Mood Watch - 23

Rats. Despite taking an Ambien CR at 11 p.m. in addition to the usual meds, I still woke up at 2:30 a.m.: just 3.5 hours of sleep. The bad news is, I can’t get back to sleep. The good news is, I feel far from fully rested. I imagine that after a few hours I’ll get back to sleep again. Luckily I have no appointments until mid-afternoon.

It’s odd. I feel almost the same irrational shame when I get too little sleep as I do when I’m depressed and sleep as much as possible. In both cases, I have to bear in mind that these are manifestations of the illness, and that beyond taking my meds and keeping a careful watch on myself, there’s not much more I can do. The best thing, I’ve found in my current situation, is to remain quiet and relaxed. Some activity is okay — it seems to keep my mind from over-revving — but it’s not a time for something like, say, cleaning the house from top to bottom. (I once knew a woman with bipolar disorder who would actually do that in the middle of the night, but until she happened to mention it by accident, and I happened to say it sounded like clear evidence of hypomania, it had never occurred to her to connect these bursts of nocturnal energy with the illness. And this was a highly educated woman, too.)

UPDATE, October 5, 1:20 p.m. - Presently I did dose off, while sitting in my office chair. Unfortunately I had a glass of Fresca in my hand and thus baptized a good portion of my lap, which woke me up again. But just temporarily: I slept until 5:30 a.m., got up, fed and walked the dogs, then crashed again until around 11 a.m.