{"id":9737,"date":"2010-07-20T03:20:39","date_gmt":"2010-07-20T08:20:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/horizonsmagazine.com\/blog\/?p=9737"},"modified":"2013-05-04T20:07:32","modified_gmt":"2013-05-05T00:07:32","slug":"menopause-why-its-a-blessing-to-be-continually-awakened-and-what-you-can-use-the-extra-thought-time-for","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/horizonsmagazine.com\/blog\/menopause-why-its-a-blessing-to-be-continually-awakened-and-what-you-can-use-the-extra-thought-time-for\/","title":{"rendered":"Menopause: Why it’s a blessing to be continually awakened and what you can use the extra thought time for"},"content":{"rendered":"

A week ago I wrote that My Sleep Habits Are Morphing Again <\/a>and yesterday was no different.\u00a0 I’d gotten the August Horizons Magazine<\/a>\u00a0off the the printer at 6:00am and it was a day I could rest and relax and snooze all day if I wanted to.\u00a0 However, each time I fell asleep the phone rang.\u00a0 Finally about 6:00pm I just went into bed and darkened my room and slept until 3:00am.\u00a0 It was one of those good sleeps, where you wake up for a few moments every few hours and just bask in the feeling of the sheets and the breeze from the fan and know you don’t have to be up for hours and hours.<\/p>\n

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I\u2019ve never been a recreational sleeper.\u00a0 Like a kid, I never wanted to go to bed;\u00a0 I\u2019d usually just go, go go until I crashed.\u00a0 I did enjoy naps, but to me, sleeping was something you had to do, not something you did for fun.\u00a0 When I hit menopause, my sleep cycles began to change – dramatically.\u00a0 I morphed into getting only 3-4 hours of sleep at night.\u00a0 If I napped during the day, I\u2019d nap for 3 hours at a time, which I learned was four REM cycles.\u00a0 Even my 3-4 hours at night would not be uninterrupted.<\/p>\n

Often I\u2019d just catnap through the night and sometimes awaken feeling exhausted from not getting any sleep.\u00a0 That\u2019s – I later learned – because every time I\u2019d wake up, I\u2019d think thoughts like \u201cOh, here I am awake again.\u00a0 I need to go to sleep.\u00a0 I wonder why I can\u2019t sleep.\u00a0 I wonder what\u2019s wrong with me.\u00a0 Maybe I should go to the doctor.\u00a0 I have a test tomorrow.\u00a0 I have to be alert at work tomorrow.\u00a0 What if I ending up not sleeping enough and become one of those people who say they don\u2019t sleep for years?\u00a0 I don\u2019t want to take medication but what are my options?\u00a0 I wish I could sleep.<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 Since those were the thoughts I began thinking the moment I woke up at night, and those were the thoughts I lulled myself back to sleep with, that was the message I was sending the cells of my body, pre-programming them for the future.<\/p>\n

But early on I got some guidance that if I am being woken up, then God\/the Universe is calling me and I should hit the floor and see what He\/She\/It wants.\u00a0 It was during these extra times of meditation that I realized what great opportunities I was being given, several times a night, to spend a few minutes working on whatever projects I had at the time.<\/p>\n

I stopped trying to race the clock to be able to have enough hours of down time lying in bed before I had to begin the next day.\u00a0 I realized all I had to do was change how I perceived my waking\/sleeping times, and change how I perceived when the \u201cnext day\u201d officially began, and what my new \u201cfirst thing in the morning\u201d routine would be.<\/p>\n

So I realized that with the correct mindset, with a change in perception to the correct mindset, I could adapt to what my body was doing and still interface without effort in my daily life, my day job and daily family duties.\u00a0 That was eye-opening to me.<\/p>\n

So, when you find yourself waking up in the middle of the night, answer the call.\u00a0 Sit up a meditate for a few minutes.\u00a0 Have a notebook handy to write ideas as they come.\u00a0 Also when you sit to meditate, your mundane \u201cto do\u201d list will come up to tempt your attention away – if you can\u2019t ignore it and release the thought, write it down and get back to meditating.\u00a0 Keep another notebook handy for writing dreams into.<\/p>\n

I hear lots of stories of menopausal women who do not adapt well to their changing sleep cycles and my consensus is: all of them are on a quest to find deeper meaning in their lives, all would like to explore other ways of living and being, yet feel saddled with responsibilities that prevent them from setting out on their own.\u00a0 Empty nest – they wish!<\/p>\n

So, if you know one of them, a slight shift in perception might be all they need in order to begin adapting more easily to what Nature is doing with their body right now.<\/p>\n

Andrea<\/p>\n

I may not need to change my life, I may just need to change my perception of it<\/a>
\nThe morphing sleep cycles of menopause; 15 things to do when you can\u2019t sleep<\/a><\/p>\n

Not able to sleep? Turn Off The TV, Turn Off The Lights<\/a>
\nMy morphing sleep cycles of menopause<\/a><\/p>\n

LISTEN FREE: \u00a0Samples of our MP3s: You Are Not The Body;
\nConnecting with Your Angels, Guides & Teachers; Healthy Eating\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

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