Whose Mind Is It Anyways?
A game where all the nightmares are made up and their only goal is to terrify you. *TW: mention of drug and alcohol use because I moonlight as a garbage human*
I wrote that right before bed the other night so I think that’s a great place to pick up and talk about nightmares. I have had recurring nightmares for as long as I can remember. When I was little the nightmare was that I was falling in an endless black void. You know…. Normal kid stuff. As I grew older that was replaced by a weekly nightmare wherein all my teeth fell out. Eventually I realized that those were just place holders for the demons that would enter my life by way of trauma.
These terrors are evil and their only hobby is turning my favorite activity into a minefield. I love sleeping. I believe sleeping cures everything. You’re upset? I bet a nap would help. You’re mad at your partner because they loaded the dishwasher wrong? Try a siesta. You’re sick? I can promise your doctor recommends rest. Sleep fuels our minds and bodies and allows our dreams to expand as wide as they want. It’s incredible - but what am I supposed to do when my favorite thing ever is also the scariest thing ever? When I close my eyes I have to surrender to the possibility of my nightmares, and those stupid terrors.
At this point, I basically have to anesthetize myself to even have a hope of sleeping. Anti anxiety meds, sleeping pills, anti depression medication, Xanax, weed, alcohol, pretty men offering promises of a fantasy; I’ve tried it all. Alcohol helped for a while, but I’m realizing all it did was sedate me into compliance. Compliance with all the things that haunt me. Eventually I had to pull up my big girl pants and put the bottle down and I did. 0/10 I do not recommend getting sober. I fully endorse sobriety, but getting sober? Super ick (I think that’s a term the youths use, I saw it on TikTok). Once my body had enough time to detox, throw a tantrum because it missed the wine (me too, get in line) and begin to heal itself, I began to slowly face all the things I was trying to numb. Also, do not recommend. I am not fun to be around currently.
All this to say, I have no answers. Currently I’m trying a combo of anxiety meds and sleeping pills (ALL PRESCRIBED DONT COME FOR ME), along with twinkle lights and a pink curtain, as well as a nice man who reads me sleepy time stories on Spotify.
No matter how hard I try, how many night lights and meditations I try, I will never be able to escape the fact that the scariest thing in the world is my own memory. I want to do nothing but sleep however, it seems like it allows gives room for those nasty little gremlins to roam free and terrorize me. I will never be able to trick myself into believing bad things can’t happen. In my experience, you can stress and worry over something non-stop and ultimately, it will still turn out worse and more painful than your meanest night demon could ever cook up to scare you. Am I just resigned to chase a dreamless sleep? If that’s true then I’d like to lodge a complaint against whoever I was in my former life, because she was obviously a word that rhymes with punt.