[SoScorpio]

I've never been a good sleeper or a morning person, but lately it's getting ridiculous. Some weeks I'll wake up depressed half the mornings. I usually feel better once I'm done getting ready and out of the house. But sometimes a vague blue feeling follows me all day when I wake up like that.
Sometimes, but not always, it's accompanied by aches and stiffness, which makes me feel worse obviously. This morning I made it halfway through my shower before crying when I couldn't get the suction cup on my loofah to stick to the wall.
My boyfriend keeps getting mad when I wake him up by crying or "jumping on the bed" as he keeps saying. I had no idea what he was talking about, I sit on the edge of the bed to get dressed, but it only bothers him on the mornings when I'm feeling bad. I think maybe it's because when I'm stiff and sore I don't lower myself onto the bed all the way, but maybe let myself fall the last few inches? I don't even notice it, but that's probably what it is.
He keeps telling me I need to stop going to bed so late. I'm trying, but there's a lot of obstacles. I've always been a night owl, for one. I just can't be very happy when I have to come home and hit the bed in an hour or less, especially if I have to get up early in the morning as well. I get home at 8 or 8:15 every night, and in order to get 8 hours sleep I'd have to go to bed at 9:30 sharp. I leave the house a little after 6 most mornings. So I'm out of the house for 14 hours, and I just don't want to spend all the hours I have at home sleeping.
I have plenty of sleep issues besides. I find it very hard to sleep without some kind of white noise. Usually I just use a fan because my boyfriend has managed to get used to it. Watching certain movies or listening to certain books on tape is what I do when I really feel like I won't be able to sleep. As a kid I already had trouble getting to sleep, but always slept straight through the night. Now I'm starting to wake up in the middle of the night sometimes. Sometimes it's because I'm sore, other times there doesn't seem to be a reason but as soon as I wake up some thought I was worrying about, or something I need to do, pops into my head. And I mean right away, not like I wake up and lay there trying to get back to sleep and my mind wanders. I wake up like it was that thought that woke me up.
And waking up in the middle of the night sometimes gives me anxiety. I think because as a kid the only time I woke in the middle of the night was when I had the stomach flu, so I'm conditioned to think that if I'm awake when I shouldn't be, something is really wrong.

I finally acknowledged my boyfriend may be right about me not getting enough sleep though, because I just realized I've stopped dreaming. I used to dream almost every night, and remember my dreams, at least in the moments of waking. Now I dream only once a week, if that. I'm not really sure how long that's been going on, I just now noticed it.
A week ago I started keeping a little journal, just noting how many hours I slept and how I felt during the day, anything that upset me or made me feel better, etc. So far, oddly, I seem to be feeling my worst on the days I sleep the most. That must be a fluke though right? I get a solid 8 hours sleep once a week maybe, and often not even then. So maybe I'm just in such bad shape that a few nights of longer sleep doesn't matter.

My boyfriend also thinks my smoking pot in the morning is related. I didn't always do that, just in the past couple months since we totaled our car and I have to get up at 5:30am to ride on a bus for an hour and a half. He thinks that maybe I feel so bad in the morning because my body expects to get high. But then why isn't it EVERY morning that I feel like crap? Because I don't feel crappy every morning, but on good mornings I still usually smoke because it makes the bus ride a lot more bearable. Maybe on good mornings I could do without it, but on bad mornings I worry that if I don't do it, my aches and pains and bad mood will persist throughout the day and I'll be depressed at work, and not do my best. Plus I have a feeling it will definitely make my mornings worse, at least at first, and my boyfriend will be even more mad. He says he hasn't been able to sleep in after I leave for a month or something. I think he's exaggerating, since I don't feel bad every morning or even wake him up every morning, at least that I can tell.
Every time I wake up depressed he tells me it's my fault for not sleeping more. Last night I was in bed before him! I got in bed at 9:30, probably still didn't fall asleep until after 10 though. I don't know what else I'm supposed to do. Every time I tell him I'll just end up laying in bed for hours if I try to go to bed earlier, he says that's just what I have to do, and eventually I'll fall asleep from boredom and retrain my sleep schedule. But then I do exactly what he says and it's like he expected me to be able to sleep 8 hours right away, even though he told me specifically not to expect that!
This morning I was actually trying to be quiet, because I'm tired of feeling even worse when he tells me it's my fault and acts so grumpy at being woken up. But I guess my sitting heavily on the bed and breathing heavily from the pain of stretching while getting dressed woke him up. He's not usually this mean... just when he's convinced that I'm causing my own problems and am just too lazy or stubborn to fix them. He doesn't get that my brain doesn't work like his, and sometimes I don't even know what's wrong, so how do I go about fixing it? He just assumes if I do what he tells me then I'll be alright, and if I can't, he thinks I'm just refusing to. But it really bums me out. I understand his frustration, but all I know is, if he was going through a rough time like this, I wouldn't be mean like that. If I woke up to him crying, I would never even consider being rough. I would comfort him and tell him to have a good day and all that. Of course, he never cries, so I'd be pretty concerned if I woke up to that. I guess in my case it's just something that happens, so maybe it doesn't seem like a big deal. And even if he was going through a rough time, he probably wouldn't let me know, because he's got it into his head that everyone has to solve their own problems without help, and there's nothing I could do for him, so he shouldn't worry me. But if I did know. Even if it was a simple as him saying the night before that he was having muscle spasms, and then he woke me in the morning by groaning when putting on clothes, I wouldn't wake up and say "What's wrong" in that crabby tone he always gives me. If I said those words at all they would be sympathetic. But I would probably already remember what was wrong, and give him a hug and rub his shoulders if he let me, tell him I love him, etc. I don't care that he woke me up, especially if I don't have to be up for another few hours, which is usually the case with him when I wake him up.
I guess I have to say it to him that way, because he doesn't seem to think he's being mean... either that or he thinks I deserve it because it's my fault. I would never be so cold.

[Anthem.]

I want to start by saying I hope I do not offend you, or step over a line I should not have. When it comes to your boyfriend, have you tried gently communicating to him that his "comfort" doesn't resemble comfort much at all? Through this struggle you are having, it seems you carry a lot of guilt for disturbing him when you are in turmoil. This could be something that is adding/encouraging/triggering your nightly anxieties. Which adds an entire other element to your issues, and enables you from confronting them. Again, I am really sorry if I am crossing a line.

About the trees, as someone who smokes every morning before work- I am just going to say I don't think that is it. Although I could be using my stoner logic, I feel like it activates my brain in the morning. Like coffees friend.

Maybe when you get 8 hours, your body is just in that weird over slept stage. People who sleep 8 hours nightly, if they sleep 10+ hours will definitely wake up feeling. I feel your pain on the whole having to go to bed an hour after you get home, its ********.

I hope any of this made sense. I read your post a couple times and I can relate to it, so its a bit difficult trying to navigate how to approach the situation. I hope you find calm in your day, breathe in some brisk winter air to coat your insides.

[SoScorpio]

Originally Posted by Anthem.

I want to start by saying I hope I do not offend you, or step over a line I should not have. When it comes to your boyfriend, have you tried gently communicating to him that his "comfort" doesn't resemble comfort much at all? Through this struggle you are having, it seems you carry a lot of guilt for disturbing him when you are in turmoil. This could be something that is adding/encouraging/triggering your nightly anxieties. Which adds an entire other element to your issues, and enables you from confronting them. Again, I am really sorry if I am crossing a line.

About the trees, as someone who smokes every morning before work- I am just going to say I don't think that is it. Although I could be using my stoner logic, I feel like it activates my brain in the morning. Like coffees friend.

Maybe when you get 8 hours, your body is just in that weird over slept stage. People who sleep 8 hours nightly, if they sleep 10+ hours will definitely wake up feeling. I feel your pain on the whole having to go to bed an hour after you get home, its ********.

I hope any of this made sense. I read your post a couple times and I can relate to it, so its a bit difficult trying to navigate how to approach the situation. I hope you find calm in your day, breathe in some brisk winter air to coat your insides.

Thank you
Yeah I've tried telling him how it makes me feel but somehow the conversation gets off course after that. I try to make the point that what he says makes me feel bad, but from there it turns into a conversation about my problems and what I should be doing. I just get off track so easily. I know if someone isn't getting what you're saying and keeps changing the subject you're supposed to just let them speak and then restate your point. But I always have something to say in response to what he says, and it just goes wrong.

And smoking does wake me up! I know that's what alcoholics say too when they drink in the morning. Except I think that's entirely different, because alcohol is a depressant, and shouldn't make you feel awake. Weed can be a depressant or stimulant I suppose. And you're right, it is kinda like coffee, only if I needed a cup of coffee every morning no one would tell me I have a problem. Caffeine is a drug too! Although out of all the drugs I have tried, legal or otherwise, caffeine is my least favorite. I like it even less than its illegal version. If I drink more than a soda worth of caffeine past midday, forget about sleep.

But yeah I'll try telling him again.. it's just hard when we talk later in the morning and he's nice again, acts like it never happened. I really hate confrontation, so when it seems like someone has moved past the conflict, I don't want to bring it back up. I have to remind myself that it's not really over, it'll happen again, and I need to address it.