Needing Sleep

Lots of great things happen to you while you are asleep.

 

Your skin repairs itself, your mind relaxes and resets itself and your body strengthens its immune system and reduces levels of stress.

But you have to do it to reap the benefits.

 

These days people like to brag about how little sleep they need.  I remember reading somewhere that Martha Stewart only sleeps four hours a night.  I thought to myself, "You've got to be kidding!  I could never last very long if I only got four hours of sleep a night!"

Even Charlie Brown & Lucy Need To Sleep

One of the key elements of a healthy life and healthy grieving is allowing your emotions to surface in order to work through them.  You can put off dealing with your emotions but sooner or later they will come back at you, even stronger than before.  Unfortunately, you have to come face-to-face with your pain.  Oherwise you block the grieving process.  If you continue to ignore these emotions, then you end up holding them inside yourself and eventually you will affect your ability to sleep and other areas of your life.

 

Do you feel tired all the time?  Part of grieving is feeling fatigued.  I was exhausted after my husband's death and I found that dealing with my husband's death made my sleeping patterns change in a way that had never happened before.  After working all day, I would fall asleep sometime around 7:30 pm or 8 pm and then sleep until 4am.  On the weekends, I would fall alseep during the day.  This went on for a number of months and then my sleeping pattern finally changed again.  It felt weird but it was okay. 

 

Even if you can't sleep because you are upset or anxious about a loved one's death, I also found you can sometimes sit still and breathe quietly and find a focal point in which to loose yourself.  It might not work the first few times you try this but it is worth the effort.

 

Sleep is critical to our well-being and resting your body will help your emotional recovery.

 

Listen to this great TED talk that Arianna Huffington gave on the value of getting a good night's rest and how sleep is essential to our creativity and recovery.  She makes some great points!

 

  

A Dose of Kindness

Visiting people who are sick is one of the kindest acts we can ever practice.  Sitting and talking, holding their hand and listening seem so simple to the healthy but those things are so essential in helping the ill know that they matter, that they are not forgotten even though they are no longer able to independently move around.

 

Bringing about a smile or laughter through a funny story is just as important as any medicine prescribed by a doctor.  Laughter, in particular, is a powerful distraction from pain and illness.

 

One of my sisters and her husband are compassionately taking care of his elderly parents.  Both parents have been diagnosed with advanced stages of cancer and my sister and her husband are trying to make this time with them as comfortable as possible.

 

My sister's in-laws live in the same retirement community as our parents and while visiting with our parents this past weekend, my sister said it would be great if I could also stop by and also see her in-laws.  I did pop by for a visit with only her mother-in-law because her father-in-law was resting.  But the time spent catching up with her mother-in-law was unexpectedly funny.

 

I must admit I was a little anxious about visiting her mother-in-law because I didn't know if she was in a lot of pain or if she was even aware of her surroundings but she surprised me.

 

But during my visit I found a talented woman who had raised three children and was diagnosed with advanced cancer less than a year ago sitting in her family room making jokes about herself and her children, talking in an accent to make some of her stories more amusing and thoroughly enjoying herself.  It was wonderful to see that she still wanted to know what was going on in everyone's lives and having such a positive attitude about life.

 

While we watched the Ryder Cup on television and she made comments about the golfers, there was no negativity about her or her husband's medical situation.  She was living the moment and enjoying her time with the people around her.

 

I know that she is not always in such great spirits or health as she was during my visit but she takes advantage of when she feels good.  It can be difficult to see people when they are ill and it may be something we would rather not do but if we were ill wouldn't we want people to come and socialize with us? Wouldn't we want people to care about us?

 

The visit reminded me that even though I may feel awkward around someone who is ill it shouldn't stop me from trying to comfort someone else.  Life is about giving of yourself and lending a helping hand.