Last night was the weirdest ever.
I arrived home from the big city mid-afternoon and man, I was dog tired.
Was all I could to keep my eyes open. I guess I should have tried for a brief nap right then but because of the time, I felt it would be better to force myself to stay awake until early evening when I could just crash for the night.
We had an early dinner (after the requisite pre-dinner wine, of course) and I was literally falling asleep in my soup.
I couldn't even stand up I was so tired!
Suffice to say, I was right out of everything by 7:00pm.
So I went about getting ready for bed, which of course includes taking my bedtime meds but I added a sleeping pill to the mix (I wanted to make damned sure that I got a good night's sleep after the physically demanding day I had put in on Sunday -- which, by the way, was soooooo worth it!).
Anyway, I hit the sack at about 7:15pm.
Didn't even pick up a book or a newspaper.
I crawled into bed, telling John that I actually "felt sick" I was so tired.
I'm sure I was asleep before my head hit the pillow.
But not fifteen minutes later, I was up again, coughing and sputtering and John came running in to see if I was OK.
"I was drowning," I said.
The coughing continued and my voice was hampered by the fact that I couldn't get my breath.
"Do you need your puffer?" Joh asked.
"I don't know," was my response, "I don't know what's happening." (Seems my asthma takes a new path with every attack.)
I snuggled back down to go to sleep again.
Some fifteen minutes later, I was up again. But this time, fluid was running out my nose -- fast! I jumped up to grab some kleenex to catch whatever and the coughing and sputtering started again.
Ok, now this is stupid. What the hell is up with this?
I had been "drowning" again and the "water" was coming out my nose -- bizarre or what?
John kept asking me if I was OK and I didn't know what to tell him because I truly had no idea what was happening, never having experienced anything like it before.
John decided he'd better come to bed, to keep watch over me, but he didn't want to go to sleep, for fear that I would need his assistance. I assured him that if I got into serious trouble, he'd wake up in a hurry.
Now, this drowning phenomenon kept happening every fifteen minutes or so for about the next three hours, and it got more frightening with each episode.
The amount of water I was eliminating was increasing, and it was taking longer to recover from the coughing and sputtering each time. I truly had no idea what the hell was going on!
At one point, I recall using my puffer to see if that would settle things down (if it did, it didn't stop the "drowning" sensation for about an hour or so).
At one point, I wondered if I was going to have to make that dreaded trip to the hospital to have them check me out. Obviously, my lungs were not functioning properly but why I was expectorating all this liquid through my nose was beyond my ability to fathom.
Some time around midnight I woke again, aware that I was no longer drowning but feeling like I'd been put through a wringer, and I had the foulest dry mouth ever! So I got up, very gingerly -- still quite groggy of course from the sleeping pill I had taken earlier. I brushed my teeth to try to get rid of the dry mouth effect and then went back to bed.
Then, I went to sleep for the rest of the night (with my usual wake-up at the appropriate interval of course).
When I woke just before 6:00am, everything seemed back to normal -- even the screaming pain in my hips and the ever-present leg cramps. Yep, normal is as normal does today.
John suggested that the whole experience happened because I was so exhausted -- but really, I've been that tired before and not drowned in my sleep as a consequence.
In any event, it will be easy going today.
If I never experience that repeated drowning in my sleep phenomenon again, that will be just fine by me!
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