Cats And The Second Sleep

My cat can sleep in a box that’s too small. She can sleep through all of Lord of the Rings, even the big battle scenes. She can sleep through multiple Zoom calls. Lately, as I’ve been struggling with insomnia I’ve realized that I resent her. Snoozing away, day or night.

When I did some research I learned that cats sleep as a way to conserve energy for the hunt. They never know when the hunt is going to happen so you could say they are always preparing. (I should say here that my cat isn’t much of a hunter so I’m not totally clear on what she’s preparing for.)

This got me thinking about my own sleep, or lack of sleep. I started to wonder if I really need as much sleep as think I do since I’m also not hunting. Maybe it isn’t insomnia that’s bothering me, maybe it’s the worry about not sleeping that’s bothering me. That’s when I found this article about second sleep. Apparently, in the 15th century being awake in the middle of the night was totally normal. (My husband does this every night, BTW) A phase of sleep called ‘first sleep’ or ‘dead sleep’ was followed by a period of waking and then this ‘second sleep.’ Back in medieval times folks got up in the middle of the night to snack, say prayers and have sex. It was considered totally normal. So in contemplating this second sleep idea I’ve decided to give myself a break. If I can’t sleep maybe I should just get out of bed and see what my husband is up to, though the cat, of course, will be on her ninth sleep.