I hate my pillow.

[DogTired]

After a day of loads of pressure brought about by having to visit a town full of triggers.
I'm tired out, mentally shot, and just want to go to sleep. Except I'm sat here, typing and nervously looking at my damn pillow.

I've got to know what I am in for prior to falling asleep and tonight I KNOW it's going to end in nightmares because of the day I've had.
My lovely 'epic music' 4 hour 'listen to and drift off to sleep' is about all I'll stay asleep for.
Not sure why, but sleep I will till the laptop shuts down and everything goes quiet.
Before someone says just loop the music, that doesn't work as a loop back wakes me. Go figure why because I can't.

So, it'll either be pain, sadness, reliving events, or seeing and feeling the loss of a friend that will jerk me awake!
Unless I flip completely, get angry, and start raving in one of the three languages I once knew but can only recall when asleep.
How do I know that? I set up a VOX switch on a tape recorder and listened to what I was saying after the wife pointed out she knew it was a foreign language but did not know what I said.
Anyway, if I start yelling, it'll be my wife (or dog) who will wake me as emotions make me go loud.

Once awake, that's it, 3-4 AM and not a cat in hells chance of dropping off again. Nice eh.
Now I was given meds to keep me asleep. Yeah right. They just don't work as I'm pulling some really heavy emotions at times.
Once awake, I'm dopey, unable to function, as well as being emotionally wrecked.
All the white coats said was take more. I did and ended up vomiting in my sleep. Not nice.

So I don't do drugs now although at times I will drink myself asleep on 10 year old Slivovitz.
I might gain an hour then but always wake up wrecked.

About the only thing that works occasionally is if the wife can catch me as the nightmare starts.
Then she weaves her magic and I sleep for a few more hours. Why?
Again, go figure, but it is nice she can stop something that ends up tearing me apart.

So what now? The psych team of pill pushers have gone VERY quiet so I guess that's my lot from them.
We've done the reliving the dream under hypnosis bit and I woke up to a female doctor with streaming tears.
That has not been repeated. In my defense I said that the dream they picked was a particularly bad one BUT docs know best right?
It's now been 7 months of getting nowhere fast and in my humble opinion, memories are getting nastier as they keep trying to pick them to bits or make them sound . . . not sure what to write here. They rewrite a dream, say read this a lot, and when the dream replays, the end will be different. "Quelle surprise", that aint happening.

 

[Friday]

Quelle surprise", that aint happening.

Nah. In my experience it never does. Not when my dreams are real or a mixture of nightmare fuel (real) blended with fiction. What DOES happen is I get pretty stubborn about going back in to finish the thing. A bit like screaming at the sea, or at someone to shoot you, who’s already taken aim and is dithering or posturing. It’s a peculiar kind of pissed off, f*ck you, do it or back the f*ck down you IRRITATE me. At which point? My nightmare jag will NOT end (mores the pity) but the effects on both my life, and my sleep, soak into the sand.

It’s happened, every autumn, for about 20 years now… in addition to random bad times… so what I focus on mostly is recognizing it’s happening sooner & getting chippy sooner.

and start raving in one of the three languages I once knew but can only recall when asleep.
How do I know that? I set up a VOX switch on a tape recorder and listened to what I was saying after the wife pointed out she knew it was a foreign language but did not know what I said.

LMFAO… it’s so true. It drives me slightly mad to know EVERYTHING happening in the dream, but not be able to translate it when I wake, because I’ve lost my fluency. Even if I’m shouting it. Maybe especially when I’m shouting it.

Not sure why, but sleep I will till the laptop shuts down and everything goes quiet.
Before someone says just loop the music, that doesn't work as a loop back wakes me. Go figure why because I can't

Because you’re hypervig even when asleep, and your mind is seeking threats… That. Is. Stupid. Common…. Amongst anyone who has learned the “waking doze” thing the military teaches. It’s life saving, and sanity saving, by knocking off the sharpest edges of sleep dep when one actually has to stay awake for weeks at a time… but it makes for some FAWKED sleep, later in life, as the more subtle the change the more it sends you screeching to the ceiling. My advice? Snicker at it. As you notice it. As the more I can find the funny, the more my BE AWARE NOW… tilts its head and thinks, maybe? Someone else is on watch and I can actually sleep. Conversely? Sleep when someone else IS on watch.


ETA… Mad love at your wife, if she’s got “the touch”. Maybe 3% of those I’ve loved or shared a bed with have. REVEL in that, if she does. It’s a gift. Which means it will also never be 100%? But soak her in, and appreciate, when it DOES work. Rather than being affronted if/when it doesn’t. Magic isn’t on demand, but special & remarkable & to be cherished.

 

[DogTired]

Nah. In my experience it never does. Not when my dreams are real or a mixture of nightmare fuel (real) blended with fiction. What DOES happen is I get pretty stubborn about going back in to finish the thing. A bit like screaming at the sea, or at someone to shoot you, who’s already taken aim and is dithering or posturing. It’s a peculiar kind of pissed off, f*ck you, do it or back the f*ck down you IRRITATE me. At which point? My nightmare jag will NOT end (mores the pity) but the effects on both my life, and my sleep, soak into the sand.

It’s happened, every autumn, for about 20 years now… in addition to random bad times… so what I focus on mostly is recognizing it’s happening sooner & getting chippy sooner.


LMFAO… it’s so true. It drives me slightly mad to know EVERYTHING happening in the dream, but not be able to translate it when I wake, because I’ve lost my fluency. Even if I’m shouting it. Maybe especially when I’m shouting it.


Because you’re hypervig even when asleep, and your mind is seeking threats… That. Is. Stupid. Common…. Amongst anyone who has learned the “waking doze” thing the military teaches. It’s life saving, and sanity saving, by knocking off the sharpest edges of sleep dep when one actually has to stay awake for weeks at a time… but it makes for some FAWKED sleep, later in life, as the more subtle the change the more it sends you screeching to the ceiling. My advice? Snicker at it. As you notice it. As the more I can find the funny, the more my BE AWARE NOW… tilts its head and thinks, maybe? Someone else is on watch and I can actually sleep. Conversely? Sleep when someone else IS on watch.

Mil-kip. I do that all the time and it amazes SWMBO. 2-3 minutes and I'm out.
Once learned, and lived, if you get a break in the day and it's drink loads, eat whats there, go for a leak, and then crash out.
Curiously no dreams, what I call a black sleep. Lovely is that!
Only problem is I don't wake up fast now, which can prove tricky if someone calls.
However, night time is different.
It's the whole process of going to bed, SWMBO first, last leak for the dog, lock up, then me.
Problem then is that's when I review the day or dwell on bad thoughts. Never a good idea but it appears I'm set in my ways.
On goes the 'sleepy' music and unless I've had a bitch of a day, I normally crash out till the music ends.
No crisis in the day, 3-4 hours sleep. Otherwise it's give up, and get up,

Out of bedroom into comfy arm chair, feet up, blanket over, and cat nap, waking up when fighting whatever.
Then comes the gem. Dog hears me talking, gets up, comes to me, I get a facewash, and the dog goes back to bed.
"So close the doors!" Then the dog starts barking, SWMBO gets up, now all three of us are awake. ARGH!

Right through the year. Random, no anniversaries, somewhat predictable if I've had a bitch of a day.

 

[Friday]

Problem then is that's when I review the day or dwell on bad thoughts. Never a good idea but it appears I'm set in my ways.

Try an adrenaline rush, right before sleep. I’m tremendously biased towards sex, but even a 20min run/sprint or (we call it a ‘trip to the beach’ or “being pitted / pitting yourself” because in bootcamp it was done in a sand pit, and the name stuck) where you chaos together all the normal exercises for stupid times, not enough time to do one jumping jack before dropping to push, 3 or 30 and it’s spinning on your back for half a sit-up & then jumping up to do cherry pickers (only half of one before dropping for Dollie’s, etc.). Sweaty, exhausted, head spinning.. hot shower… bed.

Just SOMETHING to burn off all the chemicals beginning to build up in the blood, that send the mind down rabbit holes and demand action from the body… in such a subtle sneaking ITCHY way. XP

^^^ This is a big part of why whenever I’m sick/injured my whoooooole life goes sideways, as I’m not physically able to manage my stress down to normal-life-levels & get all smiley when a car hits me, just because I’ll be able to sleep well for the next few days; BOOM actual life or death situation, and? Voila! I’m normal. For a minute. Getting old? Is seriously f*cking up my ability to live well.