Back in the laptop of luxury...

I'm back from the land of the zombies.  I spent yesterday recovering from a major allergy episode.  Something I ate?  Probably, but the problem is trying to identify what triggered this latest, very unpleasant attack.  On Friday evening I noticed my skin was irritated and my eyes were watering, by Saturday morning there were all sorts of too awful to mention gastric complications combined with throat burning, eyes watering and generally feeling bad.  There was only one thing to do - dose up with antihistamines and go back to bed.  This what I did and amazingly I slept for almost the entire day and straight through the night till 8 am today.  Saturday disappeared into a haze of sleep and pills.  Sounds almost celebrity-like - disappearing into a haze of sleep and pills, but mine were antihistamines and the day was accompanied by stomach pains and itching skin.  Not at all glamorous.

Sleep is a remarkable thing.  The restorative qualities of a few hours, or in my case 24 hours of sleep, is far beyond what it actually is.  When I stop and think about what a marvelous art sleeping is, I realise that it is something I take completely for granted and assume that I will be able to do whenever I need to.  How magical that my body knows when to sleep and how easily it happens for me.  Close your eyes and just allow that wonderful drifting sensation and ... I'm gone.

Where does my mind go when I sleep?  This is one of the questions that I imagine my kids must have asked or if they didn't, they should have. I don't have any definitive answer for this.  I guess if I had to answer it I would venture that my mind travels to that place called 'Dreamland' where it spends my sleeping hours wide awake and sorting through all my unresolved issues one by one, rather like going through my unfinished 'to do' list.  Unfortunately this 'Dreamland' is not accessible to my awake conscious mind so I usually have to redo all the 'to do' list items when I awaken.

My father has a form of Alzheimers called Lewy Bodies Dementia.  This means that when he sleeps and goes into the REM (Rapid Eye Movement) deep sleep state instead of his motor functions being paralysed, his are not. He would be fast asleep and dreaming that someone was after him and he would spring from his bed screaming and terrified.  When trying to calm him we could see that there was no way to reach him since he was in a total dream state.  In order to stop this ability to be awake whilst still sleep he has to be medicated each night.  I found this both distressing to witness but actually fascinating objectively to observe.

After my marathon sleep I am a bit less sharp this morning and feel myself to be a bit shell-shocked, as if coming back to myself is a bit more difficult than usual.  It is as if my body is made of eggshells and my actions need to be careful not to crack anything.  But at least the sneezing has stopped and the allergy attack is over.  It's left me a bit afraid to eat much since I still don't know what caused this.  That won't last long.  Also I am curious as to whether or not I'll need to sleep much tonight.  Can we store up sleep?  If I slept for 20 hours in the past 24 will I need to sleep again for two or three days? Wouldn't it be nice if we could bank sleep hours and withdraw them when needed?

I'm also happy to be back sitting on the couch and using my laptop again.  The new internet connection is up and running, faster and better.  The wireless network is back and I'm delighted that for a change, the technology hasn't let me down. Fingers crossed.

Life is full of surprises.