Just say no..

We all have experienced it. You are up watching TV or on the computer and you are nearly giving yourself whip lash from falling asleep and then snapping your head up abruptly as you nod off. You decided to go to bed only to realize as soon as you hit the pillow.. wham! Your eyes fly open. You are thinking about work, the groceries you need to buy, what color of scrubs to wear tomorrow,and the biggest stresser of all, you worry about the fact that you are laying in bed worrying, because you know dang well it is keeping you awake. You get up and take something to sleep, knowing very well you could be dragging all day tomorrow, but you don't care you are desperate! Desperate time, desperate measures! You decide a benadryl might do the trick instead of a heavy sleeping pill. You are weary and only take a half.. lucky you, you are the small percentage that get the paradoxical affect of a drug. That is just a fancy word for IT DOES OPPOSITE OF WHAT YOU WANT!!! You are more wide awake than before, and instead of relaxing and actually falling asleep you lay and stare at the clock and the countdown begins.....it starts out as only 7 hours until I have to wake up... then its 5... then its 4... you get the point. Then you end up like me.. its 3am, and my shift starts at six. The math is easy.. I don't really have time to sleep, because we all know that the nights you can't sleep it is inevidable that we fall into a deep sleep about an hour just before we have to get up! Do to the nature of my job, I find that it is really in my patients best interest if I do not go to work and attempt to provide "safe patient care." As a nurse we are taught to be a patient advocate.. in this case I am advocating that their sleepy nurse needs to stay home.. take a nap and possibly lay by the pool.. its all in the best interest of my patient you see....