Sleep Experiment

I decided almost two weeks ago to see if taking care of sleep hygiene would help my sleep patterns.  Sleep hygiene:  Go to bed and get up at the same time.  Take a hot bath before bed.  Listen to CDs to promote sleep.  Turn tv off.  Turn lights off.  Turn fan on (white noise).  Read a prayer.  No naps.  Take a melatonin at 8:00 p.m.  I logged everything and then analyzed it.  The answer is ....are you ready?....  "yes" and "no"  Grrr. 

Of course, my ability to consistently do anything is so impaired that the results are skewed.  Did I do my evening routine when I was tired?  No.  I did manage to put on a nightgown every night which is good.  Sometimes I'm so tired I fall asleep in my clothes.  (Don't tell anyone who is self-disciplined.  They will be terribly disgusted.  To those people I am mostly disgusting.  Thank God I no longer disgust myself.  Let them live my life and see how they're doing at almost 70, I always say!) 

Did I manage not to take a nap?  Well....I only took a nap when I felt so tired I was sick.  That was three times in two weeks (almost two weeks).  Well... there was this 4th time when I held off until 6:00 p.m. and then had a nap until 8:30 p.m.  Does that count as a nap?  I did pretty consistently get to sleep before midnight (went to bed at 10:00) and almost made it out of bed by 8:00 a.m. every day.  I set the alarm at 6:30.  Either I didn't hear it at all or turned it off in my sleep.  It didn't seem to matter at all whether I practiced sleep hygiene, set an alarm, took a nap or not,  or whatever.  I still fell asleep and woke up at about the same times.  However, I didn't have any nights when I was awake until 3, 4, 5 or 6 in the morning and slept until 10, 11 or noon.  That's a vast improvement.  What did seem to have an influence was how much physical pain I was in.  Of course.  So, I think my mental intention to regulate my sleep patterns had the most influence of all.

Final result:  It's time to get off my own case about sleep patterns.  I intend to continue my effort to use sleep hygiene and self care.  But worrying about all of it is over, over, over.  If I sleep until noon, sleep in my clothes by accident, etc. I no longer care.  So there.