Tired

Tired takes on a whole new meaning when you don't sleep much for nights in a row. I've been relatively lucky with Janey---most of the time, her sleep is fairly okay---she'll go to bed around 8 and sleep until about 5, which is close to the schedule the rest of us have---we are early to bed, early to rise folks. But when something throws that off, such as her sickness this week, it's hell on earth. She has been known to stay up for nights in a row, in one of two modes---the manic mode, where she is happy and hyper and wants to watch TV, eat everything, play, turn off and on lights and so on. And then there's the crying mode, where she can literally cry all night---that tuneless moaning cry that just completely wears you down after a while, a short while. I am not sure which is worse. The manic is harder to watch, as you have to be totally alert to make sure she doesn't get a fun notion like eating cream cheese out of the container or standing on chairs to reach food that is up high, but the crying mode is harder to take, although if you try very hard, sometimes you can drift off a little during it. But the nights aren't as hard as the next days. I call it zombie mode---you can sort of function, can drive people places hopefully okay, can say hi and look a tiny bit normal, but once the slightest chance presents itself, you are napping. And needless to say, nothing gets done---no dishes, no laundry, no work, no anything. Which leads to depression, for me anyway, at living in a pit and not being up to doing much about it. Sometimes during these cycles I feel like I'm part of some cruel secret sleep deprivation experiment. It's hard because Tony works very long and early hours---he leaves the house at 5 and gets home at 5, and then needs to get to bed about 8 to be able to function. So night duty, although he tries hard, is usually mine, and day duty too. He's great on the weekends---I have to give him a huge amount of credit. But during the week, it's mainly my game, and believe me, I'd be up for it if I got enough sleep. When I don't, I'm doing things like this...writing long complaining blog posts while my eyes flutter open and shut and my mind cries out for coffee.