Nightmares all the way down · 12:06pm Nov 13th, 2022
I didn't sleep well tonight!
My intake of SSRIs often correlates with vivid nightmares, but they help regulate my sleep and I tend not to wake up too early, which is one of the reasons my doctor prescribed them. However, last night, I've had a cycle of bad dreams and awakening, with a massive panic attack at the end. I "like" the blurry sensations of walking that fine line between consciousness and sleep, something about the liminal space of dreams that I really enjoy: the only responsibilities here are that I rest my body or make sense of the night. You forget your name, you get some cryptic insight that only makes sense in that state... I might have reconsidered my life path in blinding clarity after many a nightmare, sometimes with one eye looking in and the other far away.
My dreams were nothing to write home about but I do like the mood they had. The first one was about my mother and I visiting a local museum, which had a new relic on display: le crâne de l'Incube. It was a massive skull, with small protuberances, set in a grimace, which would change texture everytime I tried to look. The second was about a creature with antler, freakishly tall and standing on two legs, slowly hunting me through the forest. The third was about an ex taking me to the gym to have me serve as a sacrifice in a ritual halfway through my sets.
I may have spent too much time being awake to really make much of the details, though it's not the nightmares per se that I liked but the state of panic, blurry terror so pervasive this morning. Anxiety isn't very funny by definition, yet I do find some comfort and interest in how it affects my perception at times. The devil you know, maybe?
I'm taking the habit to write small entries here, in-between my reading stories, to practice my English and to have something to do. It's a fun endeavour, like diet exposure therapy.
When I was very small, my nightmares were all about megastructures. Huge constructions that would revolve around themselves, indifferent, massive. Rather than fear, it was more of a growing discomfort that would make me cry for it to end. One of the coolest genres is horror, which I must read more.