If you’ve shared our journey for a while, you’ll know that I suffer from insomnia. Despite trying every method available to rid it for good, there are times it plagues me. It is by far the worst when I’m trying desperately to make the frayed ends meet but they won’t. I am far from alone laying awake in the middle of the night worrying about financial issues. I know that money doesn’t buy happiness, but it sure can make life easier.

So, what keeps me up at night?

It is not so much the obvious things, but the other thoughts that haunt me and run around and around in my brain like a puppy chasing it’s tail that make me wonder.

Last night I slept for a little over two hours. All night. I don’t usually have any trouble going to sleep – I’m one of those insomniacs who has no problem drifting off to sleep but a lot of problem going back to sleep if I wake between 1 and 3am.

But last night, the bus to sleepytown evaded me. I lay waiting for it. And waiting and waiting. I must have drifted off a little before midnight, because the last time I looked at my clock it was after 11. I usually try to go to bed by 10pm. I know, I’m a nanna, but I’m also a single mumma who works full-time. And I’m exhausted.

A touch after 1am I woke cold to the bone after a particularly horrific dream, the details of which I’ll spare you. Suffice to say I checked Bubba, Bella and Beary a couple of times. Giving the three of them cuddles before I went back to bed.

I’m sure dreams are bought on by whatever we’re thinking about in the evening before we sleep. Even things in our subconscious. Beary gave me a fright when I got home from work yesterday afternoon because he wasn’t at the baby gate in the hallway woo wooing like he usually is. I called him twice and he didn’t come. Our house is small, so it’s not like he was taking his time getting to me from the east wing. He could bound from our back fence to the baby gate in about 10 leaping strides. My heart started to beat faster the longer he wasn’t there. My mind raced to that morning when he’d spent some time coughing. I had passed it off as a fur ball. In those 2 seconds between him not being there and finally seeing his big gorgeous body bounding towards me, I had convinced myself I shouldn’t have ignored his cough, that he must have had kennel cough and was laying in the corner sick. Some may say dramatic, others will know exactly how I felt. They are my family and I know all too well that family can be taken from you in an instant. And that’s what one of my dreams was about.

After I’d checked my three loves, I lay awake thinking about losing those you love and my mind drifted to a news article I’d read about Mindy McCready. Not being American or into country music, I’d never heard of her until news of her death filtered through my Twitter feed. Such a tragic and sad story: her boyfriend killing himself; having her small children taken from her; then taking her own life. And that of her dog. And I understood why she did it. Not taking her life, because I can’t imagine ever being that despairing. But I thought about the state she would have been in – an emotional state, not a rational state – when she was about to take her own life. In that emotional state, I can imagine wanting to take your dog with you. To not leave it behind to wonder why you left, but to pass over the Rainbow Bridge {or whatever your belief is} to the next life together. I’m not at all justifying it or saying it was right, rather saying that I can imagine how you would come to that decision in an emotional state.

Then my mind turned to a PSA I’d seen on television about cancer. That one in every two Australians will be diagnosed with cancer before they are 85. And that something like one or two in four women diagnosed with breast cancer have no family history of it. Bloody hell. One of my most important selection criteria for a baby daddy donor for Bubba was that they had no cancer or heart disease in their family. And then I saw the PSA. And I thought about my friend on the other side of the world fighting the disease with everything he has. I thought about his wife and again hated that I can’t afford to just jump on a plane and go see them.

I worried about money. Or rather lack of it. We need to move to somewhere that costs less to live. But I can’t afford to actually move. And trying to find pet-friendly accommodation isn’t easy. Pet discrimination is rife! Moving means changing daycare for Bubba. Which I am loath to do. Not only because her daycare family is awesome, but also because any other centre I’ve looked into charges twice the daily amount that I currently pay. Who has $131 per day to send their child to daycare? I need to go to the dentist. The dogs need heartworm and flea treatments. Bubba needs gumboots. I need some new clothes for work. I haven’t bought anything new since before I was pregnant with Bubba. And I’ve never been the kind of girl to have loads of clothes so my wardrobe is looking a little dire. How can I stretch our budget any further? I haven’t had a beauty treatment for a number of years. I don’t use expensive body creams. I’ve used Nivea from top to toe since I was 16. Maybe I could be in one of their ads: she’s used Nivea for [too many] years, and look how good she looks? Okay, so maybe after I can afford beauty treatments and get some sleep again! I’ve sold on eBay everything that we’ve outgrown or don’t use to make a little extra cash. Living in Sydney is just expensive. Very expensive.

Our pantry and fridge are bare although {let’s face it, if you’re still reading you’ll agree this post needs a little cheering up right about now} oddly enough, there seem to be perfect ingredients to make both key lime pie slice and Nutella coconut banana loaf!

Other random thoughts between 1 and 6am: I couldn’t remember what house was the last of the many I lived in when I had my old blue and white couch; and how unfair it seemed that just because you don’t sleep well your metabolism doesn’t work at it’s best! I think it was about then that Beary put two paws on the bed, tapped his snout to my nose and tipped his head as if to say to me mumma, we need to talk! I tried absolutely every technique I know but nothing worked. Sometime around 6am the sleeping tablet I finally gave in and took at 4am kicked in.

Don’t call the men with the special white jackets that do up at the back just yet. I’m not quite ready for a padded cell. I just need some sleep. I did have a dream sometime between 6 and 45 minutes later when my alarm went off that I won $85,000. My first thought? How many lives of 4-legged friends I could save with some of that money.

So today, utterly exhausted and looking approximately 184 years old, I set out to take Bubba to day care then come home and prepare myself for my very important afternoon ahead: I’m meeting with my new boss for a few hours about my new job.

I might need a second coffee.