It’s 22:47, and I’m already in bed. This is the problem with being someone who actually tries to maintain a reasonable sleep schedule, you give your brain way too much space to wander off into dangerous territory.
I went to bed at 21:30. Ninety minutes ago. Like a responsible adult who read all those great books about sleep hygiene and circadian rhythms. Past me was so optimistic, so naive. “I’ll just go to bed early and wake up refreshed,” I thought. What a joke.
There’s this situation. You know the kind. The kind where you’ve both had that conversation. The one where you nod and agree that this is just fun, just easy. Nothing heavy. Nothing real. Where you both say the words that are supposed to keep things simple. Except someone forgot to tell my heart about that conversation, because here I am, horizontal and supposedly relaxing, while my mind replays every moment like it’s searching for hidden meaning in a favorite song.
The thing is, some moments are too perfect. They sneak past those carefully constructed boundaries like they don’t even see them. A quiet moment on a bench after a long day. A conversation that flows like you’ve known each other for years, not months. Those little instances that make you think, “Wait, what are we doing here?”
By 23:15, I’ve already lived through three different futures. In one, I stick to what we said: casual, uncomplicated, clean. My heart stays in its cage. In another, I say something that changes everything, and the words hang in the air like a question mark. In the third, I just keep lying here, slowly dissolving into my mattress, choosing nothing and everything at once.
The cruel joke is that I know if I could just shut down for eight hours, I’d wake up with actual clarity (or at least a semblance of it). The kind where emotions don’t feel like they’re trying to escape through your ribcage. But no. My brain has decided that the best time to feel everything is between 22:00 and 03:00, when the world is quiet and there’s nowhere to hide.
Here’s what they don’t tell you about going to bed early: it just gives you more time to marinate in your own thoughts. At least if I went to bed at midnight, I’d only have a couple of hours to endure before exhaustion finally won. But starting at 21:30? That’s like volunteering for a feelings marathon you promised yourself you wouldn’t run.
00:23 now. I’ve officially failed at today, and I’m already failing at tomorrow. I’m tired but wide awake at the same time. My brain, meanwhile, is still replaying that one moment from last weekend. That one very moment where everything felt too easy, too right, too much like something we said we weren’t doing.
The feedback loop is perfect in its cruelty: Can’t sleep because I’m feeling too much. Can’t process feelings because I’m tired. Can’t get untired because I can’t sleep. Round and round, like a carousel of confusion that never stops spinning.
Tomorrow I’ll drag myself through the day, pretending I’m a functional human who definitely got their recommended eight hours. I’ll make better choices. I’ll stick to what we agreed. I’ll remember that we both wanted simple, uncomplicated, no strings. I’ll follow the unwritten rules, and I will go to bed early again. But I already know what will happen at bedtime tomorrow. I’ll climb into bed, full of good intentions, and my heart will start its nightly podcast: “Previously, on Feelings You’re Not Supposed to Have…”
Maybe the real problem isn’t the situation. Maybe it’s that between 22:00 and 03:00, in the space of my supposedly responsible early bedtime, there’s nothing to distract me from the truth: sometimes your best intentions are just that. Intentions.
Some intentions get quietly rewritten by moments that catch you off guard. Some feelings arrive without permission and refuse to leave, even when asked politely.
01:07. Still awake. Still feeling everything I’m trying not to feel. Still pretending that going to bed early makes me a responsible adult rather than just someone with more time to overthink things that thinking won’t change.
The cycle continues. And somewhere between what we said we wanted and what keeps me awake at night, I’m learning that you can schedule your bedtime, but you can’t schedule your feelings.
Maybe I’ll figure it out after a good night’s sleep.
This was a personal essay, a bit of an experiment. Perhaps creative writing, perhaps (probably more likely) an attempt at putting something into words that’s hard to put into words.