Sleep Patterns: Vacation vs. Home

I woke up everyday on vacation around 6:30 – 7am. The first week I blamed it on the time change. Back home it’d be 8:30-9am so it seemed logical. But by week 2 and 3 I thought my body would have caught on. Others blamed it on the altitude or the light streaming in the windows of where I was staying. I’m not sure what it was, but I consistently woke up earlier than I wanted to!

Now that I’m home and sleeping in until 8:30, 9 and sometimes 10:30 and theoretically in bed more hours than I was on vacation, I’ve got a new theory.

On vacation I played hard and slept well, even in a strange bed every couple of nights. I slept really well, woke up very rested, and remembered my vivid dreams (the one about being attacked by a moose and a camel came to save me and the other where Don Maass told me to dump by historical and write my time travel book, though I attributed that to listening to The Time Traveler’s Wife in the car.)

Being home, I’ve noticed I’m having trouble going to sleep, and I’m waking frequently through the night. Why?

Now for the theory. On  vacation I didn’t worry about anything. I enjoyed each moment without a care for the next day. At home there’s so much to do I lie awake worrying whether I accomplished enough during the day and thought about what I needed to do the next.

Needless to say, I’m not sleeping like I did on vacation and I’m sleeping in. So how to remedy my sleep issues?

I’m not sure. All I can think of is “cast your cares on Him.” Easy in theory, hard when your home looks like a tornado swept through it after the hurricane had its way. SIGH!

Maybe I just need to fall into a new bed time routine and lay off the caffeine during the day!

Thoughts?