I Can't Sleep...

I’ve always been a strange sleeper. I was able to out last all my babysitters and it wasn’t odd for my parents to return home after a night out to find the babysitter asleep on the couch and me watching Johnny Carson – at the age of four. I once got into the medicine cabinet when I was six and drank a bottle of Phenigran. My Mother called poison control and they said not to worry, I’d probably just sleep a good 10 – 14 hours. Wrong. I was up for 24 hours straight. One night the house across the lane from us caught on fire and lit up the night sky, bringing a fleet of fire engines, but I slept through the entire thing. In my teenage years I was a sleep walker. In my 20’s I suffered from sleep apnea and was told on many occasions that I talk and laugh hysterically in my time of slumber. Now, in my 30’s, I’m dealing with insomnia – something I’ve dealt with before, but not for 11 weeks in a row.

One of my all time favorite movies is Fight Club and it is from this movie I take a direct quote: “With insomnia, nothing is real. Everything is far away. Everything is a copy of a copy of a copy.” And to this I add – with insomnia you live on a different level than everyone else. I don’t mean on a greater level or an inferior level… I just mean on an unfamiliar level. You see things differently… you see things that are not there… you see things that would frighten others. You feel dizzy all the time and wonder how it is you haven’t collapsed. Everything in your vision is blurry and closing your eyes hurts, it burns. Routine takes over and you find yourself arriving places not knowing how it is you ended up there. It’s scary to wake up from being awake and realizing you’re somewhere you weren’t 20 minutes ago… AND you drove there.

I’ve counted sheep. I’ve exercised. I’ve taken a hot bath before bed. I’ve done the warm milk trick. I’ve tried relaxing my body from the toes up. I’ve tried natural cures, chemical cures and I’ve tried illegal cures. I’ve read, listened to music and watched boring TV. I’ve tried chanting, meditation and near suffocation with a pillow. Nothing is working. I’ve been taking Melotonin supplements to help increase actual sleep time (because my body doesn’t produce enough of it) but one of the side effects is vivid nightmares. I’m prone to nightmares anyway, so the Melotonin is just making them worse. I don’t know how many more times I have to watch people being brutally murdered in my dreams before I begin to question the dark corners of my soul.