Everybody Needs a Sleep Buddy!

This is the story of a woman who lived the first seven-plus decades of her life not being the person she wanted to be. One day, when she finally became who she had always wanted to be and maybe always was—engaged, creative, funny, do-gooder—she got Parkinson's.

Put differently and in keeping with her life theme, the day she finally got to help herself to the Large Potato that represented her Best Life, she noticed a tremor in her finger, an imbalance in her gait. All signs pointed to Parkinson's.

Below are excerpts from her recent journal entries, lightly edited.

Sept. 5, 2021 - What (and Who) I Have Become

So I have Parkinson’s. I’m a mess. A mess with resources. 

Also, I have staff. Thank God for my inheritance or I would be long gone. 

My first and most important staff member is the Wonderful Wendall.

There is also my human sleep-aide, Alyssa. Yes, I need someone to hunker down with me to sleep. 

I also need someone who gets me to move my ass. That someone is the part-time trainer, Ivy— part-time because she doesn’t show up. But I love her, so I give her a pass because my aformentioned assistant, Wendall, was weary, I needed to hire an assistant for my assistant. Which is how tobacco-chewing Jake came into my life. He cleans the tile with a toothbrush. Bless him. (Although I sometimes wonder if I need to fire my assistant's assistant to keep my assistant from getting jealous; you see the dilemma.) 

It’s not unlike the Brady Bunch for the Elderly. Maybe I should take them on the road and call it Char Char's Coterie.

Sept. 6 - Becoming my Father 
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Exhausted; didn’t sleep. Why would I? Had an energy drink. Made things worse. Worn out. Tired. Tired of life. Sick of life. 

Sad, heavy eyelids. Yet can’t sleep with them, closed or open. 

Not feeling funny today. 

Tremor in my index finger makes it difficult to write. All signs of Parkinson’s.

It’s one of the worst illnesses a person can have, so naturally I have it. 

I will discuss it with my favorite, tried and true general practitioner, Dr. Good. She recently referred me to a neurologist. 

The first available appointment with the God Known Also As The Neurologist was in January, more than six weeks away -- making it a certainty that the uncertainty will ruin any days approximating holidays.

It's hard to be a writer when you can’t write. Painful. Treacherous.
My father had Parkinson’s (thanks, Dad!), but it was diabetes that killed him. Slowly.

At one point, my father couldn't walk, sleep or eat. I was still afraid of him.

He would be listening to talk radio while eating a popsicle - his favorite. It would be dripping down his chin, and he would just smile. The simplest things made him smile. Like a child.

Then his time was up. 

When will my time be up? Set the timer. Time is up. My best friend Betty’s time was up. She had an aneurysm. Goodbye to lucky Betty. She didn’t have to suffer through old age, which sucks. Every inch of it.

But whose measuring? I’m shrinking. I used to be 5’3”. Now I’m 5’0”. Soon I will be a little person. I’ll be in the circus. That’s where the elderly go when they shrink - Char Char’s Circus. I sense a theme. I won’t go to assisted living. I will instead redirect straight to my Circus, along with the Bearded Lady and the Fire-Eater. 

To be clear, fire is not allowed per the FAA bylaws to which I am devoted. FAA, to the uninitiated, is Food Addicts Anonymous. It’s true - I’ve joined a cult of sorts to control my grazing. I’m not a cow, though I sometimes graze like one. Oh, how I graze. Hence the allegiance to FAA, which is the only program that has helped me in my quest to become an aspiring, first-rate restrictive, like my mother. So I'm in the process of Becoming My Mother AND Becoming My Father -- there has to be enough material for a musical in here somewhere.

So that's a TV show, a circus and a musical to those paying attention. The spin-off upsides are incalculable because everyone is currently getting old and decrepit. Relatable material here. 

Interestingly, I can’t stop eating, I can’t stop drinking, I can’t stop drugging, and I can’t stop my current vice - shopping. But I CAN stop sleeping. I’m in the Big League of Insomniacs. 

I’ve tried everything. Meditation, sleep hygiene, melatonin, gabapentin. Nothing worked until I got a sleep buddy. Not for sex, to be clear. Just to sleep. I needed a good old-fashioned sleep companion, not a pill. This was new for me. The not-a-pill part. We’re so conditioned to need pills, yes? The professionals tell us we need them and we believe the professionals, sometimes (often?) to our detriment. Yet, all I needed was someone to talk to, with whom to share my day with and watch TV. This someone was and is Alyssa. I pay her an obscene amount of money a year. She’s a very expensive form of Ambien.  

She puts me to bed at 11p. She says “Nighty-night, Char Char, I love you,” and that’s all I need to lull me to sleep … until 12:30a when I’m off to the races. This is precisely the time I start thinking about how much money she is costing me, which keeps me up at night. 

My solution is to fire her. But if that, then this: I’d be back to Square One.

In the meantime, she is still helping. She comes to my house every night, unless there is some act of God, like a flood which recently happened. I let her off the hook that night.

It's all connected. If I'm not sleeping, I'm not losing weight even if I'm not eating. If I'm not dreaming, I'm ruminating except when I'm obsessing while not sleeping. 

The things about which I obsess most whilst not sleeping are eating, shopping (like am I wearing the right Johnny Was pajamas to induce sleep and if not, which colors, sizes and patterns do I need to order tomorrow?) and, now, Parkinson's. 

I should add here that my shopping addiction was short-lived – and maybe just dormant –because my assistant started refusing to ship things back for me and I ran out of storage space under my bed -- what with all the boxes.

Mr. Parkinson's, as I'm calling him, doesn't know who he is dealing with ...