As a student in college, I had an internship that kept me busy for many hours in the day, and I would come home feeling completely exhausted and wondered many times how I would ever be able to take on a full-time job. I got that job a few years later through a connection of a leader in my church who worked there. I'd made the mistake of assuming that I couldn't take time off during my first year there (because I had no earned time off hours), so I pushed myself through it. That was a mistake. I was already feeling a large amount of stress a few months in and since the company had a long stretch between January and May with no holidays off, it was really taxing. That being the case, I started early on having to deal with insomnia. Every now and then I would wake up in the middle of the night not going back to sleep easily. That happened a few times in my past, so it didn't feel like anything to worry about at first. I also had days when I zonked out as soon as I laid down on a couch at home. I wasn't worried at all.
I began to take notice of how it affected me when I felt so tired that I felt "like I'd been run over by a truck," and my legs felt heavy when I tried to walk. That was completely forgotten when I got to work. My first type of work there often got my brain active and increased my alertness a little. By the end of the day, I had completely forgotten my morning tiredness.
My insomnia tendencies never completely went away, but I knew it was becoming a problem several years later after a few changes were made, particularly in the roles of management in the company. The replacement managers were still cordial with me, but we were different in our perspectives and goals. They put more emphasis on the logistics of running the business, which isn't bad, but it was at the expense of staffing satisfaction and well-being. A good number of people (not just me) really struggled with the changes being made, and I heard a lot of frustration from my coworkers during that time period. I'm fairly good at adjusting to change, and so I bore with it for some time, but with the changes came an increase in stress.
I loved how flexible the job was when I started, but the new managers began to lay down more strict standards and decreased that flexibility. Though I understood their concerns, the strictness increased my stress, even to the point that by the last year or two, I was experiencing chronic stress, resulting in multiple nights of not sleeping at all, and I was no longer able to perk up during work hours. I was exhausted all day, and when that afternoon slump hit, I swear I would have fallen asleep at the computer a few times had I not gone to the storage room or (after that room was removed for other purposes) to the restrooms where I could lock myself in and rest my eyes for two minutes or do a few jumping jacks to perk myself up.
When I left, my insomnia continued, which didn't bother me while I was taking care of family, because it allowed me to check on them during the night, but even now I still deal with it, though it's finally improving. I'm actually able to sleep at least 6-7 hours most nights now and have a little sleep aid on the side for nights when I feel the adrenaline not settling, which are decreasing. Some of these struggles take years to recover from, especially long-lasting ones like this.
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| A picture likely taken during a sleepless night. |
