When my daughter and I relocated back to my home state, I had gone to make enquiry at one of the best schools in town. Although the school is quite a distance from my home, I had resolved to be using the school bus.
Imagine my shock when I was asked by the head teacher if my baby is going to be a boarder. I was confused and had to inform her again that she's just four years old, so which one is boarding school for a baby??
She smiled and responded "even children younger than her get enrolled with us as boarders." The way I shouted and exclaimed "ha!" because why? why should a baby be isolated from parental care as such tender age?
Like the head teacher knew what was going through my mind, she smiled and said to me, "some parents get really busy schedules and other times, the children might be from broken homes and the parents might have moved on with their lives."
That did not really sit well with me because for me, I'd rather drop my child off with a relative than to ship her off to a boarding school at such tender age.
I do understand that there comes a time in our life when we have to make the ultimate sacrifice in other to move on to the next level. For me that sacrifice is my sleep and I am currently suffering the consequences.
Initially I use to get at least 8hours of sleep in every 24hours. But as I take up more income stream to meet up with the high standard of living, I find myself stealing from my sleep time. It's s so bad that I currently have just 4 hours of sleep left. So recently, my sister asked me if I could take up a writing gig as a ghost writer and I told her yes.
She was like are you sure you can do it? what time do you have? because I currently work two jobs and then there is hive making it the third. She sees that I am struggling and she needed to be sure I could handle a fourth so I told her not to worry I got it all under control and then she asked again, "How?".
I kept quiet, in my mind, I went, "this girl is not letting me fly that easily." So I told her I will cut into my sleep time and take 2hours off.
She went "hmmmmm...." and then asked, "how many hours of sleep do you have now?" I didn't want to say but I had no choice, so I told her 4hours. She exclaimed then went "Ha! Don't worry, you can't do the job."
As much as I wanted to revolt and then patronize her to give me the gig, I knew she was right because already, I am starting to see things that are not there.
My brain is starting to skip and that is It warning me that I am pushing myself too far. So imagine now if I take off another 2 hours of sleep and now left with just 2hours to sleep in all of 24hours. I might just land myself in a psychiatric home if I temper with my sleep time too much.
I knew I had to call myself to order when my daughter missed her midterm test because I had thought I read midterm break in the school memo. Or was it on two occasions now I wanted to purchase some items and pay with cash transfer? first transaction was two thousand, eight hundred Naira only but I had sent twenty eight thousand Naira I was lucky to get a reversal immediately from the vendor as it was a local market.
The one that happened recently was with a fast food, instead of three thousand five hundred Naira only, I had transferred thirty five thousand Naira and was also lucky to get a reversal after three days.
Another thing is, I do not even know I have made these errors until the vendors would bring to my notice asking me, "Madam how much did you transfer?"
It was in the case of the thirty five thousand Naira, I knew I had attained some level of financial freedom because before now? I will not be able to sleep with the thought of such money being in another person's account instead of mine. Especially knowing fully well there was no exchange.
Or was it Yesterday I had diluted my face cleanser with some water as it was making my face too light in complexion, I had wanted to shake it to mix properly before using as I had thought I covered it, but the cover was just on the ironing table escaping my minds eye and that was how some content poured out of the bottle and soiled the ironing table.
Other times, I find myself going the opposite direction and then realizing I am in the wrong route after few drive.
I do not need to be told how important sleep is for my mental health but at the same time I need to be able to finance my necessities.
It's a really tough trade off for me and I hope as I keep progressing, my sleep does not have to be the ultimate sacrifice in getting to where I want to be.
Thank you for reading....
PS
All images are mine