vivid dreams in Pregnancy

I write this post, desperately hoping that it’s going to make sense. In my sleep-deprived exhaustion, I’m a little worried that I can’t fully make myself understood today. And I’m supposed to teach classes full of children? I know what you’re thinking – ‘just wait till the baby comes, then you’ll know what tiredness is’ – but it’s not being unable to sleep that’s getting to me today, just simply not enough of it.

As I’ve mentioned before, I work away for three days a week, staying in school on the two nights I’m away and then going home Friday afternoon. It’s pretty exhausting, as leaving home at 5.30am on Wednesday morning means that I not only have to be awake at that time, I actually have to…like…drive, and concentrate and everything.

And sleep has been a little odd during pregnancy. I haven’t had a bad time – I didn’t have all the frequent trips to the loo in the night that lots of people get in the first trimester, and really, until this pelvic pain kicked in in the last week or two, I’ve been pretty comfortable.

But it has been weird. I seem to sleep much more deeply. I wake up groggy and often disorientated; this morning, I stepped – no, carefully manoeuvred myself (thanks to pelvic pain) – out of bed and very nearly hit the wall opposite me. I just had no balance whatsoever. I even had to leave a little later so that I could sit and eat some breakfast first. Normally, I’d just grab something to eat on the way, but I felt positively wobbly this morning. Not tired, as such, as I’d gone to bed reasonably early, but as if I’d been dragged from the bottom of a pit and hadn’t readjusted properly.

Perhaps the strangest thing about sleep during pregnancy, for me, has been the dreams. Good lord – there is nothing like them. I like to think I’m a pretty imaginative person and have big plans of writing stories and eventually publishing novels. But pregnancy dreams are like something from a Terry Pratchett book or something. Of course, the problem with crazy dreams is that after that initial moment of…’What??’ you promptly forget them. However, one that I do remember definitely involved being on a sailing boat (I don’t sail), in a race, with Rowan Atkinson as the captain, trying to retrieve a horse that had gone missing (on the water??) While asleep, this made perfect sense. It’s great – it’s like your own personal movie tailored to your own wacky sense of imagination!

But for all the entertainment, sleep is getting less and less comfortable. I usually like sleeping on my back, but am finding this awkward and all the advice says don’t do it once your bump starts growing, as it can block your blood supply. My right side always used to be fine, and this is M’s preferred way of lying, so if I want a hug at night, I have to lie on my right. The left side is usually the best, but it’s giving me some back ache and for the first time ever, I’m having to sleep with two pillows under my head – normally I’ve a fan of a more pancake-like pillow situation! Not to mention the pillow that I have to have between my knees to keep my pelvis comfortable.

It’s the pillow between the legs that has been the biggest revelation, actually. Not only does it hold my pelvis in a more stable, comfortable position, I also find that in the (excruciating) event that I have to turn over in bed, holding the pillow tightly between my legs helps to keep my knees together; apparently it’s that opening of the pelvis and twisting as you turn over that causes that bone-splitting stabbing pain. So that’s good to know! I haven’t invested in a pregnancy pillow yet. I know there are some really good ones on the market and lots of people swear by them, but I’ve been waiting until sleep becomes, inevitably, less comfortable. Maybe it’s time to start thinking about it now.

I am, however, making the most of every moment of sleep that I can get. As I type this, beside me is a big pile of marking that I really should be doing. But already being tucked up in bed in my PJs makes sleep seem so much more inviting.

And I wonder who will make an appearance in my crazy dreams tonight. It is rather annoying that it’s never Johnny Depp or Ryan Gosling. Rowan Atkinson? Seriously?!

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