What was I supposed to do in the meantime? Up until this point, I had written about this project in past tense… but here I was at a point in my life where the project caught up to the here and now. I had to let it idle a bit, but I needed to write. I just didn’t know what to write. I sat back and thought about where things were going. I looked at my Jupiter tattoo and remembered that sometimes I just had to be patient in life and let things play out. My meeting with the scriptwriter for this possible film adaptation wouldn’t be for another month. So, I just let life happen for a few weeks. Oddly enough, opportunities just kept arising and I went with all of them. I started working with a new global client, and it was the best opportunity I could have asked for. I was given the freedom to work in a project-based environment on my own time each week. I couldn’t have been more grateful for a high-paying gig that had all the flexibility I ever needed. It was almost too good to be true, and I felt I was unable to fully engulf myself in appreciation even though I desperately wanted to.
I realized there was another piece of my emotional hang-up rearing itself in my work life. For whatever reason, every client I ever had was either unstable or unpredictable. I would pull in these picturesque jobs and somehow, they’d always dismantle themselves shortly afterward. Once it was a company that promised to double my salary if I’d learn 6 computer languages in 6 weeks with the purpose of hurling myself into time-sensitive projects faster. I mastered the concepts, and the company folded about 4 months later. I remember during this fantastically overwhelming job feeling what I could only describe as my skull tingling – like when your foot falls asleep. To this day I don’t know if I was experiencing nerve compression due to working long hours or if my brain was quite literally on the verge of a stroke or aneurysm from all the knowledge I was cramming into any connection that might grasp the ideas. One thing was certain, though. I was further ahead for having empowered myself with new pieces of technology… and I was also very sure that this wasn’t a career I would have enjoyed long term.
The next client that found their way to me was a company that paid very well but would simply disappear for months at a time. I’d have a great 6 month run and then I’d hear nothing for 2 or 3 months. This company offered the flexibility I needed, the challenges that entertained me, and enough creative work to keep me inspired. Unfortunately, the disadvantages consisted of a highly volatile workplace environment, workers with mouths that would intimidate sailors, and undertones of sexual comments teetering on a dilapidated invisible fence that separated good fun from harassment. The pros outweighed the cons, though, and there was just enough mutual understanding and respect to keep the communication open and functional. I chose to keep this client as a side gig simply because the work was too easy to turn away. Besides, it always seemed to make an appearance at times when I could use some extra padding in my bank account.
My next client laid me off after 3 months of work because I “did my job too well.” That was a first for me. Apparently, they expected results within a year’s time and were understaffed and unequipped when I hit their goal in 3 months. No matter what clients passed through my colloquial door, they always seemed to be short lasting and undependable. Now, once again, I had an ideal client with all the makings of a perfect scenario, but I found myself rushing to just enjoy the ride “while it lasted”. I also couldn’t stop myself from still trying to obtain work from other clients even though I didn’t need any more hours. I had 30 hours with this company, 15 hours with another client, 15 hours with a side gig I was doing, and the last thing I needed was more hours. But I found another client offering work, and I agreed to a temporary 40-hour week with them as well. In just a few weeks’ time, I had created a 100 hour work week for myself. I had created quite a mental disaster for myself and wondered how I would continue to work on this writing project (or movie project?) with this many hours already booked each week.
I knew I had to trust clients again and scale back on my hours, but I didn’t know where to start. I always overbooked myself so that when one area fell apart, I wouldn’t have to stress about bills. I knew it was time to trust my main client, but I just kept feeling like it was premature and naïve to do so. Why couldn’t I just enjoy making good money with a flexible schedule and call it finished? Putting my family’s food in the hands of one company just didn’t feel logical, and I couldn’t grasp the idea. So, I decided to be content to always have two main clients and a side gig. Now, I just had to muscle through these temporary extra 40 hours per week I had added to my schedule. Probably uncoincidentally, I began to feel a bit off and decided now was as good a time as any to focus on my health and get myself back in shape again. I went to my doctor to try to uncover any possible clues as to why I felt overweight and run down. Any attempted fixes never seemed to work. I was tested for thyroid issues, hormonal problems, possible autoimmune diseases, and everything else a blood panel can check. Everything came back as good as it could possibly be with no answers in sight as to why I just couldn’t get myself together again. There was absolutely nothing wrong with me – except I led a highly stressful, albeit happy, lifestyle with broken sleep patterns.
My doctor insisted that it was time to try to sleep in one large chunk rather than two small segments. Most of my life has been inundated by unsolicited advice that I needed more time to sleep. Years ago, I was told that my 5 to 6 hours of sleep simply wasn’t enough and was the cause of my health issues. That doctor was correct, and I made sure to always do my best to get as close to 8 hours as possible. What I didn’t realize was that not getting those 8 hours in a row was also making a huge difference. The problem was that fixing it simply wasn’t an option. I had to work at night. My brain didn’t function in the morning at all. There were too many distractions, too many people that needed me, too many emails, too many texts and phone calls, too many errands to run, too many meetings – it was all simply too much. I had tried for years to work a “normal” schedule, but it just didn’t work for me. I went to bed anywhere from 1am to 3am depending on the workload I had that evening, got up around 6am to take my son to basketball practice, then came home and slept from about 8am to 11:30am. This is what seemed to be the best solution. I could work at night when things were calm, I could still get my kids to school, and then grab the rest of my sleep when I got back. Apparently, this wasn’t as ideal as I thought, and my doctor insisted that I had to find a way to get all my sleep at once. I tried to explain that this wasn’t ever going to happen, but then I decided to give it a shot anyway just for grins. Here’s how that went:
At 10pm, I decided I was going to bed. I made the announcement to my family. My other half was still working in the recording studio downstairs, my older son had a 10pm bedtime, and my younger son always stayed up until his midnight bedtime (due to his sleep schedule and being homeschooled for the semester). I proceeded to make my way to bed. Then my older son got out of bed and decided to go to the bathroom. Without me there to redirect him, he got sidetracked by my younger son. Finally, at 10:30pm I used our security cameras to tell him to get in bed. My younger son thought it would be a great night to practice soccer in the basement (directly below my room), so the loud thuds of the soccer ball pounding against the wall made it impossible to sleep. I turned up the volume on my sleep music and did my best to ignore my budding little MLS prospect. I finally fell asleep at about 11:30pm. My other half came to bed at his usual time – around 4:30am. Now, normally, I would wake up for 5 minutes and go right back to sleep. However, this time, I had gone to bed early… meaning I had been asleep for 5 hours by this point. My mind whirled in and out of creative thoughts, the day’s itinerary, reasons why I should be asleep, and anxiety over the forthcoming day that I knew would require a nap that wouldn’t be a possibility. I gave in to the stampede of voices in my head and decided to try to at least get some work done.
I made my way downstairs through the dark with the light of my phone’s flashlight and grabbed my laptop from my office… only to discover how much my younger son had enjoyed his unsupervised late night. Judging by the scene in the shadows, he had eaten two bags of popcorn, drank 5 cans of root beer, and created an obstacle course out of half the things I owned downstairs. I knew my older son wouldn’t be expecting this and he’d trip over things when he woke up, so I began picking up everything as quietly as possible. Suddenly, my sweet little dog who is elderly and has heart problems realized I was awake and got super excited to see me. She ran downstairs to greet me and then followed me right back up the stairs. She barely made it to the top before having a screeching syncope seizure-like spell that had frequently been the result of overexertion lately. I sat on the floor with her to calm her and take care of her, but by this time she had woken up my other half who now felt guilty for waking me up. At this point, I had taken care of everything, but it was now 6am and time to get ready to take my son to basketball practice. To make things even more frustrating, I now had all the work to do that I didn’t stay up to do at night like I usually did. I did indeed go to bed earlier. But the consequences of this supposed advantageous bedtime consisted of everything being out of whack, a tired older kid, a sugared up unsupervised wild younger kid, a fainting dog, a guilt-laden other half, only 5 hours of continuous sleep (instead of 7 or 8 hours of broken sleep), work overdue, and trying to force 8am creative steam out of a pot that doesn’t brew until noon. The entire day was a lost cause, and I accepted defeat. Broken up sleep was just the way it was going to have to be until summertime. During the school year, there simply wasn’t a logical way to have continuous sleep. My life just wasn’t built that way. Once again, I had to accept that I don’t fit social norms and it was pointless to try. As odd as it seems, it was comforting to know that I was doing exactly what I needed to do. I didn’t mind if no one understood. It made sense to me, and I had a new sense of peace about it.