taking sleep for granted

The speaker used to take sleep for granted but recently lost the ability to sleep comfortably due to constant coughing. They have been experiencing this for days and it has affected their ability to read or watch anything in bed. They also lost their sense of smell. They have tried different solutions but nothing has worked. They are currently taking antibiotics and hoping for improvement. They are finding it difficult to stay hydrated and have lost their appetite. Despite the challenges, they are accepting the situation and hoping for a good night's sleep. They are also curious about the loss of their sense of smell. I used to just take it for granted that when I was tired and my bed is laid out in front of me, I could just get into it, or get onto it, settle down, get comfortable, read for a while, turn the light out, go to sleep, wake up, put the light on, read for a while, do the same thing again. And I just accepted that, that's how I could, that's how I slept, just took it for granted. And I realised that while it's, if you have a bed somewhere to sleep, and we all need to sleep, it's easy to take it for granted, and really it's a right for us to sleep, and not everyone can sleep comfortably, some people don't even have anything but the street. But I've realised recently how much I take it for granted when I lost the ability to sleep comfortably. Nothing changed, and the bed is still there, everything is just as it was, but I experience, I've been experiencing something that has meant that the moment I lay down, I start coughing, literally, the moment I lay down. In fact actually what's been happening as there's been attempts to alleviate this, and now I'm halfway through a course of antibiotics, and there has been some improvement, especially during the day, what seems to happen is that as I approach the time when I'm going to go to bed, it's as if my body knows this is going to happen, and starts preparing itself for the coughing. I start to cough more. Now I'm not doing anything other than very mindfully, very slowly, preparing for bed, I haven't been, I may not have been coughing at all for hours, I mean there'll be one or two here and there, but most of the time I am just okay. But it's as if it senses, that soon it will have freedom to just cough as it wants, because I will be unable to do anything about it except sit up to alleviate it, then sit up really properly if I really have to cough, and if I'm lucky, if I'm able to get up mucus, and it will happen from time to time, I can lay down again, I'll start coughing and up I'll go again, and I'll repeat this cycle round and round and round until I have a moment where I get that mucus out well, and then I'll be able to lay down, and I won't cough. Now I'm exhausted, because I haven't slept for days because of this, not properly, and so if I'm lucky I might fall asleep in that period of quiet, not for long, because I'll be woken up abruptly by coughing or the need to cough, which will be quite a difficult cycle to go through, before I go back to the original cycle again and it keeps repeating itself, or I will just appreciate the peace of lying there without having to cough, and then at some point that tickle will begin to take over again and I won't be able to control it and the cycle will begin again. This has been happening for days and days and days now. Again, tonight, just as I'm getting ready so I can feel the tickle and the coughing starts, I go through the same routine. I can't read, I don't try, I don't watch anything in bed, I would love to just sleep because I realise how much I'd taken it for granted and really miss it now that I haven't the ability to just do that again, at least for now. Yeah, the strange accompanying effect of this experience which was unforeseen is the complete and total loss of the sense of smell. I simply smell nothing. That the world has one neutral smell, I suppose you could put it. The smell of air, like water has no taste, air has no smell, but there's freshness. I had to use my anti-mould spray the other day, it's a chlorine bleach based product, very pungent. I couldn't smell a thing. I'm okay with it being, with this issue, it's intriguing, it's got nothing to do with the nose, my nose is clear. It has to be a neurological thing. But I don't, I'm not really bothered so much because I just need to sleep. I need to go back to my lovely rhythm of being able to sleep when I'm tired and waking up and reading when I'm not, just enjoying the space and the freedom. That I would prefer to have back. I don't care so much about the smell. It hasn't affected taste completely, I can still taste things, but I dare say there has been some effect on taste. But so that's just one sort of additional effect of what I'm experiencing right now. Just as I'm about to go to sleep or lay down, I think I should talk about it. When I talk about it, when I speak, even if I've been coughing, it stops. Whatever the process is going on about what it needs to do, I mean I have to accept it. Coughing can be so intense, almost to the point of retching as it tries to, as it gets up, the sweating. It's quite physical. My stomach muscles ache, my ribcage, diaphragm, my head throbs. It's a hard work coughing all night. But I have to allow it because there is mucus in there that would come out and when it does, feel so much better. And yet somehow there's more to it. I can't quite explain it. But there's no point in resisting it. I tried before I came to understand the futility of such activities. I tried to find a better solution. Can I sleep sitting up? Can I sleep on the chair? Can I put the bed back to the back seat and just sit in the... I tried to find ways where I might not be comfortable but if I can find a way not to have to cough, maybe I can doze and get a little bit of sleep here and there with better than what I was having. I can't lay out except on the bed but I can't sleep on the bed so I tried to find all these solutions. I was getting nowhere. And I realised, look, I have to be warm. I can only be warm in the bed. I have to be comfortable. I have to be able to lay out. And if I can't lay down, I just go up and down. Eventually I get so exhausted that in those moments of non-coughing, my body falls asleep and I sometimes instantly dream because I'm so lacking in REM sleep, I just shift straight into it. I don't know how long it lasts. It might not last long at all. But it's a strange difference to how one normally sleeps. How I normally sleep. And my sleep isn't that normal. So I miss it. But I feel better today than I had done since, well, last Saturday really, so almost a week. I've been lucky. I've been supported by my friends and can shower and sit in the warm room and just recover, even doze. And I've been even able to do some of that in the library even though I can't really cough there. It's a bit challenging to control it and to let it out. But it's warm and I can sort of doze a little. But yeah, it's been really difficult to deal with not sleeping. Hmm. So hopefully the antibiotics are dealing with the underlying infection in the lungs and eventually the urge to cough when I lie down will leave. But it's not left yet. And I can't be afraid. Oh God, I've got to go to sleep or I'm going to be coughing. But I also have to be realistic and accept what it is. I'm not trying to escape. I'm not taking any drink or drugs. There's really nothing I can take. I take a little honey which helps to soothe the throat that might get a bit sore from all the coughing and it does help. But other than that, apart from attempting to keep hydrated, which isn't as straightforward as it seems, I get very dehydrated doing this. A lot of mucus production takes water to provide it. But for some strange reason, the water, renewing water, tastes foul. Ingesting water now is unpalatable, like there's something interfering with it. So I can't replenish it easily. I do, I have to, but odd reaction. It's only today really that I've had a proper meal. I haven't really had an appetite. I haven't really eaten much. All these things in a sense are counterproductive to keeping my strength up to deal with this, as if the thing itself is quite controlling. It's powerful. It's not a simple thing. I've never experienced anything like this before. Sure, we've all had coughs and colds from time to time, but I've never experienced anything like this. And it sort of has brought me to a state of surrender, of acceptance, of, well, this is how it is. You know, I've done my best, I've got help, I've had help, there are people around me who care. Now I've just got to deal with it. I've just got to get on with it. And we'll see what tonight brings. I don't feel tired, exhausted. I'm not sitting here, can't keep my eyes open. That's how I felt yesterday. It was all catching up with me, but I did manage to get some sleep. At least at the beginning of the attempt to sleep. After four or five hours, when I woke up for a pee, I couldn't get back to sleep. Every time I laid down, the coughing started, and that pattern I have already mentioned carried on again, as if there had been no improvement at all. But again, another antibiotic pill has happened. So it should be really fighting it now, and it should be winning. And I'm hoping for improvements, signs of improvement. It may take a while for me to actually be able to lie down without being concerned that at any moment I'll have to sit up and cough it out. I can't cough lying down, it doesn't work. And something about lying down causes a change in the airways. It doesn't even matter how I lie, or which side I lie on, or whether I'm on my back. I've got two pillows propping me up. I suppose I could put a third there. I thought about it, but didn't do it. I'm not going outside to the booth now. But I really don't think it matters. I want to be able to just lie down, and I can't yet. So I have to accept the up-down, up-down, up-down part of this experience, and hope that throughout the course of the night, some sleep is found. I get tired enough that I'm able to sleep, sort of what happened yesterday, at least at first. Now I'm not that tired, I'm not like that, so I don't know what will happen. I would love to read. It's been a week since I've read a word, and my routine has all changed. But we'll find out shortly. So I just thought I'd make a recording about something that isn't so cerebral, in many ways. But it is an interesting experience, and what's with the smelling? The sense of smell completely disappearing. What's that got to do with things? Fascinating in many ways. And I wonder when I'll notice it has returned in some way, what will be the first thing I smell? Should it? Assuming it does come back. I'm not unique in having the experience of the loss of smell temporarily. I believe I've had something like it before. Not complete loss of smell, but I noticed a vast deterioration temporarily. But this is the first time I've experienced complete loss of smell. And it's a strange thing to experience, because to me, if there's no smell, it means there's nothing to smell. Now, that's the information my brain gets from it. There's nothing I can do to compensate for it. I don't smell something, then there's nothing there to smell. But of course, we know there is. Chlorine bleach is something that's obvious, but I can't smell it. It could be all around me, making it impossible for somebody to be here, but I wouldn't know. That's quite strange, isn't it?