The Second Bed

Zzzzzzzzzzzzz.

It's been awfully hot in various parts of Remap Country these days, and honestly, there's really nothing worse than trying to sleep through a layer of sweat. (Patrick is the only one who can just crank up the ol' AC.)

But even in "ideal" conditions, sleep does not always come easy. Maybe your brain can't turn off. Or, as Rob has dealt with throughout the week, your leg is throbbing with pain. Not exactly what one would call ideal.

Hopefully you're reading this after a good night's rest. But if not? Well, Rob and Patrick have plenty of stories about the nature of sleep.

Patrick: I am, generally, a sound sleeper. Once I’m out, I’m out. I can’t nap for shit, a grace only granted by my body when all other options have been exhausted. (This happened most recently while flying from Chicago to Los Angeles for Summer Game Fest following an intense family wedding, in which I downed an entire cup of McDonalds coffee, only to pass out for two hours.)

But when I can’t sleep, I get fidgety. I twist, turn. I think about looking at my phone. I wonder if having a new, cooler pillow would help. Maybe if I drank a glass of water? Oh, it must be because I’ve started going to the bathroom more often in my early 40s, so I should go pee.

Inevitably, this practice disturbs, then awakens, my wife. She does not sleep well. Getting to sleep isn’t the problem—it’s staying asleep. Her brain doesn’t enter a zombie state when she wakes up at 2am. Instead, it’s time to get up for the day and start thinking about all the problems, issues, and tensions coming. Did you remember to make the kids lunch for school?

Our evening routine these days usually goes like this:

• Feed the children, then feed ourselves
• Watch something on TV with the kids
• Give the children a little bit of independent tablet time
• Start the (increasingly long) bedtime routine for both children
• Hang out on the couch with one another, preferably with a short TV episode
• My wife heads to bed, while I play video games for an hour or two
• I head to bed, slowly closing the bathroom door to hide my toothbrush buzzing

When the Switch came out, my wife wondered if this portable wonder could solve the problem of us not sleeping together during weekdays. She asked if I could try playing in bed as she dozed off. Within minutes, she turned over and asked “Do you have to press the buttons that hard?” Needless to say, the experiment did not last more than a night. I, uh, now play on the couch.

A few years back, we added bunk beds to my oldest daughter’s room. She was excited to share a room with her sister, but in reality, that second bed became the place I went to when I was having a restless night, feeling sick, etc. Like I said, I sleep pretty well and am thankful for that, but on nights where it wasn’t going my way, the last thing I wanted to do was ruin the upcoming day for the other person, too. And generally speaking, a bed “reset” would often do the trick for me, because I could remove the anxiety of disrupting my partner and focus on relaxing myself.

Just this past year, though, we swapped the bunk beds for a loft bed, aka the one where the bed sits high and there’s a desk underneath. It’s super popular with kids these days, especially since that’s a spot to store all their various electronics and whatever. Cool! Loft bed seems neat. But it also saw the death of my 2nd bed, which means my only outlet for crashing on a rough night is the couch. And look, we spend decent money on both couches, but they are not bed quality!

My youngest has asked to inherit the bunk beds, but putting them back together is such a pain in the ass. I told her we could talk about it when she turns six next year. And as much as I’m not excited for all the (re)building, I gotta say I’d be really happy to have that other bed back again.

I know that you’re working through a leg injury at the moment. Some of my worst nights have been while working through the cycling pain and anxiety of recovery. How’s your bed situation? 

Rob: My left leg is cursed. I talked about my ACL surgery in high school. A few years ago I had to have tendon surgery because I was headed toward a rupture due to some bone spurs in my heel, so that laid me up for about four or five weeks. Fortunately Destiny: The Taken King had just come out so I mostly spent that month in a fugue playing Destiny on my couch. Now I have an almighty bruise from tripping on an ottoman (and landing on the edge of said ottoman with my shin). The musculature in the two legs is completely different, which makes finding pants a fun issue even setting aside my weight and height. Anyway, right now it’s about three times larger than my other leg with swelling, and if I don’t keep it elevated, it starts throbbing in a way that starts as mildly irritating and swiftly becomes borderline excruciating. Especially at night.