An empty space….

….Sleep….

  Do you sleep well?  I don’t, I dream every night. My dreams start out all different and oddly I usually always remember most of them. I talk in my sleep often and sometimes have full blown conversations with whoever else happens to be in the room trying to sleep.
Most nights I’ll dream about my Rider on his horse. I’ve written about him in many poems, he never changes, and I always run. I wouldn’t call him a nightmare, just a dream.
  Nightmares…. When I was younger, and I mean a lot younger (6,7,8,) i used to wake screaming and sobbing. I had to share a room with my older foster sister and she, along with the rest of the house became used to me waking every night screaming.
  As I got older they became less. My mind prioritised other things, other thoughts.
  When I was a child and I used to see a psychiatrist, she said that it was ok that my mind blocked out painful memories. I’d answer the same every time…. It may be ok now, but what happens when I have children of my own and I’m doing  something mundane like bending at the washer pulling wet clothes out, and all those memories start coming back?
The answer was always the same. You’ll be able to cope….
  For most of the time those memories stay behind walls all locked up. But sometimes, like now, they are back in my thoughts. Not really the waking ones, they cascade and torment my mind and dreams as I sleep. It’s hard to get rid of them. But I will with time….
   Last night was the first night, and I know it’s going to be one of many. I didn’t lay down to go to sleep until gone 2 this morning. I woke to the sound of my own screaming at nearly 4 am. Then wandered around the house for a while until I ended up sitting on the kitchen floor looking out the patio doors.
  I seem to end up here a lot. Just watching the sky get lighter. We get a fox family come into the garden, plus hedgehogs and the vast assortment of birds. Sometimes I sit there and write most times just get climbed all over by one or both of the cats.
  Today I’m tired. Really tired. But tonight I don’t want to sleep. I’m scared of the thought of what I know is going to happen. I hate waking up in the state I get.  So a few weeks of this…. I can handle it, I will handle it, I’m going to handle it….
That saying goes through my mind…. “It never rains but it pours….”
  I don’t want to go back to the doctor just yet and tell him how I feel, I don’t want to go back on tablets. I may feel like I’m drowning but yes, I am still keeping my head above the waves.
  Writing on here is helping, but writing always has been my outlet. That and pumping music through my veins….
 
….just keep walking forward
it doesn’t matter if fast or slow,
Keep putting one foot in front of the other
because that’s the way to go….

.x.