Nightmares

Sometimes life is scary. Right now it feels like one of those nightmares where you are desperately trying to wake up. Every muscle in your body is jerking and straining, your mouth is open wide, and you can feel the air being sucked deep into your lungs. Your chest expands, and you begin to let the air out, but there is no sound coming out as the air leaves the recesses of your chest. You feel your chest cavity empty, but your muscles don't relax. You repeat the entire process again, again nothing. After the third attempt panic sets in and you feel like the breath has literally been knocked out of you. HEELLLPPP!!! No one can hear you because there is nothing but silence vibrating against your vocal chords. So you begin flailing every movable part of your body to escape the nightmare, to will yourself to wake up. As your body convulses, your mind reacts to your body's attempt to escape its recesses. You wake up suddenly. Your breaths come deep and heavy, your body remains tense, and your pulse rate is still elevated, but you are awake... or so you think. Soon you begin to realize that things are not as they seem. There are objects from your childhood scattered around your room, there is a person you haven't seen or spoken to in months sitting next to your bed stroking your hand, telling you that everything will be fine. You look at the person and your heart dives into your stomach. And you begin screaming and flailing all over again. Again, there is no sound and your body can only make small jerking movements. Its as if you are being restrained physically but there are no bonds on you. The person looks at you and smiles and upon seeing the horror in your eyes begins to laugh hysterically. All the while you are attempting to scream, his laughter cuts through the air. It is the only sound you hear. Then your heart stops and it feels like you've stopped breathing. Your body literally begins convulsing as you attempt to force yourself to take the smallest amount of air into our lungs. Your body lurches once and your eyes fly open. Your heart is beating wildly from the lack of oxygen. You stare into the dimly lit darkness trying to steady your hearbeat and regulate your breathing to take in the maximum amount of air. Your feel lightheaded in the darkness, but you are afraid to let sleep take you for fear of another nightmare, so you lie for a moment longer. Then you leave the confines of your bed and venture into the living room and turn on the tv. You watch mindless infomercials and cartoons until your body begs you for sleep. But you continue fighting to stay awake until 3:30 because you know that you have to get ready to go. So you go through the motions: you shower, you brush your teeth, you put on a warm, comfortable sweat suit (even though you know it'll be 80 degrees when you walk outside), you retrieve a frozen water bottle from the freezer, and you wait for your ride to call so that you can leave. You get to the dialysis center, and continue to elude sleep for another hour or so. Then you begin the dialysis process, and 20 minutes after being stuck, Sleep plans a successful attack behind enemy lines and overtakes you. You enter into a restless sleep, infiltrated by probing thermometers, loud voices, nurses and doctors talking to you and beeping machines. But you are thankful for the restlessness of the sleep... it keeps the nightmares at a safe, unreachable distance.

Life is making me tired... tired of screaming at the top of my lungs and no sound coming out... tired of sleepless nights, and restless days... tired of the delusions that come from those sleepless nights... tired of delusions period. Tired of trying to catch my breath just so the nightmares can overtake my dreams once more... Tired of everything... Sometimes tired of life...

Yeah... I think it's time to visit the therapist again...