When does sleep deprivation officially become self-abuse?

I've written a lot about how sleep deprived I am, about how I put the boy to bed and get back to work and do not shut down until midnight. Or one. Or sometimes later.

I've tried many tactics to get myself in better sleep shape. My laptop dings at me at 9:45 to stop working. My cell phone chimes at me at 11:00 to crawl into bed. And still, night after night, I click ignore and keep on until I crash.

It's time to stop that. I've said a gazillion times before but something changed for me this week. As I stared into the dark of my bedroom, a thought came whispering to me, "Why are you abusing yourself like this?"

The question came through so loudly that I have not been able to stop hearing it. Since then, I have been thinking a lot about what the line is between not taking good care and self-abuse. I've been asking myself why, when I need sleep, want rest, require so much more now that I am going it alone here, that I am still so deprived.

So at 1:37 last night, I scribbled out the things I must move to the top the list. I put on paper what I need in order to be more balanced, so live in the center rather than on the sharp upswings and downswings of energy.

One of those things is eight hours of sleep. I can handle seven, but really, I am an eight-hour kind of person. I always have recognized that but have rarely realized it.

Another of those things is time alone. Not in front of a screen. Not at 2 a.m.

A third is time for projects outside of work. Scheduled time, daylight hours.

A fourth is yoga. I love yoga so much, my body aches for it and my mind begs for it. So why am I not doing it more often?

Finally, I need help. I joke about wanting to have a houseboy on hand (ahem), but really, I could use a housekeeper to come in and dust and mop and scrub and straighten the things I find myself scrambling to clean in the wee hours.

There are only a few things but let's be honest, it's a big list. It's not hard to hire someone to scrub your bathroom floor or to hunt down a vinyasa class. But it feels like a mountain of a commitment to choose myself, and not just stuff I want sparkling in the distance. To choose the needs whispering to me from the summit.

Now help a mama out: How in the hell do you make yourself go to sleep at a decent hour?

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Just one of the reasons I love Sharon Osbourne

Because she is plastic surgeried like crazy, because she will tell you how fabulous it is too pull all that skin back and how horrible it is not to be able to feel your ass after lipo and she will still rip on "lying bitches," the celebrities who are not so truthful about the whole flabby flesh mess.

Oh Sharon, Sharon, Sharon. Thank you for topping off my The Hills-gasmic night on Chelsea Lately by saying:

"Nicole Kidman's forehead looks like a fucking plasma screen TV!"

Oh Nicole, Nicole, Nicole. I'm sorry, darlin', but Shay-ron's got a point. I don't even care what Sharon Osbourne is famous for now or how the hell she became a celebrity in the first place (it was more the flagrant cussing and Ozzy-corralling than the rocker wife-manager thing, right?). Right there, she's officially better than People magazine to me now.

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Where I go when I can't sleep

It's rainy and I'm tired and I was up too late last night indulging my brain on fast-forward in whirring through my to-do lists and projects and what I forgot to order from the magical, fabulous grocery delivery. I meant to go to bed. In fact, I meant to be asleep while my thoughts were reminding me of how productive I suppose I am not when I am not still from the hours of 7 a.m. to 1 a.m.

When I was little and I couldn't sleep, I panicked. My mom would come in and rub my back and sing to me. Then later my dad would come in and talk me through the first few scenes of The Sound of Music or Grease or whatever would lull me into some harmonized slumber. Even as an adult, I would sometimes freak out if I had trouble falling asleep and have to read or blog or watch E! until I could relax enough to go back to bed.

Last night, I wasn't upset or even worried I was awake. I was just awake. Instead of making my way through Rizzo-Sandy dialogue or mentally singing my way through the song where all the kids have on clothes made out of the curtains, I let my racing thoughts speed on ahead without me.

I let my mind go back to someplace serene. Someplace I did not want to leave. Someplace lovely that felt exactly what I'd like my room to feel like, especially on those over-thinking, not sleeping nights.

OK, so it was a hotel. My special place was a hotel. Thank God life has changed a bit and it wasn't some Comfort Inn on a frontage road in Missouri where the carpeting is orange and the nasty ass coverlet is more orange and the little bottles of shampoo are worse than the cheap stuff you dig up from the basket under the bathroom sink at your mom's house. Thank. God.

Oh no, darlings. My mind was on the Oceana. Have you been there? If you have, you know. If not, I leave you with the cell phone photos I couldn't help but take of the room I didn't want to leave. I don't want to go back to the Oceana in moments of sleeplessness in less-feathery, less-serene bed in my cold city, but that's what I will do until someone wants to cozy up there with me sometime. Please, please, for the love of Something About Maria, let that be sometime soon.

Here's to better sleep. And possibly, a drink and a dip and another few dreamy nights. This time, not alone.

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