I have been diffusing lavender for the last few nights. I have to say that it is actually helping me sleep. I resorted over a year ago now to taking 6.25 mg (yes, super low) of Seroquel nightly because I wasn’t able to sleep. I would only use it on weekends but was still sleep deprived during the week which wasn’t good because trying to do my job was more difficult. I gave in and have used it nightly for a year at that dose until the last few nights. I have been able to take just a tiny bit of it, and I still am able to get to sleep. Unfortunately, I still wake up and have a hard time getting back to sleep or have emotional/bad dreams in the few hours before I have to get up, but something feels a bit different in my head too.

I am exhausted today because of my awesome cat waking me up a few hours before I needed to get up. It made me dream about a similar type of situation of when I lived with my sister for almost two years in the place we had together and her partying phase which kept me triggered horribly the whole time and caused her to be verbally and emotionally abusive towards me (our relationship is improved now that we are not living together and she has a family of her own). The dream I had was so much like it was in real  life, and I woke up feeling upset.

It is really upsetting to me how so many things can bring up so much in real life and in dreams. I would like sleeping to be a safe place/space, but it often isn’t. The other morning, I had another horrible nightmare of men trying to hurt me. I jumped out the window and was running down this dark street and trying to hide in yards or something. I don’t recall the rest of it,but I woke up in sweat and terrified. It wasn’t as bad as the two in one night I had in previous weeks where someone was standing at my bedroom door. That is one of the worst ones because I wake up in the dream and see someone and/or I wake up from a dream terrified and then see someone standing there who isn’t really there. My therapist says it is indicative of having been abused (at least more in those who have it as a recurring dream,but who knows) For me though, I know that it actually is in. I can oddly talk about things I don’t have all the memories for, though it still confuses me.

And today, the sky feels scary. I cannot go out because of this mix of being tired and part of me saying the sky feels scary and something bad will happen. It is also interesting how the weather, certain ways the air smells, certain hot or cold temperatures of the air and ways that the sky looks can trigger familiar things I again have no memory of fully except the feelings. It is unnerving because it happens in the fall and spring usually and triggers a lot of panic and terror.

I have no idea if there is even a safe place inside anywhere or if any parts are in safe places. I would hope so, but I have no idea how things work inside as I have no access to that information. I just would hope it exists somewhere inside since it rarely has on the outside.