Wired For Sound
Patrick is wired for sound, or should I say, snoring?! The wheels of medicine move slowly in Northeastern Vermont, but then again, maybe no slower than the wheels moved when we lived in Baltimore… Patrick has issues with sleep… too much, too little, too shallow of breathes, snoring, did he just stop breathing? Why is he coughing so much, etc. And what better way to get a handle on all these questions than a sleep study.
Getting the referral was the easy part! The family doctor wrote that and I remember her saying, “Oh good, you can get that done this mud season when your business is slower”. But indeed it took until stick season to actually see the sleep study to fruition. (For those of you who don’t live in Vermont, “mud season” is late spring, when the snow is pretty much gone and it’s raining, and as implied, it is MUDDY! “Stick season” is the time in between fall foliage and when the snow flies when all you see when you look at the trees are sticks (what the rest of you would call bare branches).
First, there was the appointment to see if Patrick really needed a sleep study (because of course, what would the primary doctor or I know?!) And that took weeks to schedule and happen. And guess what? Patrick did indeed need a sleep study! And then because I had to accompany him (and theoretically sleep (??) in the room next to him overnight in the hospital), it needed to be scheduled when there were indeed both rooms/beds available. And the first available opening was smack dab in the middle of our busiest season, fall foliage, So, I pushed it off to stick season, when it did indeed happen.
And as luck would have it, Patrick actually slept that night. He was a pretty good sport about getting those electrodes attached and all the consequential spaghetti wires floating all around him. He only got mad several times when the technician was trying to put 2 belts around his chest and waist and was waking him up. I don’t blame Patrick. Mama bear is not very happy when she gets woken up either!
So, the night progressed… Patrick sleeping, me mostly reading my Kindle and napping intermittently. I did get a kick out of experimenting with their sleep number bed, a new experience for me. But I have to assume that the sleep study went fairly smoothly because we have YET to hear back on the results. But the main thing is Patrick keeps sleeping (or not) every night, and our life keeps on keeping on, sleep study results or not!
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