While browsing through these devices I had this nagging reservation. Berkeley has slept without the need for a nightlight in her room; adding one now was making me nervous. I realized I don't want her to become dependent on a nightlight, but more importantly, I don't want her to become afraid of the dark.
Last night she woke at 2:30am. Robyn tended to her for a few minutes and then came back to bed. Maybe a half hour later she was up again crying. I went in and the first thing she requested was that I turn on the light. I probably spent an hour or so with her and she revealed that she was worried about "the lions." She not only voiced this concern, but kept checking behind her back as if she expected to be attacked at any moment.
Here I worry about DNA. I'm worried that if you zoom in close enough you will find a little sequence of A's, G's, C's, and T's that spell something frightening on both hers and mine. But that's not all I worry about. I also worry about the environment. I worry that I've hinted to her of my own fear. I worry she's picked up from my behavior that one SHOULD be afraid of the dark, even if one isn't predisposed to be so.
I often think of the things I want to pass along to her, but not this--this is a thing I hope we don't both have to carry. I've come pretty far I think. The rational mind of an adult can cope well where a child's mind is more prone to fantasy. I suspect this sort of thing happens to all children at some point; nonetheless, I'll feel guilty if it sticks long to her.
Normally we let her cry a bit when she wakes and usually she settles back in and falls asleep. But this time I heard it; it wasn't just discomfort or frustration, there was fear there. It echoed around the inside of my head like the cry of a lost child draped in white, running through some dark and unknown forest. It sounded too much like one of my own. I couldn't remain in bed and I found myself staying with her longer than usual.
Normally we let her cry a bit when she wakes and usually she settles back in and falls asleep. But this time I heard it; it wasn't just discomfort or frustration, there was fear there. It echoed around the inside of my head like the cry of a lost child draped in white, running through some dark and unknown forest. It sounded too much like one of my own. I couldn't remain in bed and I found myself staying with her longer than usual.
When I was a child I had a couple requirements for sleeping. I wanted curtains closed; this allowed me to avoid werewolves. I wanted doors closed; this prevented mass murders from standing in my doorway. I wanted closets closed; this allowed fewer shapes for my mind to contort. The problem was anything could take a terrible shape. A bookcase is easily a large man. A dresser a gaping mouth.
But the real solution was people. If I could surround myself with people I knew then I would be fine. Where people were not available, which normally they weren't, dogs made acceptable replacements.
I can't imagine this is significantly different than most other childhoods. And as the years went by I was relatively content as long as I had a dog willing to sleep in my room.
This all changed when we moved from Indiana to Washington. This was a stressful time in my young life. I hated the move. I left some really good friends behind. I was starting high school a year earlier than I had planned (because in Indiana 9th grade was the last year of junior high but in Washington it was the first year of high school). And generally I was just feeling out of place in the town we moved to.
We stayed with some friends for a little while in this new town. It was a small town that lived and died with the lumber industry. It was sort of remote and I guess most people felt safe there. The people we lived with had a penchant for leaving their downstairs back door unlocked. Their house wasn't massive so my brother and I ended up sleeping downstairs with our two dogs. We slept on two couches, one on each side of the room. And of course the state of the door always bugged me, but since it wasn't my house I guess I felt weird about locking their door for them.
One night, after having been asleep for a while, I heard a high pitched ringing noise in my ear. First it wasn't very loud but it grew and grew with strength. It grew so much that it woke me fully and I opened my eyes. There, clearly, standing next to me was a bearded man in a flannel jacket. He held a large knife over his head. He slashed it down at me. I tried to move my hands but they wouldn't budge. So instead I closed my eyes and thought, "this is what it's like to die." There was no pain. Just a horrible paralysis and the ceaseless ringing. It went on and on for what felt like hours. During that time I thought about how my dogs and my brother had failed me. How did the man get in without rousing any of them?
Eventually I regained control of my body. I opened my eyes and all was well in the room. There was no man. I had no wounds. The dogs slept next to my couch. My brother slept on his. As for me? I didn't sleep the following two nights. Eventually exhaustion took me and I returned to a relatively normal sleeping schedule. Unfortunately from that time forward, at various intervals, I'm woken by that same ringing noise and by that same dreadful paralysis. I've learned to keep my eyes close and to wait it out. But fear always hangs over me during those minutes that disappear like kidnapped children. I'm certain the stress of them must shave away hours of my life.
Once I'm awake I have to talk my self out of them being some sort of harbinger of imminent doom. I simultaneously want them to mean something and nothing. I want them to not just be some flaw in my brain, so I give them meaning, but I hate the only meaning I can find for them.Whatever it is, it has become more tricky as I've learned to cope. I now have dreams that start with the ringing. When I wake from the dream--feeling safe that it is over--something odd or frightening will happen. Soon I realize I'm still dreaming, caught in some dark Inception plot. So when I finally do awake, I have to wonder if I'm still worming my way out of my subconscious. Other times I "wake" from so many different layers of dreaming that I'm left crying in my last and final dream, wondering if I'll ever really wake or if I'm stuck there forever, wherever there is.
And so it's not the common dream I worry about in Berkeley's DNA, nor even nightmares. No, instead I hope night terrors will always only be a thing she knows about because her father has them and that they forever remain something she does not have to carry.
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