Perimenopause sucker punched me like Chuck Norris. I couldn’t sleep — ever. I tried melatonin and magnesium. I avoided blue light before bed. I turned my room into a paradise of weighted blankets and pink noise and frigid air conditioning, but I still lay awake for two hours every night. Inevitably, I woke up five hours later. 0/10 do not recommend.
Remember Fight Club? Remember how Ed Norton’s insomnia has him hallucinating an entire personality? If someone had told me I was Tyler Durden at the height of my sleeplessness, I might have believed it.
Insomnia exhausted me, and exhaustion spiraled my ADHD symptoms. For the first time since I was diagnosed 10 years ago, pharmacology failed me: Adderall didn’t cut it anymore. Not only did I have the memory of a particularly stupid goldfish, but my impulsivity became nigh on unmanageable. Routine tasks were Sisyphean. I needed help.
Doctors, coaches, and ADHD gurus shout it to the heavens: Get outside! You need sunshine and trees and movement! But I’m an indoor kid. I hate sweating. I loathe breathing hard. My shin splints hurt too much to run. Do not suggest a bike: My children need a mother.
I tried doing sit-ups on the living room floor. The cat sat on me while the dog licked my face.
Reluctantly, I faced the cruel truth: If I wanted to sleep, I had to venture outside and move my body.
Once I’d finished cussing, I bought new shoes and decided: I will walk. I’ll take the dog, avoid eye contact with the neighbors, and head out on the trail system that meanders behind houses, through woods, and over streams. No cars to worry about. Very pretty. The leaves were starting to change, and finally, it wasn’t 90 degrees in the shade.
The dog went ballistic as soon as I pulled on my new sneakers. We ventured into the sunshine (no, it didn’t burn me to ashes), down a trail, and into the woods, which smelled like crushed leaves. The sun slanted low through the trees. I didn’t touch my phone the whole time. And after 2 miles, I came home, freed the dog, and took off my shoes.
That first walk wasn’t transcendental. It didn’t change my life. But I didn’t lie awake for quite so long that night.
So I walked the next day — and the day after that. I didn’t especially love walking, but I enjoyed unplugging. I liked the geese passing overhead. I liked seeing kingfishers and hearing streams.
On the fourth day, I started to feel like this new world was more familiar. A heron stalked the same stretch of creek every day. One particular grove of trees always smelled musky, the almost-skunk scent of foxes. My dog sniffed the same patches of grass. Neighbors were taking down their Halloween decorations. They waved to me, and I waved back.
The walks didn’t make me sleep like a hungover college student. But I stopped flopping and flailing. I no longer kicked off my quilt, then yanked it back on. I didn’t wake up at 5 in the morning. After a week, I wasn’t exhausted anymore. Tired, yes; I have three kids and a house and a job. But I didn’t feel like I might be organizing fight clubs in a dissociative fugue state. My muscles hurt less. Best of all, my brain no longer felt like reheated spaghetti.
Walking outside wasn’t a miracle. I didn’t immediately shed pounds (though the dog did), and my ADHD didn’t vanish or even return to pre-peri normal. But it got better. I actually remembered to use that planner I bought, and motivation became a little bit easier to scrounge.
Life didn’t fall into place right away, but I’m old enough now to realize it usually doesn’t. So I keep walking.
