The People Behind My Eyes

Tackling My Issues with Beds and Bedrooms - Wednesday, May 24, 2006 - 11:30 PM

Beds bring back memories I’d rather forget. I associate them with only unpleasant things. Why would I want to sleep in a bed? I mean, dang, you get beaten on one, you get molested on one, we did our homework on it and we studied the Bible all in my mother’s bed. We ate dinner while sitting on her bed, we watched TV on her bed, we laughed and cried there, we sat quietly there and we argued there. The truth is, the rest of the house was ignored and the three of us literally lived in her bedroom so all these things happened in her room and on her bed. My sister and I didn’t sleep in our own beds most of the time growing up. When we did sleep in our own bed it was around the age of 12 or so. We had our own rooms but those beds stayed empty quite often. The thing is too, bedtime hasn’t been something pleasant. Many times the things that happened in our house were late at night or around 3am. If she said we were in trouble early in the day she made us wait all day and to get the punishment. Just before bed is when she delivered that punishment. As the night went along, if we stayed up longer and longer we could guarantee that the punishment would be more severe. If it got late she was up festering OR she was up laughing with us as if she didn’t have something horrible planned. So we’d either walk on eggshells OR we’d let our guard down and laugh and joke with her. It just all depended on how she felt that day and at that moment. Bedtime, beds, it was all connected with uncertainty and most often pain and/or humiliation. So why on earth would I as an adult be able to associate it with rest or rejuvenation? I don’t, I see them as a burden, as a constant memory that some things never change.

I don’t mean to say we never slept in our own beds but the vast majority of the time we slept with her clear up until about the age of 12. Although she made good money those beds were draped with scrap material from clothes she never got around to making us. We had plenty of clothes but she always bought material saying she was going to start making them for us. She never did and that material was used for covers and sheets. I wet the bed until around … oh man, I think it was the 8^th grade. We didn’t wash those sheets much at all so the smell was quite strong. My sister did not wet the bed like I did. She only wet the bed on her birthday and did that clear up until her late 20’s. You know too, we were never required to clean our room until we reached high school. … wait that’s not true. We were in the 2^nd grade but I don’t recall having to clean it after that. In the 4^th grade we were not required to clean that room. As I got older I cleaned it by choice and not by requirement or force. We had other chores but the bedroom wasn’t one of them…not that I recall. I don’t think it was other than the 2^nd grade that we had to clean the room or else.

Choice, the doc said that now I have more choices because I’m an adult. We talked about how hard it is for me to eat and feel like I deserve it because I didn’t work my ass off before I ate. He said I didn’t have to go by that standard anymore he said I have the right to set my own standards now and said that I can choose things on my own..things like how my bedroom is laid out and what colours I use in there. There are colours I refuse to use because I don’t want my room to look like that of someone defenseless- a child. Although my favorite colour is soft pink there is never a time when I want that colour to be dominant in that room. I don’t even wear that colour but I do love it. I don’t my room to look like a little girls room or for me to look like a little girl because to me, being a little girl is dangerous and it makes me a sitting duck (defenseless)……………..

Beds and bedrooms are hard but my medical doc said my lack of sleep is literally killing me. I could force myself to stay awake for up to 4 days at a time (6 days short of the average time it takes for a human to die without sleep.) I just didn’t want to lie down. I didn’t want to walk in that bedroom and climb on the bed. I kept looking at the door expecting her to be standing in the doorway. I could feel someone above me; I thought someone slipped into bed beside me. I listened for footsteps to come close to the door until I just couldn’t take it and got up to leave the room. Walking into that bedroom and lying down is only a fraction of the battle. I have to actually sleep and sleep means my brain is going to vomit up the past like a 3 day old re-warmed Quickie Mart burrito. Of course there is the anxiety (or emotional diarrhea) that follows. That takes hours to get over once I do finally wake up. So, the whole issue of sleep is rather …well, its messed up.

Recently I’ve started sleeping on the loveseat and then in the middle of the night when I’m too drowsy to think I get up and get in the bed. I told the new doc/therapist this and he paused to consider my statement. He said he supposed there was no hard and fast rule and certainly no laws saying I have to sleep in a bed. He asked if it was negatively affecting my health. I think he was talking about back and neck problems. I said no and he said then if it works then fine. He again said it was my choice to do so.

I make the loveseat with blankets and pillows then heat the lavender aromatherapy pillow. The dog is at my side and the kitten lies on my chest. I fall asleep that way with so much less anxiety and fear. I don’t keep looking up. My imagination isn’t looking for the mother; it’s not waiting to hear her approaching footsteps. It’s not waiting to hear her sing the “safe song.”

With the mother we knew the night would go well if she sang a certain song. If we heard her sing this song then we knew it would be a safe and calm night. My mother may have been a devil but she sang like an angel. “Go down Moses, way down in Egypt’s land. Tell ‘ol Pharaoh to let my people go. They worked so hard they could not stand. Let my people go.” I’m tellin’ ya, she sang like an angel but her skill for violence and follow through on destructive purpose were much like that of the devil himself. She was beautiful too.

Now, in 2006 I don’t need to hear her sing to know that I’m safe. I don’t need to hide inside her voice for protection or send up prayers so that she never stopped singing. I’m trying my hardest to change my views on sleeping so I have to start with the place that I sleep.

Grounding Tools: Things that remind me that I live in my own house, things that let me know I’m not in my mother’s home …

1. My mother would never have a dog in her house but she would certainly never have a cat. When I see Captain & Gracie I can know for sure that the mother is NOT in this house, that I’m in my own home.

2. (Ownership) I try to remember where I bought certain things so that I know it was me as an adult that made purchases and that they were not in the home when I was a kid, therefore I’m in my own home as a relatively safe adult.

3. (Scent) I have aromatic sprays, incense and spray disinfectants, things my mother never had because of allergies. I don’t think my mother would like sandalwood anyway or jasmine and vanilla. I don’t think she would like the scent of burning candles. These things were never in our home back then and are a visual as well as sensual cue that I live in my own home and set the standards for what is acceptable and what is not. I like that thought, I set the standards. I really like that thought.

J of A