The things that keep you up at night

Imagine it’s the end of the day. You did your nighttime routine. Everythings off, and you double-check that the door is locked. You feel satisfied. You feel safe, right? So you crawl into bed. You might even tell your significant other good night, or if there’s not one maybe a pet. My point is you are in bed still feeling safe. You check your phone before you put it down for the night. You close your eyes thinking you will now sleep.

WRONG you hear a noise. A NOISE! Is it the fridge? The loud neighbors? Of course not, it has to be a fucking monster. Every single noise you hear won’t come to you like sounds of anything that they actually are. No, it has to be someone breaking in. It has to be someone there to harm you in any possible way. It doesn’t matter that you’re locked in. Or that your significant other is literally right next to you, and would be alerted if theses were real sounds of danger.

So you lay in bed and watch the door. You don’t know what you’re watching for. You just know if you sleep now something bad will probably happen.

You imagine a man emerging from the darkness of your kitchen. He is your monster. You try to tell yourself there is literally no possible way for a person to just appear out of thin air. But you watch for the man regardless.

You play on your phone. You tell yourself you’ll just stay up for another hour or two. You think you won’t stay up all night again. At some point, you will finally get over this ridiculous fear and go to sleep.

Some nights you are right, but tonight you are wrong... again. You don’t sleep. Instead, you watch video after video on Facebook. Now it’s two in the morning. Maybe you’ll finally try. I mean you got to sleep at some right? Maybe if you cuddle close to your significant other you’ll feel safe again. Maybe just maybe their warmth will ward off the intruders and bad thoughts.

Instead, you lay in the dark wide awake. You think of the man that could still appear in your doorway. You think of literally every mistake you made in your life. You think of all the traumas you endured in your life. Because what better time to do this than in the middle of the night, when you should be asleep.

You might even kick yourself. You thought tonight would be different. You needed tonight to be different. Every single night you tell yourself you are safe. You try so hard to believe you are safe. You envy the person sleeping next to you. Actually you envy every soundly sleeping person in the world right now.

You start to grow more frustrated with each passing second that you are still awake. You know that if you had gone to bed when you were supposed to, things would be so much better. You know that in only a couple hours now your significant other will get up, and get ready, and go to work. If you can’t sleep in the safety of their arms, how are supposed to sleep alone? So you toss and turn until you eventually fall asleep.

It is now six in the morning. Your significant other kisses you. They are about to leave. You contemplate asking them to stay, just so you can sleep some more. You don’t, but it’s always tempting. After they leave you start your day off by going back on your phone. You start your day thinking tonight will be different. Only the cycle starts all over again.