Past Bed Time

I took this photo from my window Christmastime last year. The top of the TransAmerica pyramid tower is lit green again, but I don't know what the moon is up to now. The red brick church in the lower right is Old Saint Mary's - the only building in the picture to have survived the 1906 earthquake. It helps me keep track of time to hear its chimes - when I notice hearing them in the daytime hidden in the cocophany of bus-spouting, cab horns, hollow hotel whistles for them, cablecar polished-brass-bell-clanging, and China-town kids' sidewalk crackers. All noises I like if my alternative were someone's TV too loud - which I somehow never hear packed in so tigtly to so many other people.I took my one Truvada, my one Norvir, my two Reyataz, my two Gabapentin,and my one Ambien. And I am wide awake, and not in a functional way. There are things I need to do. I have to do something tomorrow I want to do but am afraid of, and I want to be ready. So I want to sleep, so that I can get up early functional. I just took a Valium (optional). I was supposed to take everything (every nighttime thing) at 8PM, and be asleep by 9. My phone is set to beep at me different unobtrusive ways to tell me exactly when to take what. It really matters. My overdose was from not being organized about when I was taking what - not alcohol with it all. The only way the wine contributed would have been in the disorganization and mistiming, and forgetting what I'd already taken and retaking it. It's just that drinking complicated what was already too complicated. I haven't been around people drinking yet, but so far I have had no feeling of missing it. That feeling of being conscious during that degree of almost speechless sedation was unspeakably terrifying. I was scared to take the Geodon ever again, but taking it right, at "bed time" - so far - has been OK. A little scary if I wake up in the night while it's peaking. And it does help. I'd rather it not need to, but it does.

My psychiatrist was really relieved about the not drinking - to a degree that surprised me. He had expressed concern, because alcohol affects immune function detrimentally more than any street drug - or prescription drug that I'm taking. The Valium is new, and affects the same brain receptor alcohol does, without the damage. I don't take as much as I'm allowed.

It will be interesting to see what my immune counts have become. The last ones were in June (see sidebar), and I didn't start drinking regularly (this time around) till the first New Orleans trip in July. So we'll see what's happened since then January 7 when I finally see my doctor.

Sleep. Sleep. Please. I want tomorrow to be a good and worthwhile and easy smooth day.