Sleep is for the Weak

One thing that really annoys the love of my life these days, according to his blog, is when well-meaning parents suggest that his life will change drastically with fatherhood.

(http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=59775710&blogID=219745336&MyToken=0c7866d0-acf9-44ed-8bd1-dfe3871d296a)

It's pronounced like a Varsity football player bragging about how much action you get once you win a homecoming game, with the combined smugness of those who've been there, taken their lumps and lived to tell about it to those who haven't yet made the team. And it annoys him. Because, well, if you knew us before, that's a big ole "Duh!"

My aggravation this week will be saved for those who suggest that I sleep as much as I can cause I'll never sleep again properly and probably won't average but about five hours of restless half-lidded, so-tired-you're-stupid, exhaustion-induced serial catnaps for the next ten years. The resulting anxiety has given me the "don't average but about five hours of restless half-lidded, so-tired-you're-stupid," exhaustion-induced serial catnaps. I have never had trouble sleeping and now can't manage to fall asleep unless its full daylight and I'm on my computer, working at something with a deadline. I sleep through movies, through e-mails, through electricians drilling holes in my upstairs bedroom. I cannot, however, sleep peaceably in my bed at night.

My good people, I have never slept much. Well, that's not true, there were those first ten years of life and then the three months during the second trimester, but those were long ago and I've forgotten the feel of a rested body. Seriously, at 18, I was working and going to school, at 19 joined the AF and survived Basic Training and Tech School cramming, at 20, I went on night shift and worked from 7pm to 7am , then went off to the college for another three hours of instruction. By the time I was taking my history final, I'd be in full exhaustion-driven hallucinations, getting the test answers from Thomas Jefferson who kindly showed up to coach me through the exam I was sleeping through.

Then there was grad school – a plethora of writing, teaching and school assignment tasks that took 26 hours a day to complete. I was good. I did it in 20. By the time I'd hit New York, and NYU, I had this perfected and could usually throw in a few hours of drinking afterwards. By Sunday, I was wearing out, though, and would need a full 8 hours to patch up the damage so I could do it again next week.

Then the college teaching years when scholarship had to be wrung out of the last dregs of a 4/4 teaching load full of College Composition classes that made even the bravest and most dedicated want to skip town, expatriate to the Bahamas, cornrow one's hair and tend bar for the rest of your life. I still managed to run two student groups, get a crew of students to London, attend conferences four and five at a time and become part of my small town downtown social scene. In fact, I was rather looking forward to this pregnancy of a time of hard-earned rest, recuperation and clean living to undo some of the damage I've done with too much coffee and bourbon and not enough shut-eye.

It started about a month ago, though, when the hour that I'd be up eating yogurt and reading War and Peace gave way to a patchy sleep that went from 11-1:30, 2-2:30, 3-4, 4:30-5:00 and then either 5:30-7 if the electricians were coming and 5:30- 9 if they weren't. On this six hours, I'm supposed to haul around my 8 pound unborn child, finish my classes and course work and be civil to those who smugly suggest that I should sleep now because I'll never sleep again.

Word of advice to those approaching the pregnant: we are tired, we are usually hungry, and we have few reserves for asinine advice like "sleep when you can." What about "What sleeping pill can we take that won't kill our child but will allow us to get through the 1:30-3pm spell?""

Now that would be good advice. But I'm not bitter, just sleepy, and what the hell, sleep is for the weak anyway.