11.11: I woke last night around 2 AM, barely thirty minutes after I originally went to sleep. My youngest was standing in my doorway, wanting to crawl into bed and into the comfort of family and safe, warm, space. Something about the moment terrified me. It wasn’t so much the surprise of him standing there as it was a memory of my own youth and the terror that evening often brought. I was-am-afraid of dying. It isn’t the part after you are dead but the moment itself when you see yourself slipping away, as if someone opened a giant trap door into your life and everything below you is blackness.
What scares me most of all is the recognition of no longer being me–no longer having a sense of this life, loves, family. They will continue on in my absence and, in time, think of me only as a distant memory. I will not be able to see them grow old and love and find family and happiness. I mean, I know little about the hour of my death and could live to 100, but the idea of dying itself is terrifying.
I don’t think it is something you get over. You shelve it, pushing it deep into your sub conscious in the places it cannot be reached until that memory of fear is torn free to envelop you.
Some Thoughts:
- Being this morbid is awful. This, along with the occasional lack of motor control and hallucinations are the hallmarks of a lack of sleep.
- Dog has completely given up on peeing outdoors. Not good…