Thursday, April 22, 2010

Night Terrors

Do you guys get nightmares? I do. I get little bursts of nightmares once every 3 or 4 months, like an unwelcome aunt come to visit, or a kind of weirdly-spaced head period. (Gross.) They usually go for 3 to 7 nights in a row, and I am on night 4 at the moment. And so I stay up until stupid hours in the morning watching porn reading and fighting sleep, and then when I do drop off I wake up all sweaty and gross an hour later, sometimes mid-scream (although I have somehow developed the habit of clapping my hand over my mouth, so essentially I wake up hitting myself in the face which, while it has the advantage of not waking my family, is not really better), and then I am afraid to go to sleep again.

Having reread that paragraph, I'm not entirely sure why I'm sharing this with you. (It's probably because I want sympathy, and also it's the middle of the night and I can't think of anything else to talk about.)

Sorry to paint a picture of me in bed all sweaty and screaming, I'm aware that might put some of you off topic. Probably I shouldn't have mentioned porn. And anyway, it wouldn't be like that, for a start I'm not a screamer and more importantly I would be panicked and gross and terrified of a vampire baby*. And that's just not romantic!

*it steals my passport and then it waits in the wardrobe and then it SWOOPS DOWN ON M- cue wake up. I am aware that this is ridiculous but I didn't want to be all "hey listen to my more disturbing nightmares" because then you'd all stop reading. Actually, you probably wouldn't. You voyeurs, you. You naughty, naughty readers. Stop it. I am so damn sleep-deprived and tempted to become a dominatrix; apparently it's quite good money but I guess you need to sink a bit of capital into setting up your dungeon.

Does anyone else over the age of 12 get nightmares? Anyone? Please don't let me be alone. Hold me.

Moving on, does anyone have any suggestions for getting rid of nighmares? If it worked on your child it could well work on me. We are probably not so different, except for the porn thing, and the dominatrix thing but I was kidding about that.* And I would like to stop having nightmares, because they make me tired and when I am tired I write not so good blogs - this is a prime example - so really it's in your own best interests to fix this.

*at least until my financial position changes

Also, thank you for listening to my whinge.
I know it is boring when bloggers whinge.

And now, to balance that out, something heartwarming: today, I took an escort ad which was ANZAC day themed (ANZAC being our war remembrance day. Commemoration day? You know the one). Not only did the massage parlour offer specials for returned servicemen, but they invited current members of the armed forces to "stand to attention" with the girls. Everyone's supporting the troops. With their-

AND THEN THE VAMPIRE BABY SWOOPS DOWN

15 comments:

Unknown said...

Vampire baby! I get nightmares as well. I start having them if I don't have alcohol for more than 3 days. Then I have a nightmare approximately once every 6 weeks where Kevin Spacey kills me. If someone tells you how to stop having them, please pass that information along. Ever since I moved to the city I have nightmares of someone breaking in, stealing my dogs, killing me in my bed and since I live alone no one finds me for months, etc. Thanks Ally, I'm going to have nightmares tonight.

IT IS ALLY said...

Whoooooops. Sorry. That Kevin Spacey one sounds nasty, too

erin said...

I have nightmares all the time. They range from kind of spooky to downright horrifying. Sometimes I wake up all clammy. I mentioned it to my mom and she said to cut back on my sugar/caffeine intake. But it didn't work.

If you figure something out, let me know.

Anonymous said...

I actually woke up just this morning from a nightmare and it involved a good friend of mine. The worst part was I was very angry at her when I woke up so when she called, well I let her have it for all the terrible things she did in my sleep. She was very nice and even tried to think of what she might have been thinking in my dream to make her act that way! Hope you are almost done with your nightmare stretch, they really are awful!

Andrea Eames said...

No suggestions, sorry. I go through periods (HEAD PERIODS) of having them too. I sing little songs to myself when I wake up to make myself feel better. That doesn't really help, I know.

WV: OBLOODE. Ovary blood! Everyone's getting in on this period metaphor.

Vanilla said...

I come from the Freddy Kruger school of Nightmare Salvation.

And this is going to sound corny but you need to become a dream warrior.

If you work out a set of skills you have and a trigger, such as, putting on your onesie then if you do that in your nightmare you get those skills.

So before you open the closet in your dream you put on your onesie and bam your surrounded by a zorb and the vampire baby bounces off.

The skills have to be rediculously complicated and the trigger relatively easy to do.

So dont think up a trigger that requires a montage to produce liek the karate kid or something.

Hope that helps, it has others.

Wax off
Gary

Chris Rees said...

Each night before you fall alseep, visualise your 96 followers, filing in to your room one after the other and giving you a big hug. After about six or seven this will get really boring, you will fall asleep shouting (in your mind) "fuck off - gaah, why are you all so MUSHY!" And you will then enter REM sleep in an attitude of militant impregnability. Also, lay off the cheese.

Anonymous said...

nightmares when i get trashed on gin.
TB

Anonymous said...

nightmares when i get trashed on gin.
TB

Veronica said...

I have suffered from night terrors most of my life. I learned years ago that they were triggered by watching scary/gore movies. When I stopped watching them, the terrors stopped.

My suggestion is see if you can find a common trigger to the nightmares and if you can, avoid it like the plague.

apple cheeked, potato shaped girl said...

I used to have a lot when i was a child, I found climbing into my parents bed helped but that might not be the best option at our age.

NB the last time I had a bad nightmare was at the lodge....

I also had one where love of my life was dating you and I was ok with it and then you died in a horrible car accident and I was distraught, so was LoML and it "brought us together". and we were like "Its some thing good from something so bad"

I woke up feeling so bad - like you had died but also guilty :-(

art said...

You know that little bit in back of your head that says 'oh oh, here comes that nightmare again'... that's the bit to stay connected to ... the nightmare is an entertainment put on by your ego to stop it getting bored, and you are the audience. If you don't like it boo and hiss, shout 'lousy costume' at the vampire baby. You can change the script once you realise you wrote it.

cerebral e said...

*uncorked - at least if your dogs are stolen they will not eat you after you are killed.

IT IS ALLY said...

Thank you, everyone - is nice to know I'm not the only person having a crappy sleep. Will try the advice of those who offered it & let you know if anything works.

Kat - If that happened, I would totally be ok with you shacking up with my widower. Just wait until after the funeral. (Directly afterwards is fine, but DURING is not. At the funeral reception thing is also fine.)

Alyson said...

My kid quit having them when we stopped locking her in the closet.