Do you snore if there’s no one around to hear it?

An advantage of living alone is you can be as noisy as you want

I snore. Hoo boy, do I snore, as did both my parents. I recorded myself once. Wow.

My dear departed husband bought bright pink rubber ear plugs by the hundreds. He didn’t complain; he just plugged his ears and went to sleep. The man was a terrific sleeper. He would doze off seconds after we turned off the lights and stay asleep all night. He didn’t snore. He gave out these little puffs of air. Puff, puff, puff. It drove me nuts, but a bigtime snorer dare not complain.

Now that I’m alone, I can snore full blast with no one to mind. That’s if I’m lucky enough to be sleeping. That’s not working so well these days. Between sleep apnea—yes, I have a CPAP, which I hate—and the various aches in my hips and ribs, restless legs syndrome, and a mind that refuses to shut down, I’m an annoying nighttime noise machine.

In my efforts to sleep, I often turn on music, either on my phone or by asking Alexa to play something. It’s loud because I don’t have my hearing aids in. My choices are eclectic. Brandi Carlisle, Willie Nelson, Kate Wolf, Josh Groban, Rhiannon Giddens. If I can catch an episode of “Fresh Air,” score!

As a result, the algorithms are so confused they don’t know what I like. I might fall asleep to Freddie Mercury crooning “Love of My Life” and wake up to Steven Tyler screaming “Dream On.” No, Alexa, no. I’m trying to sleep.

But I can listen to the good, the bad, and the upsetting because I’m alone. Nobody else occupies that queen-sized bed. Even the dog died, and she preferred the quiet of the living room.

As long as I’m awake, I check my phone for texts and emails and end up getting caught by amusing videos. Oh, look at those handsome men dancing to “All That Jazz.” Look at those adorable dogs. Lord, what is the president up to now?

Eventually I shove my phone under a pillow and try again to sleep.

I was in a hotel in Corvallis the other night after my ultrasound-guided steroid injection for my hip pain. It was too far to drive home in the dark, so I stayed at the Super 8. The motel had really gone downhill since I was there last: Surly guy at the desk, pool closed, a continental breakfast that consisted of bagels and Frosted Flakes, and a level of cleanliness that would send my hyperclean sister-in-law screaming,

The walls were thin. I heard people talking and a dog barking. I slept poorly. Sometime in the wee hours, I turned on my music—Queen—then realized, OMG, I might be waking up the people in the next room. I slammed it off. Sorry! I should have brought earphones, but I didn’t. The neighbors might not have liked my snoring either, but I don’t have an off button for that.

It was a long night.

I’m the queen of medical reactions. Inject anything into me, and I’m going to have all the side effects. Saturday night, back in my own house, I knew it was happening again when my face turned scarlet and my skin felt like it was burning. My restless legs ramped up to a thousand, and I could. not. sleep.

I googled steroid reactions, even though this was not my first steroid shot. Ah, hot flush, insomnia. Yep. I had forgotten.

I tried all my tricks. I rehashed my TV shows and played a mind game in which you think of as many words as you can that start with a particular letter. My letter that night was H—heavy, hot, hyperbole, humongous, hey, why am I still awake. I played my music. I tried the CPAP, lasting a whopping eighteen minutes.

I lay there wide awake and decided I could not be any less sleepy. Experts say if you’ve been trying to sleep with no luck for a half hour, you should get up and do something else, so I did. After all, I wasn’t going to bother anyone.

I went into the office and paid bills. I had considerable accounting to do, what with Christmas expenses factored in, but paying the phone company felt better than lying in bed trying to force myself to sleep. I don’t think sleep can be forced. It’s a sneaky critter that needs to slip in when you’re not looking. Like ants.

Bills paid, I crawled into bed at 1 a.m., ahead on the day’s chores and finally able to sleep a few hours. And snore, as loud and as long as I wanted. Even God was covering his ears. Or was he? Does a snore happen if nobody hears it?

I’m just saying one advantage of living alone is I’m not driving anybody nuts with my nighttime noises and wanderings.

Post injection, where four practitioners under the age of 30 ganged up to shoot poison into a hip flexor tendon that is very close to my personal private parts, my hip feels better. Today my face is no longer Santa Claus-suit red. I still can’t sleep.

And that’s the last I want to speak of my health for a good long time.

I received my first Christmas card the other day. It was from the furniture store where I bought my mattress. Very pretty picture, promises of great savings inside, and oh, by the way, Merry Christmas. I don’t need any more furniture, but I put it on display anyway.

And then last night, like a miracle, a loved one I hadn’t spoken to in years called me and renewed our connection so sweetly I keep thanking God. She was thinking of me, she said. And she hadn’t even read my last post urging people to call someone this Christmas season whom you haven’t spoken to lately.

Let’s Talk

Are you a noisy nighttime person? How do you deal with it? If you don’t live alone, how do you adjust to each other’s nighttime quirks? Do you have any favorite tricks for falling asleep?

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The Nomo Crones are back for another Childless Elderwomen chat on Saturday, Dec. 13, noon Pacific Time. Our topic this time is “Celebrating Our Light.” This is a supersized panel you won’t want to miss. Register at bit.ly/gwe-celebrate.

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How did I end up alone? My first marriage ended in divorce. My second husband died of Alzheimer’s after we had moved to the Oregon coast, far from family. I never had any kids, only dogs and cats. Now I live by myself in a big house in the woods. You can read our story in my memoir, No Way Out of This: Loving a Partner with Alzheimer’s, available at your favorite bookseller. Visit https://www.suelick.com for information on all of my books.