Snoring

I snore. Over the past few years, my attempts to combat this flaw included quitting smoking, quitting drinking, and losing 40 pounds. OK, so I didn’t do these things specifically to stop snoring, but I figure they should help. I feel for the many spouses, partners and sleeping buddies out there who must deal with this affliction on a nightly basis.

My wife has her own bedtime issues that annoy me to pieces. Specifically, she likes to fall asleep with the television on, and I am a silence person. In an effort for peace, I wear a night eye mask and earplugs, which usually does the trick. The earplugs hurt my ears after a while, and my son usually comes into my room in the morning and puts them in my water glass, but it is a compromise.

I am out of the house three to four nights a week, so I get to bed around 3am. On the other nights, I do my best to get to bed early to catch up on sleep. Two nights ago was one of these nights. I went to bed at 10pm. For some reason, I couldn’t sleep well. Every time I drifted off just a little bit, I was startled awake. I couldn’t figure out for the life of me what was going on. I was exhausted, but without fail, I nodded off, and then popped back awake time and again.

I ripped off my eye mask and pulled out my earplugs. The clock read “Midnight.”

Tommy: “Can we please turn the TV off?!?”

Nicole: “No”

Tommy: “But I can’t sleep and it’s Midnight!”

Nicole: “I can’t sleep either”

Tommy: “Maybe it’s because the TV is on”

Nicole: “No, it is because you are snoring, and I have to kick you every ten minutes to shut you up”

This is the exact moment that Nicole almost got thrown out the window for the first time in her life.

Since I wake up with the baby 95% of the mornings, regardless of the day of the week, or work schedule, we have agreed that on nights when I snore, Nicole will wake me up only once, and I will sleep in the living room until Nicole falls asleep, and then I will return to bed. This way, I get to sleep a full night at least 3 nights a week, and Nicole never has to experience crashing through a glass window.