The FOG

I took a nap today. Insignificant, yes, mostly. But today I took a nap which for me was a huge feat because I hadn't actually slept in over 60 hours. I get so confused by the insomnia versus fatigue cycles that I can't really know what to expect. I am miserable when I can't sleep. I am awful to those around me and even more awful to myself. The worst part is trying to sleep...you know that feeling that is often described as drifting or falling? People have said they remember feeling peaceful and just floating or falling and then suddenly WHAM! they feel frightened and are awake. I do that, a lot. But it isn't falling for me...I am just hanging out, trying to sleep, almost asleep when suddenly there is a heavy weight on my chest, it must be someone attacking me! Or there is a weight on my legs...I can't move! It's a snake! Or some psycho axe murderer jumps out of nowhere in what was once a peaceful dream. When I have trouble falling asleep, I have seriously odd visions that scare me awake and then I can't stop visualizing it...so I lie awake while my husband, my kids, the cats, the dog, the neighbors, the city sleeps. They all sleep. I drift in and out of states of peace and fear throughout the night. When morning comes everyone wakes and starts to get ready for the day while I just lie there, exhausted and frustrated. Oh how I wish I could just SLEEP, deeply, without dreams.
I long for good healthy sleep, the kind that makes you feel refreshed, energized, and ready for the day. I don't remember the last time I slept like that. The reality sinks in when I try to go through a day without having a desire to crawl back into bed. I am just so stinkin' tired all the time! I am not the person I have always pretended to be on the outside. Inside I am a wreck. My mind spins in a million different directions, constantly. I struggle to organize my thoughts into one subject or to maintain a conversation that doesn't end up with me apologizing (at least 10 times) for talking too much or digressing. I can only imagine how difficult it must be for someone to follow my thought processes in a conversation. The conversation may go something like this:
     1st subject.....blah, blah, blah and oh....2nd subject (related to 1st subject).......and then 1st
     subject...then 3rd subject (unrelated to 1st, related to 2nd)......then 1st subject.....then 2nd
     subject.....then 4th subject (unrelated to any of them)....then back to 2nd.
By then even I am somewhat confused about what the original conversation was about and have to ask a leading question "what we were talking about?" or "what was I saying?" Perhaps this happens to many people, but I feel like I am constantly asking people to fill me in on what I was just saying. My disorganized thoughts are drowning me.
I feel as though I have so many different thoughts going through my mind these days that I just can't organize them. I picture placing them into thought columns, organized by subject and prioritized according to relevancy. Oh if only I had a librarian for my thoughts!
Weird...I just...never mind. Yeah, I just thought about what it would be like to have my own personal brain librarian.
So, as you can see, the fog consumes me. It jumbles all of my thoughts into this mess. It is almost like taking the pages of ten different books, all the same size with identical print, and shuffling them and dumping them into a pile on the floor. Sort that! It's a mess...that mess describes my thoughts. There are so many going through my brain that I can't stay on one subject with digressing.
So....what was I saying? Oh yeah, my nap. Naps help, they seem to decrease the thickness of the fog, slowing down the thoughts for a little bit once sleep has come aboard. But only if I can actually get to sleep.