My Sleep Story: Almost Too Embarrassing To Share

It's not like I dig ditches all day long or do some other physical work. I kind of just get into bed. And at the risk of rubbing it in, I don't even have to turn out the light.
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I assume you've read the headline and think I'm going to tell you about my bedwetting problem, right? Nope. My bed stays dry through the night, and will remain so for a few more years until I hit menopause and start hot flashing all over the sheets.

When I began writing for Huffington Post in 2007, Fearless Voices was both the theme of the category in which I was published and the title of Arianna's book. I had a fearless voice, and was thrilled to chime in here. But now, I feel like an outcast. Everyone is talking about how to get to sleep. How to stay asleep. How to sleep well, deeply, restfully and many more adverbs all of which imply that sleep is an elusive dream.

Not for me.

I sleep like a rock within minutes of turning out the light. It's almost too embarrassing to share. No Ambien. No wine. No Lunesta. No melatonin (although my kids get a spray of it every so often.) No warm milk .I can drink a gallon of coffee at 6:00pm and still zonk out at 10 p.m. as if on command.

I love sleep. I need sleep. My husband and I had years that stretched well past our children's infancies where we did not sleep through the night.

There was a four year seizure disorder for our eldest in which the grand mal seizures always started in the middle of the night. I slept with a Fisher Price baby monitor next to my bed for over a decade, at first for the hungry cries of my babies and then for the choking, chilling sounds of a seizure in progress. That was followed by a year long sleep interruption in my five-year-old. And then there was the two year stretch where my now 13-year-old could not sleep through the night without being with her father and me. My girls have autism -- and sleep can be an issue related to their diagnosis.

As of this moment, all three girls are sleeping through the night, or at least until 5 a.m. Close enough. Waking refreshed to the sound of an alarm clock is a miracle I'd share if I knew how.

It's not like I dig ditches all day long or do some other physical work. I kind of just get into bed. And at the risk of rubbing it in, I don't even have to turn out the light. Rolling over and scoodling under the covers will call forth an immediate visit from Morpheus.

That's my story. I don't fit in here right now because I sleep well. On that note, it's almost 9:30 p.m. You know what that means.

Night night. And I hope you can sleep tight.

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