Sometimes late at night...

Sometimes I have terrible nightmares.

Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night feeling all freaked out but don't know why. It's important for me to try to calm myself before my stress levels rise too much when this happens. Sometimes, the voices in my head get really busy at night time. Last night when I got into bed I felt like the words were rushing round my head so fast I couldn't make them out. I tried for a minute to fathom who was saying what and then I decided to try to ignore it because I was so tired, I just needed a good sleep. I felt anxious.

Sometimes, in the space between us getting into bed and me falling asleep I find myself feeling extremely scared and anxious. I can't pinpoint why. My body becomes super tense and jumpy and fidgetty. My feet jerk about and my breathing gets erratic and I scratch at myself uncontrollably (some of my parts suffer from dermatillomania). I switch to an anxious, scared child part. Sometimes I will wimper and snuggle up to my husband; he often realises it's Little C and will comfort us. He'll stroke my head and tell me everything is OK and there's nothing to be worried about. This often helps, sometimes it doesn't.

If he's already asleep, I don't like to wake him. Sometimes this part will suck their thumb to comfort themselves. My husband doesn't like us doing this. Not surprisingly really although if he understood how it can soothe a scared child maybe he wouldn't mind so much.

Anyway, I digress. Last night I tried to ignore the rushing and words. I fell asleep but woke again in the night with a really bad headache. I think that sometimes, if there are parts that are feeling very active, they can stay awake while I am sleeping. I don't think my body is doing very much except for probably shifting about in the bed and remaining in a tense state. But then, who knows? My husband doesn't talk of me getting up in the night, which makes me feel I'm probably not doing things unawares, but then he doesn't often mention the times when I know I have gotten up and gone downstairs, like last night.

When I lived at home as a teenager, my mum would sometimes ask if I had been up in the night. She'd say she heard me pottering around in my room. I wondered if I was sleep walking. I often would have woken in the morning feeling as though I had just run a marathon. Now I wonder if it was an alter who was busy doing something in the night.

I like to think that nowadays I am more aware of the alters when they take over. I tend to feel as though I'm still there, I'm looking out through my eyes, but someone else is in charge.

For example, a few nights ago I got up in the night and went downstairs, I remember doing that, but I felt different, like it was Little C that was taking me down there. I was observing myself from within myself, if that makes any sense?

Well, as a child might do, she opened the back door and stuck her head outside because she was curious about what it would be like at night in the garden. She looked up at the moon and stars and sniffed in the cold air and felt a bit excited. She shut the door again and started jumping about the kitchen, flinging her arms about in a childish way. I remember being a bit taken aback and pondering how ridiculous I would appear to anyone outside looking in. Then she went back upstairs and got into bed and I fell asleep.

Sometimes I wake during the night as an alter. I might wake for just a few seconds and realise, this is this part or this is that part (as I am the observer I am usually aware although I have a feeling I'm not always observing). So I guess there is a lot going on when I'm sleeping.

Does anyone else share my experiences?