraging of my dreams in a way that I didn’t understand was possible before I met him. I want to be able to give him the freedom of experiencing the quality of life I’ve been experiencing these last few weeks, and it pains me so deeply that the thing that has been promoting mine has simultaneously been prohibiting his. Every night, I tell myself, I will wake up at 10 tomorrow. Every morning, I can’t, regardless of how much I want to. 

On the same coin, I think the reason I have such an understanding of how burdening it is for him is because of how I am – and have always been – the most alive at night. On the same coin, I am the most alive, alert, and energetic between one and four in the morning. In the instances I allow myself the opportunity to be awake and do things during those hours, I am able to do the most. Hell, I’d be willing to bet that if I didn’t change anything – if I didn’t visit the doctor or try and change my sleep habits – and I had the ability to be productive during the hours of the night regularly, I would far exceed the accomplishments I’ve made in these last few weeks. I regularly crave the ability to be awake and to do all I wish to at night, and while I’ve sacrificed my ability to be alert during those hours for several reasons – my job, my role in society, my schedule matching up with my friends – I have also sacrificed it for my boyfriend. Just the same as he yearns to show me how wonderful and productive rising early can be, I yearn to show him the wonders of being awake at night. Just the same as his levels of energy are boosted in the morning, mine is at night. Just the same, just the same, just the same… Since our relationship began, I have seen a fraction of a percentage of the time awake at night than I did before it. I mirror his bedtime and rely on his regular and socially camouflaged routine as guidelines for myself, and while I was employed, it helped a great deal to keep my life more regular, but I have sacrificed the version of me that I am then. That version of me probably reflects normalcy, and that is a difficult pill to swallow. Still, I understand his loss because of my own. That has played a role in both guilt and frustration. In all, it is another reason why I am desperate to get better. 

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