Daniel greeted me when I got home, “Did you know that a tree fell on our house during the storm?”
I lit up. “Oh cool.” I rushed out the back door. “This is so exciting.”
I wasn’t concerned about any outer damage to the house—that was my landlord’s headache. And I hadn’t noticed any issues on the inside. I was merely a rubber-necker with the added excitement of being in the center of the “calamity.”
A landscaper came over to assess the damage. “So when did this happen?”
I shrugged. “I guess sometime during the storm.”
He was incredulous. “You don’t know?You didn’t hear anything?”
My heart skipped a beat when I made the connection—I must have slept through it.
I haven’t really slept well since the brain bleeds, despite my chronic exhaustion. Until I cut gluten out of my diet, a good night’s sleep was when I slept four hours straight. And after I woke up, I was lucky to get back to sleep within two hours.
Going on a gluten free diet really seemed to improve the quality of my sleep. Now, I usually sleep four to six hours straight. And after I wake up, I get right back to sleep for two or more hours.
But whatever night I have, loud noises have always woken me up, always.
How could I have slept through what must have been a loud crash? Had anything changed?
A few years ago my chiropractor suggested that I take a magnesium supplement. He thought it would help with my sleep. I tried it, and found I was having an easier time falling asleep. But it didn’t prevent me from waking back up within one, two, or four hours. And once awake, before I went gluten free, I usually stayed awake.
Falling asleep has never been a huge problem—a book usually does the trick. I stopped taking a magnesium supplement on a regular basis.
But recently, I read about other benefits of taking magnesium and decided to get back to taking it regularly. Falling asleep is once again easy—I’m not getting much reading done.
The other change I made recently was minimizing sugar consumption—I was told it might help cut back on my headaches.
Perhaps it was the magnesium, or maybe the decrease in the amount of sugar in my diet. Or possibly a combination of the three, magnesium, no gluten, and less sugar. Whatever it was, the important thing was that I slept through a tree striking the roof.
Now, that was really exciting.