Chew on this!

I used to have terrible nightmares!

I started reading Stephen King novels when I was twelve or thirteen… Yes you have “R” rated movies (which I was NOT allowed to watch by my parents) BUT we had a “Riding Library” (the library was in a big bus who would go from school to school and every classroom would get half an hour to go in there pick or return your books. If all the grades had their books the bus would go to the "real library" and restock and drive off to the next school).

Nobody had ever heard of “R” rating the books. They had little pictures on the bottoms which would say if it was a horror book, a comedy book or a romantic book but that was about it. I had an extremely overactive imagination and the Stephen King books were exactly what my i needed, i thought... Nobody stopped me from reading them and so I read them all, my imagination getting wilder and wilder upon every new book. I won't  say the books caused the nightmares but they sure didn’t help!

The worst nightmares where pretty much always the same. I would be in a closed off room. All the lights would be off so it would be extremely dark. And I would be trying to find the light switch… no scary monsters, no scary murders, no gore and blood everywhere but the dreams would “feel” so real, it would completely freak me out. And sometimes this literally meant that I would get out of bed and would start searching for the light switch or the door handle to find the light.

I remember one time; I had the same dream, moving around in the dark touching everything trying to find the light switch. I touched my desk, my dresser, my Ethan Hawke, Keanu Reeves and River Phoenix posters and finally I had reached a little shelf (and yes in Holland we build houses out of BRICK) and so this shelve was drilled in with bolds INTO the wall. Somehow I thought that was the door handle that would open the door to the light, and to safety. So I RIPPED THE WHOLE SHELF PLUS BOLTS FROM THE WALL!!! This sent my mom flying up the stairs (my parents slept right below me) and she would scream in panic thinking I was attacked by a burglar or maybe some strange ex boyfriend climbing into my bedroom (read: Boy Trouble)!!!

As soon as she would step into my room and would let the light from the hallway in, I would wake up, get my heart rate under control and crawl back into bed… well, after my mom did a check, check, double check… As soon as we started to put a little night light in my bedroom, the nightmares would turn into a little less of a nightmare, or at least I would stay in bed… big improvement I must say. Also less damaging on my own bedroom…

In 2006 we had sold our house and farm in Holland before our visa’s were approved to come to America and so we had to wait. We had nothing anymore and were pretty much living out of our suitcases (everything was on a boat towards the USA), we needed to live somewhere, so some of my parents (incredibly sweet) friends let us stay with them, until we would get our visa’s and start our American Dream. They had a little area in front of their hog barn which we transformed into a temporary home.

It was a little two bedroom “apartment” and my mom and dad had the bedroom and I slept behind the bookshelf in the living room/kitchen. We made this little area for me so I had a little “privacy”. The problem was that I could hear everything! As soon as my mom and dad would wake up I would wake up behind my bookshelf…. Not good.

So I decided to wear earplugs. You know those kinds that you push together so they get really small, you put them in your ears and they get bigger again and thus eliminate the sounds. They work great!

I was dreaming…

I was dreaming about cute boys…

I was dreaming about this unbelievable nice dinner with a chocolate dessert… It was sooooo real! And the chocolate tasted sooooo good!

Hmmm… Maybe the chocolate was not that good…..

I woke up and O MY GOSH what is that in my mouth!?! Instead of chewing feverishly on my chocolate, I was chewing on my earplug… Trust me… I RAN to the bathroom, spit out my so called chocolate and threw up!

And yes, mom woke up… asked me if I was all right and if my nightmares had returned because she saw me reading a Stephen King novel and I didn’t have a night light… I told her, “No it wasn’t a nightmare I was having, but it sure was a nightmare to wake up like this!”

I don’t wear earplugs anymore. I rather stay awake. And I don’t keep loose things on my bedside table. Who knows what else I might I stick into my mouth when I am asleep.

Do you have “bad” nightmares???


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