Tick Tock
Oh the joys of insomnia
I won’t lie. My chest feels tight.
It’s Monday morning, the day after the big 4-9 birthday.
The day was filled with my loved ones, goofball ridgebacks, beach walks, belly laughs, cake, gifts and a cheeky glass or 2 of fizz. I went to bed with a grateful heart, feeling blessed I had all I could wish for on my 49th birthday.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t to be any quality shut eye to follow such a giddy day.
There was maybe a 2 hour period where I slept like a baby.
Then boom! I was awake.
I could literally feel my heart pounding through the duvet.
‘Tick tock, tick tock’ were the words echoing through my mind, whilst I reached for my phone, squinting to check the time, 1.35am, uuurggghh really?!
What is it this time Tanya?! What is pickling my mind tonight???
The more I wrestled to fall back to sleep, the more my thoughts and heart beats raced in tandem. It was as though Phil Collins was in the corner of my room playing a rendition of ‘In The Air Tonight’. Please god don’t let this be one of those nights.
For those that know me, I do love to start a new project.
At 2am, 3am, and yes at 4am, my relentless imposter syndrome was well and truly awake. Was it the fizz? Maybe too much birthday cake, as I do like to squirrel away far too much sugar, or was it down to the fact this Substack writing project was making me feel out of my depth?!
My promise to myself to write every day for 365 days documenting what it’s like to be 49 warts n all, might have been a rather ridiculous idea. At 3am it certainly felt that way.
Stupidly I decided to scroll through the news headlines on my phone. A moment of pride as I read highlights about the Lionesses for all that they have accomplished and will go onto accomplish, avoiding the baby killer articles and then aimlessly flicking back and forth between Instagram reels and stories, praying boredom would kick in and I’d be back into slumberland. No chance!
Putting the phone down, pulling the duvet up so to cocoon myself and prise myself back to sleep, I wondered could it be that I’ve set myself up for failure?
Was this writing project going to be one thing too much for me to cope with?!
Nope! I refused to surrender to the doubting thoughts.
At 3.56am I well and truly told my inner chimp to shut the hell up. This writing project is a bloody good one. I’m ready to embrace each day. Granted it’s not going to be smooth sailing. But I’ll take the good with the bad and flip the script on as many negatives imposter thoughts as I'm mentally capable of dealing with.
The beauty of the wake up call, the one positive of yet another night of insomnia led me to the fact that next year it’s a leap year. So now I have an extra 24 hours to enjoy whilst being 49. One more day to write about if I managed to be Forty Nine with Ease. Every cloud has a silver lining.
If you can relate to any of this please do comment.
I’m intrigued to know.
What keeps you awake at night?
What are your best remedies for falling back to sleep?
I need to practice what I preach and journal in the deadly hours when the relentless the ‘tick tock’ won’t simmer down.
Until the next time
Take care and stay safe xx
Can certainly identify with the overthinking/sugar/alcohol/menopausal induced insomnia. Any tips? I try that alleged army trick: concentrate on my pillow, duvet, then do a body scan starting with my head, face, neck, chest, arms etc. Sometimes works, sometimes doesn't.