The present drug regimen I am following requires me to take 40mg of steroids once a week on a Friday. I can then expect to have no sleep that night. Strangely the following day passes quite well. I can’t say that I am abnormally tired and can usually even manage a short walk into the village to buy a newspaper. (I take the long way round.)
Sunday is different however. That’s when I have the ‘crash’. It’s hard to get out of bed, the brain is fuzzy and I have to really push myself to do anything. That continues to a lesser extent in the following days with some improvement towards the end of the week. Just in time for my next steroid day.
I like to think I cope with it not too badly since I know what’s causing it and it’s only going to last for a certain time. ‘All things must pass,’ sang George Harrison, although he was probably thinking about other matters.
To get back to the sleeplessness, one caring friend was concerned that I might be lying awake fretting, paralysed with anxiety, smothered by waves of despair. It’s not like that. You might say I would say that wouldn’t I. But it’s true. I’ve come to enjoy the silence. I’m writing this at 5. 30 am after a totally sleepless night that has not seemed too long with the only disturbance being birdsong and now a faint traffic noise in the distance.
I’ve been reading of course. Night Boat by the Glasgow writer Alan Spence has kept me going recently. Born in Govan he writes so well about working-class life in the sixties and seventies. He became a Buddhist in his teens. How does that happen in Govan? Well in an RE lesson at school he heard a Church of Scotland Minister describe Buddhism as ‘religion without God’ and thought ‘That’s for me!‘ Discuss.
The long night is also a good time to pray and the wireless will be on before long to keep that going! This present political climate has done wonders for my prayer life. So honestly it has not been a bad night. That can’t go on of course. In Scripture sleep is described as a gift from God. The Psalmist writes:
‘I will lie down and sleep in peace,
for you alone, O Lord,
make me dwell in sleep.‘ (Psalm 4: 8)
‘In vain you rise early
and stay up late,
toiling for food to eat -
for he grants sleep to those he loves.‘ (Psalm 127: 2)
It’s part of the essential nature of being human that we renew ourselves physically, mentally and spiritually in sleep. Even Jesus needed a kip. And He could take it in the midst of a storm at sea. Read Mark 4: 35-41. That shows how important it is for us if the Son Of God couldn’t function without it in His humanity. But what I am experiencing now I can cope with.
I’ve always been a sound sleeper but not much of a dreamer. At least I don’t seem to remember many dreams I have had. I have heard it said that you always dream in sleep. It’s a kind of mental effluent that keeps you healthy. You only think you have had a dreamless night. In fact you have just forgotten. Well, maybe. But it makes me feel a bit inadequate when I listen to a colleague who has quite vivid dreams that bring him powerful truths to reflect upon. Like the late Rev Murdoch Campbell, a Free Church Minister, whose writings have had a deserved revival in recent days. He cherished dreams when Bible verses came to him in times of suffering when he needed comfort and when he mourned for the spiritual health of Scotland. I read somewhere that C.H. Spurgeon having struggled with sermon preparation on a Saturday woke on Sunday morning with his three headings! And then there is John Newton who had a vivid dream in his teens which he was to reflect upon through the rest of his life.
All of these men could point to the number of times in Scripture when God revealed himself to men and women as they slept. Jacob dreamt of a stairway reaching to heaven with angels ascending and descending and God at the top. His son Joseph interpreted dreams. God appeared to Solomon in a dream. Joseph the carpenter of Nazareth was guided by God in a dream. Even the Magi were warned by God in a dream of Herod’s intentions towards the baby Christ.
I stand before all these examples amazed because my dreams when I remember them tend to be just plain daft. However, there have been times in these recent months of cancer treatment and the ups and downs that come with it that some images have come of a different order. Nothing spectacular you understand. But I have recognised myself preaching to a gathering of people. On one occasion I was celebrating the Lord’s Supper. Just a couple of nights ago I was leading a Bible Study with young people. Nothing bizarre was happening. Just me and the things I have been blessed in doing in the past.
It would be good to have Joseph’s take on this. But with all due respect do we really need him?
