Righteous Slumber
I don’t like going to sleep. Being asleep is not such a problem because obviously I am asleep and therefore oblivious to what is going on. It is the act of going to sleep which troubles me and consequently it has in the past taken me some time to fall into slumber. Once I do, I always sleep straight through until morning and awake refreshed and raring to take on my first fuel of the day. I recall a room mate on a football tour when I was 21 asking me why I was still up reading at a late hour when he had been asleep and woke to use the toilet. I explained I was enjoying reading my book, after all, I was not going to admit to him the real reason why I was still reading at midnight. I need to exhaust myself so that I know when I climb between the sheets I will be embraced by my deep and untroubled sleep straight away. If I cannot do that I have learned, after many fretful nights, thatt sleep will not come easily to me.
I know why this is. It is not, as a spiteful ex-girlfriend Tonia once remarked,
“You cannot get to sleep because your conscious won’t let you after all the despicable things you have done.” I laughed that one off. She had no idea.
No. The reason is that when I am going to sleep I believe that everything I have built up and created will disappear. I fear you will vanish because I can no longer see you. I am troubled that all my hard work in finding and establishing supplies of fuel will melt away once I am not able to control it. I need to be in constant control of what is happening and hate for that control to be taken away from me by asleep. Naturally, I must sleep like everyone else but it is in that few minutes as one settles down that the demons creep out from the corners of the room and threaten the destruction of my empire because shortly I will no longer be on hand to govern it. It matters not that I have woken the next day and found everything intact. I am terrified that one day that just could change. Accordingly, I need the transition from wakefulness to sleep to be swift and pronounced.
24 thoughts on “Righteous Slumber”
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Seems I am the only one. I love to sleep <3 but I dont wake up late neither. Life goes with the sun.
If only that were always true.
We have much in common on this front. I hate going to sleep because I view it as a waste of time.
Those hours I am sleeping could be better spent doing something else more productive. I need sleep to function, yes, but it`s not something I enjoy doing.
I struggle a bit too with the notion that the world I have created for myself will crack and crumble if I am not awake to ensure it doesn`t. I find myself doing a bit of a mental inventory upon waking just to ensure everything is still as it needs to be.
Like you, I often don`t fall sleep until around midnight or 1 am and then I am up at 5:30 am. I am fortunate I don`t need a lot of sleep to function. I love the night time – I come alive at night!
Seeing is believing B&T.
Very interesting post HG. My compliments to your web designer. The stock photos are very illustrative and well chosen.
I doubt that you would ever watch such a silly film but I recommend that you avoid the movie, “Fifty First Dates.” It would be your worst nightmare. Imagine your fuel source waking up every morning with no memory of what happened to her the previous day.
(This is off-topic but would you give us a hint of when your next book, “Exorcism: Purging the Narcissist from Your Heart and Soul” will be released?)
Excuse the delay in replying CS, your comment was caught as spam for some reason. I see a double-edged sword with such a person as described in the film. On the one hand she would have forgotten all the seduction but then again she would also have forgotten any abuse and be primed for seduction again. Mind you, thinking it through I don’t suppose we would get so far as the devaluation so it would be fresh positive fuel every day but there would need to be seduction afresh. On balance, I’d skip her.
Re Exorcism it will be available in the next 7-14 days.
Oh for years I used alcohol to help me sleep…more & more of it. And yes, I was keeping my demons at bay, although it didn’t always work.
This post is one that stuck out at first read. It is so interesting to read and understandable about the thought of losing everything. It makes perfect sense.
My hatred of sleep goes back to the age of 9 when the assault happened. I spent my first sleepless night wondering if he would take my life. I hate drifting off, sleeping, dreaming and waking up. Being awake during the middle of the night is aok. People miss so much in the quiet of darkness, so sometimes i thank him.
I felt bad for the Ns in my life. It felt that they were competing with me in my insomniatic bouts (sometimes days without sleep). Now I know that it was about them.
Well. ,well , well
.
Nc was an habitual user of sleeping tablets prescribed & over the counter. Zimovane , Zoclopone , night all , sleep aid .. you name it he’d take it , failing that it was vodka or a couple of bottles of wine usually red because of the high % of alcohol .
If he couldn’t sleep he made sure I didn’t too .
It’s never occurred to me until reading this that he was fighting to keep his demons at bay …
Another fascinating piece of writing HG. Thank you .
Pleasure SS.
are you also a night owl?
I eventually fall asleep between midnight and one and rise around six. There are times when I will stay up all night, but that is when those shades come to haunt me.
My ex would also have trouble falling asleep! I would get calls or messages I can’t sleep! He would start talking and eventually fall into slumber. He would take sleeping pills also( when he remembered to have the prescription filled. But there is one thing that he told me and now I don’t know if it is true or not! He told me he also had narcolepsy, where he could be talked nag and just fall asleep in mid sentence. I never seen him do it though. Is this even possible HG? Xxx
Well the condition is entirely possible Fool Me but more likely it was disclosed to you as part of a pity play.
Sometimes!
So true HG. The post is another one to face. Fear of losing control is terriying isn’t it? After working so hard putting all the ingredients so perfectly, how dare it vanish into the wind of nothingness. Fear.. another illusion of emotion?Making it personal to all contenders. How do we let go? How do we release this attachment to it? Meditation? Do you think going beyond the created thoughts, letting go of history/memories may lead one to freedom of clarity and focused lenses as opposed to listening to the subconscious?
I ove to sleep. I love to dream. My dreams are more real than reality and a lot more exciting. I HATE it when I can’t get to sleep, but that doesn’t happen very often. I’m sorry you have trouble letting your mind rest.
HG, I have a question that has nothing to do with sleep, but I behave been thinking about it for sometime now. You played football which is a team sport! How did you handle that? There is no I in team. I would think you would want all the attention to your self and would of picked an individual sport. You definitely have a love for the game so it was not something that was forced on you.
Well when you are the captain of the team and the star player, it is far easier to deal with. I competed as an individual in athletics.
How silly of me! Of course you were!! ❤️
G would take a sleeping pill early in the evening… He carried them with him. Even if we were out late, I noticed him swallowing one… He was very knowledgeable about every brand of sleep- aid in the drugstore… I’m sure he faced many a night terror….
Have you always had trouble falling asleep? Or was it more in your adult life HG?
Certain distractions have often caused sleep to evade me.