Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Sleepwalker

I got lost in my own bedroom last night.

Sadly, it's happened before.

I was sleeping and in the dream that I didn't know what a dream, I was standing in our front hallway and someone cut their hand wide open.  We're talking blood gushing EVERYWHERE.  Apparently my panic in my dream translated too well to my body, because I leapt out of bed to get bandages to help the friend- only when I opened my eyes, the room was pitch black.

It took me several minutes to reconcile that I wasn't where I was supposed to be.  Meanwhile, three steps away from the bed, I was utterly lost.  I recall hanging on to the dresser at one point (right beside my bed) and trying to convince myself I wasn't in the front hallway, I was in the bedroom.  In my mind's eye, I still saw the hallway, knew that I had to be there because that's where I last "remembered" being.  Meanwhile, my brain is feverishly trying to figure out what the dresser is and where it fits in to the hallway, what the bath towels are- anything I touched, it tried to contort in to something else.

After stumbling around in just a few steps, I finally was able to calm myself and recognize enough of the signs of sleepwalking that I knew I could go back to bed.  Thankfully I was easily able to find the bottom of  the bed and I gingerly (and blindly) walked myself back to my spot and crawled in.

This has happened off and on forever, even though I haven't caught myself sleepwalking in a while. It's very bizarre to know what you are doing and to see it, but not be able to stop yourself- I usually have to play out several minutes of whatever is going on until I can convince myself to go back to bed.  Sometimes I can do this without waking Tim. Sometimes, I'm not so lucky.  I sit here now, fully awake, and wonder how my motor skills were fully functional, but the reasoning was not.  I can still feel the panic of knowing someone was badly hurt and needed help, but not being able to make it to the bathroom (right off the main hall) to get towels to help.  Add in getting lost in the dark, in a familiar place and it's even worse.  I knew that if I walked too far, I'd have trouble finding my way back to the bed.  Perhaps it was some small part of me trying to keep me safe.

Oh well, thankfully that was the only episode of the night- and no.  It never occurred to me to call out to Tim for help  (turning on the light, etc). In my sleepwalking state, I was alone. And lost.  In the dark.

-Kristen

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