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I come from a long line of sit sleepers. What exactly are “sit sleepers”, you ask? Well, imma tell you. When you’re a sit sleeper, there’s a 98% chance that you will fall asleep within ten minutes of sitting down. The likelihood increases when you’re in a comfy armchair, it’s warm and cozy, and you’ve had any alcohol whatsoever. If you’re laying down, forget it-you’ve missed the entire episode of Orange is the New Black.
I noticed I came from a family of sit sleepers early on with my grandmother. When I was kid, we got to spend the entire summer at the cabin on Coeur d’ Alene Lake in Northern Idaho. The best part of this wasn’t the long summer days filled with swimming, boating, and lounging in the sun. No, the best part was that I got to sleep in my grandma’s bed. It was the best sleep spot in the cabin. The other room was the “boys’ dorm”, filled with bunk beds and farts. It was gross.
Without fail, the moment my grandma got settled in, covers just right, and with her current book, she was snoring. Except, it wasn’t just snoring. It was something entirely different. See, my beautiful grandmother took her teeth out at night. I still remember those weird, waxy looking chompers floating in a glass on her nightstand. Because her teeth weren’t in when she fell asleep, book opened on her face, it sounded like the subtle flapping of a flag in the wind.
It was always really entertaining to bet on how many minutes, seconds it’d be until I’d hear the flapping.
The entire time we had the light on to read, I’d slightly nudge her and she’d sputter awake and continue reading right where she left off. I remember really being concerned that she’d never get through her book. Somehow she did. The marvels of this world are endless.
The best part of this whole nighttime ritual was that sometimes I’d tell her she was sleeping. Every time, she’d swear up and down that she hadn’t been sleeping.
I’d say, “Grandma, your book was on your face!”
She’d say, “That’s how I read best.”
Oh, how I miss the nights I’d nudge my grandmother to say, “Grandma! Your lips are flapping again!”
Of course, my mother was gifted with sit sleeping. One of my fondest memories is of our nighttime reading. No matter how late, how tired, how stressed, my mom read to us from infacy. As we got older, my brother and I read to her. Each stage had a different level of narcolepsy-like sleeping spells.
Some nights, my mom would be in the middle of a sentence and suddenly, the book and her head would fall, and she would be quietly snoring.
“Mom!”
“I’m awake!”
Then, she’d pick up right where she left off.
When we grew into voracious readers ourselves, we started to read to Mom. That was hilarious, because with no book to hold, and nothing to do other than lay and listen, she was usually snoring before we could even get through a page.
If we ever have my mom watch Harry Potter, she’d likely say, “Why is this vaguely familiar to me?”
We’d answer with, “Well, mom, we only read the entire series!”
A fun little aside about my mom and falling asleep in inopportune situations:
Not only has my mom fallen asleep during reading and during every.single.movie. she’s ever watched, she’s also been known to fall asleep while eating. Yup. You read that right. I wasn’t going to mention that it was likely due to some medication she was taking for her back, but either way, she fell asleep while eating a burrito. Except that’s only what she thought she was eating. She said she was eating her lunch and the damn tortilla would just not cut. She said she hacked and hacked away with her plastic fork, but no luck. Eventually, she decided to just gnaw at it with her teeth. At this point, she woke up/came to and realized she was eating her paper plate. I ask her to tell this story at least a couple times a year, because it’s just too good.
I always thought falling asleep the second one sits was an old person thing. Well, at 33 years old, I can tell you it’s not!
Guys, I have become a sit sleeper something fierce!
I’ve seen two movies over break, and during both of them I’ve fallen asleep.
Like, fell asleep and woke myself up snoring.
Yesterday, we went to see Rogue One at the luxury theater. I am fully convinced that those damn reclining seats have led to my demise.
I was all settled in-candy opened and ready to be demolished, napkins draped across my chest like an adult baby, and my contraband drink nestled safely between my ass and the seat.
I felt I had enough food to keep me awake. If I’m eating, I can’t be sleeping. It’s usually a foolproof plan.
Except, it wasn’t.
I finished my theater food too soon.
All of a sudden, I hear the crinkling of wrappers. It sounds like it is coming from inside my head.
It stops.
I go back to drooling all over my napkins as I try to keep at least one eye on the screen.
Suddenly, the sound again.
What the actual eff?
I suddenly realize it’s the girl next to me. She’s been crumpling her candy wrappers like inside my ear.
I’m aghast. I’m shocked.
How could someone be so rude?
Then. I realize.
She was crumpling her wrappers next to my head, because I was snoring.
My head was leaned to her side, my mouth was gaping, and I was snoring in her face.
Who is this person I’ve become?
At this rate, I’ll be ten times as bad as both my grandmother and mother combined.
HELP!!
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Tag: sleep
Ugly Sleep
Don’t get me wrong, I adore waking up to my boyfriend’s adorable sleeping face. Most days. Yes, I love feeling his warmth against me as he peacefully dreams, and all that mushy shit. But, let’s be real here. Those memes that paint the picture that love is sleeping like you’re one big romantic pretzel are bullshit.
This looks fucking awful. I bet his breath smells like hot Limburger cheese.
Let’s be honest, here. I’m going to paint a true portrait of what it’s like to share the same bed with someone.
First, I’m going to break it down to how sleeping with your significant other changes during the different stages of your relationship.
In the beginning, during that fateful “first sleep”, you don’t actually sleep. Instead, you lay perfectly still so as to not wake the other person. You don’t want to portray, so early on, that you sleep like an epileptic Tasmanian Devil. Not yet. Additionally, you fail to sleep because you must concentrate on never opening your mouth. No one likes a mouth breather, especially after you’ve had chicken cesear salad for dinner.
Not only must you keep your mouth odor to yourself, you can’t, for a second, allow your body to relax. You don’t want your bowels to believe it’s “a go” to expel any gas. Farting on your first night together, especially if your fart smells like hot salad, would be the absolute worst thing to happen.
Eventually, you relax enough to actually sleep and you feel euphoric that you shared such an intimate, beautiful thing together. Cuddling sometimes occurs, as does morning kisses. Either you don’t smell each other’s breath, because you both secretly brushed your teeth prior to “waking up”, or you’re too happy to care your breath smells like something died.
Somehow, your communal sleeping habits move from nose-breathing picturesque statue and sickeningly romantic, to something so ugly. So scary.
When my boyfriend and I first started dating, I was so scared to pop the fart cherry. You know, getting past that first fart in front of the same person you don’t let know you pluck hairs from your chin? It was so scary, and so painful. If the gas was too intense, I would pretend I left something in my car, so that I could go outside to let them fly. I recall a time when he, too, used to be embarrassed to fart in my presence and would actually say, “Oh! Excuse me!” Gone are those days.
Like easing up on farting in each other’s presence, so has our sleeping-with-someone-new-rituals. Nose breathing all night long is just not realistic, so full-on-gaping-mouth breathing complete with drool is what’s happening now. You don’t really know someone until you’ve smelled breakfast, lunch, and dinner on their breath.
The idea to write on this topic came the other night when, while rolling over, I almost lost an eye to the corner of my boyfriend’s man-sized pillow. It’s this behemoth down pillow with really poky corners, sharp as tacks. I secretly think that’s how he’s going to do me in. Who will ever be charged with murder by pillow corner?
As I laid there, feeling grateful I still had two eyes, I pondered how the way we sleep is the direct opposite of how every “love meme” says its done. As I listened to his even breathing, mixed in with a fart here, and a fart there, I wondered how we got past that too-embarrassed-to-be-a-real-human stage. I figured it all comes down to the fact that it hurts to hold farts in, and breathing your morning breath into someone’s face, is just another way of saying, “I love you”.
When your relationship has made it past the first, surreal, romantic “get a room” months, sleeping gets real and it gets ugly. If you can honestly say you or your significant other has not farted in bed, laughed, and said, “I was just warming up the bed for you, because I’m romantic as shit”, you’re a fucking liar. If you don’t wake up looking like Amy Winehouse, after a binge, you’re an alien. If you still sleep with your mouth as far away from your lover as possible, give it up. Pretty sleep is no way to live. I don’t love my boyfriend any less because I recoil when his frigid toes touch me in the night. He doesn’t find me less attractive even when dried drool cakes my eye shut. We both understand we don’t have to sleep like horny teenagers to be in love. “Ugly sleep” wins over shitty “pretty sleep” every time.
We all wish we looked like Snow White while sleeping. Just like having Kylie Jenner “asshole lips” is unrealistic, so is looking pretty while snoring.
