Sleep Apnea

Remembrance Day Sunday was an excellent service. The loss of so many of our youth was a pain that was always there when I was a child. So many lost and we remembered them year after year at school marching to a nearby Church on Remembrance Day. Long lines of children block after block going to honour those youth who would not grow old like we have. God  has been kind to my generation. 

I learned about my Sleep Apnea (mentioned yesterday) doing a sleep study years ago now when I was in my late 50s - the decision was that I had mild to maybe medium sleep apnea. However it doesn't appear to bother me particularly  and I am in my 82nd year now. The sudden wakeup is always a bit shocking as it generally happens when I am dreaming something traumatic but it doesn't appear to cause me any problems. Someone once told me (can not remember who said it) that it was a reflex action because my heart had stopped which I think is strange. But perhaps that is why some people die of Sleep Apnea; no idea on that. 

When I worked at the Hospital during the time that the Ontario Government created these large hospital groups in each large city (by then my second child was fourteen years old), I happened to be working in Perinatology which is advanced prenatal care for High Risk babies and my boss was Chair of Ob/Gyn (Dr. Carl Nimrod an absolutely excellent person) on the committee merging Obstetrics across the City and eliminating the smaller hospitals (my delivery of our second child was at one of these smaller hospitals) and I volunteered to be the secretary (my boss wanted to pay me when he asked me to do it but I said no I would love to volunteer and all the doctors had volunteered their time which I do hope the province appreciated as it was hours and hours of committee time to put the plan together). One of my few personal volunteering activities but I said I would be honoured to help. I wanted to feel that women could arrive at a hospital and not be told that there wasn't a doctor (namely obstetrician or resident obstetrician) available to come and talk to a patient when they were becoming very exhausted and myself really just wanted a caesarean section as I had asked at six months gestation). My back had so much pain that night so when she said there wasn't a doctor there I told my husband to take me to the Civic Campus (we were still fairly new to the City and I had no idea I was so close to the General!). My husband said no that his cousin would be coming (a natural birth is considered superior to a C-section for a birth). Unfortunately I never forgave my husband; as I preferred a C-section but never mentioned it to him in the years that followed as that would be unfair to our daughter. At some point the nurses/someone took me to delivery but I do not remember getting there so had passed out perhaps as I was in a lot of pain.  

I loved it that it would save other women from such an experience and when the opportunity presented itself I volunteered to be secretary and it was good to hear the process by which all birthing would be in teaching hospitals. Later that morning after the delivery when I finally woke up the nurses were so very helpful bringing me news on my newborn daughter about whom I was very concerned (likely they were different nurses I have no idea; my sight was somewhat limited all my life until I had cataract surgery). The nurse brought her to me and I could see she had good colour and a good cry plus she was hungry and I fed her. My back though pained me for eighteen months after she was born. I gradually did exercises to strengthen my back and the pain diminished. After my first childbirth I had had a bad back and a numb leg (partial - the femur area) for five years and this time the same so I knew the exercises I needed to do and gradually the strength and feeling returned once again as I am a dedicated exerciser for sure (I was out doing a 2 K walk every day by the end of the second month, worked up to it). 

Motherhood was an experience I had never contemplated in my youth. Coming from a large family the idea of raising children having helped to raise my younger siblings was not top of the list but I was always looking at it from the point of myself but when Edward and I decided to marry that did change the picture for sure although we were married for nearly eight years before we had our first child. Edward was the light of the girl's lives all of their life. He was just there for them all the time except when working or at committees or what not and did always try to do what was best for them. I do give him 100% for fatherhood and the girls adored him. 

Why trauma affects an individual's sleep; I am not prone to dwell on the past. I think sleep apnea brings one to a very alert wide awake state (personal experience). Generally it affects my sleep for a couple of days hence my up in the middle of the night again!

Today is basement cleaning and later, after another sleep hopefully, I have to set the Robot going. Perhaps a little work on the Blake family later as I continue to review the Close Rolls. This has been a fascinating trip through history reading the Close Rolls. I also found the Calendar of Patent Rolls very interesting which I did maybe ten years or so ago now; the writeup is on my blog. I think my brain just likes to be constantly challenged with new knowledge. When I was young I loved science, mathematics and everything I could learn about them. I enjoyed research very much and some of my working time was devoted to research projects for various employers. I stayed longer if the research was interesting. But I think my brain just always likes to have that challenge to acquire new knowledge; understand it and utilize it if I can. When I made that decision at 20 not to work for the RCMP in Criminology and got married instead, it changed me a lot actually. I still continued to be interested in science and mathematics and did work at that type of work although a lot of it was writing. But I became a less independent person which because of the trauma (knife attack in my teen years whilst helping someone move out of a situation she was unhappy in) was not good for me in the long run. I think now (as I did then actually but her sister's boyfriend had offered to come along as well so did agree) that if you are in a bad situation then call the police; they can handle such things - bad mistake on my part trusting someone to have my back! However, these last five years have brought me back to myself - extremely independent and a loner. It is better for me and when my older daughter comes home one of these years we actually get along quite well and both enjoy doing the research that interests us. Certainly I would have liked to see her marry like her younger sister but that didn't happen but she is content and her work pleases her which is important in one's life I think. 

Back to sleep. It is just 4:42 a.m. EST!

Thank you God for another beautiful day in Your world.  

And I did sleep.

During the reigns of Edward III, IV, V, and Richard III we see Blake in London, in the Midlands, in Southampton (city likely), and gradually into Wiltshire. We know they are at Calne from the Parliamentary Archives as John Blake I served in 1383 and John Blake II served in 1415. They were contemporaries of Robert Blake of Quemberford near Calne. There were glimpses of Blake prior to 1383 in Wiltshire and I  have postulated in the past that the Blake family of Calne was possibly descendant of the Richard le Blak family of Rouen, Normandy and Wargrave near Windsor, Berkshire. Finding proof of the movement from Wargrave through Berkshire to Hungerford is also a project in my mind simply because the Blake family at Speen, Berkshire and the Blake family at Andover, Hampshire in the mid 1500s mention each in their wills. They do not define a relationship but one is left with the impression of kinship but it is distant in the mid 1500s. My suspicion that an individual living at Enham near Andover married a descendant of Richard le Blak and probably in the early 1300s but proving it will be interesting. I do mention them in the book because kinship is claimed by the portion of the Blake family of Andover that moved to Surrey in the late 1500s and early 1600s and eventually to London itself where Daniel Blake had the Blake Pedigree Chart created in the late 1600s with additions into the mid 1700s. Definitely he linked the families at that time both in the Chart requested by them with family information used as the basis of the chart including the Visitation of Surrey 1662-8, and several others listed earlier (must insert). In the mid 1800s perhaps or earlier Edward Jarman Blake I believe created the Blake family tree held by the Blake Museum in Bridgwater (they do not give it an author but the work that is in the chart does favour the thoughts of this individual looking back at other work done in a similar time) and Edward Blake moved the connecting link in the Pedigree Chart back several generations because the link in the Pedigree does not follow the wills. 

Going now to the Calendar of Close Rolls during the time of the Henrys III, IV, V, VI, and VII. This spans a broken time as they served non consecutive terms as King of England -  1227 - 1266 for Henry III and does not include his minority term between 1216 - 1227 when he was of age.