The Chair

When my husband and I started househunting, we had just two requirements besides cost and location: that each floor have a bathroom and that there be space for my mother-in-law if she needed to stay with us. A few years prior, she had lived with us for awhile and it had been. . .difficult.

The house we bought is a ranch with a finished basement. At one point, the previous owners had split the house into two separate living spaces. As a result, we have two living rooms, two kitchens, two bathrooms, and two bedrooms upstairs and one downstairs. Because the kitchen and living room in the basement are larger, it’s our main living space.

The upstairs living room became a holding ground and then dumping ground for this and that. Chewy boxes. Exercise equipment. Books. Additionally, we had a cat, Fay, that liked to pee on anything soft. We had her tested multiple times; she was fine, just a jerk. So there was no point in having nice furniture upstairs.

I actually purchased beautiful wooden lawn furniture. The chair and bench at least provided something to sit on, and Fay wasn’t tempted to pee on them. But then we lost Fay in 2022, and now we were stuck with a very strange room.

She was a jerk but Fay (black cat) was my sweetie and I miss her very much. She adored Little Buddy.

Sometimes I don’t want to go downstairs. Maybe my husband is taking a nap and I don’t want to bother him. Or my knees hurt. Et cetera. But with nowhere to sit upstairs, that meant chilling out in the bedroom. In bed.

That was one of the very first things my CBT-I doctor said needed to change. I should only be in bed getting ready to sleep, sleeping, or waking up. So I bought all manner of pillows and blankets, trying to make the wooden chair and bench comfortable. For short bursts, sure, but not for hours at a time. Nor was the office chair in my art studio a reasonable long-term solution.

My husband and I went to Fred Meyer, which is kind of like a department store (like Target), with groceries, toys, camping gear, all that. It also has fairly inexpensive furniture. More expensive than Ikea but cheaper than actual furniture stores. Additionally, everything was on sale for Labor Day!

I tried every floor model, settling on a gray recliner. I don’t really like recliners, but I need to sit bisexually, and the recliner had the most amount of leg room, so to speak. It cost about $300, and luckily we were in a position to afford that. We wedged it into the trunk and set it up that night.

The gray recliner. now in the dining room. Behind it: the wooden bench it replaced. The indignity of it all.

It’s been fine. It made the doctor happy. The reclining mechanism got borked pretty quickly, so it just stayed open. The gray was inoffensive but also didn’t exactly fit in with the decor. It was definitely more comfortable than the wooden furniture. I sat in that chair during many afternoons, trying not to take a nap. I sat in that chair during many nights, not wanting to go to sleep. It wasn’t always comfortable, but it was always there. It helped me stay awake. It helped me sleep.

And a year later, I am thanking the recliner for its service and retiring it to the dining room, in case I ever have guests and they need a place to sit. A pink love seat has taken the place of honor in the upstairs living room, purchased from a real furniture store.

It’s funny to think how important a bed, chair, or couch can be to recovering from insomnia. And while it’s a simple solution, I know I’m very lucky that I could just buy a new one without too much worry. Money won’t buy happiness but it sure can help you sleep.

Ignore the Chewy boxes in the background.