Maybe I’ll just sleep…

I try not to talk. I take in the smell. I hear the rain sounds layered with instrumental music in the background. I feel the table creak as they move around me. I hear their breath and try not to feel weird about it. I drift in and out of sleep. I like that it’s an allotted time, they will wake me. I only ever see a woman. The feeling of safety is higher with them. For 45 minutes, or an hour if I’m lucky, I’ll drift in and out of thoughts. Trying really hard not to have any thoughts at all.

When I was really little, I remember feeling like I was holding my breath when it was quiet — like I had a few seconds, maybe less, before the yelling started. Before we’d go off on a no-so-thought-out adventure that would lead to someone getting hurt or spending more money than we had.

I remember almost getting frostbite one Christmas, the adventure was Coastal Texans visiting Red River, New Mexico. I sort of remember the adventures of snow and exploration, but they are a lot quieter than the yelling that ensued or the crazy accidents that just happened. My father’s constant refrain of, “this will make a good story someday,” as my mother’s eyes bulged trying to warm my toes, trying to figure out the redness and weird welts.

I also remember when I was right at 8 years old. I didn’t completely understand what was happening at the time, I do now. What I remember without context was this feeling of pressure. Of knowing the heavy silence was everyone in the room trying to not blow up, that’s what my child mind called regulating. Ha! I remember in this instance there was grief, one of my uncle’s had just died at aged 29. I enjoyed the memories of him, but it was hard to contrast that against the last time I’d seen him. So frail, people not allowing me to touch him.

There was also so much anger and shame in that room. I knew those feelings at 8 too, church can drill shame in hard. I didn’t understand that last part in this space for a long time though, why should we be ashamed of him dying. He was so thin and fragile, shouldn’t we just love him. I remember knowing there would be yelling, uncontrollable rage pouring out of my other uncle, my mother, my father soon. I would feel unsafe, I wanted to fix it. I remember trying to make myself small, trying to leave, even trying to say the right thing. None of it worked. Later I learned my uncle was a gay man who died of AIDS in the 80s. I’m still processing that one.

It’s hard to know yourself when you are always watching everyone else first. I don’t know myself, I second guess me, my wants, my needs all the time. Have I ever known myself? What I wanted? Maybe it started when I was a child? I do remember liking praise. Being good at something. I don’t remember being good at much though.

But who the fuck cares! I’m so tired of the part of me that thinks I’m supposed to figure it out. Fix it. Trace it back to the exact moment it all went wrong and do the work of making it right. I sometimes hate the millennial in me, the woman in me, the mother in me, that reaches for self help books. Sometimes it’s not my things to work on or fix. Sometimes I just need to not give a damn. That’s hard when I see merit in a person or idea. When I watch someone I love struggling, the pull to dive in and help is so strong. What would happen if I did nothing? I don’t know how.

I struggle daily to be alone. Especially as a mother. Also as a partner. Physically, mentally, and emotionally too. To be still and quiet. To find me under all of them and their needs. I don’t know how to clear my mind. To drift and wonder and not fill in the lists. Sure, some of the lists are creative and interesting, but I cannot be still or quiet. I struggle. At night it’s the hardest — the insomnia, anxiety, a racing mind.

I do remember wanting to be a singer as a child. I remember singing loudly to ‘The Judds’ or ‘The Eagles’ and losing myself. Moving my body, dancing around the room. Music was the one place I could get close to calm in my body and mind. I could even lay still listening to a song over and over, the knowing of the beat that came next. The familiarity of the dip in the singers voice. It almost felt soothing. I still do that. Put headphones in, and listen to someone else’s words. The feeling in their voice. It helps me regulate. It helps me be still.

At night I read until my mind stops listing what I owe the world. Sometimes twenty minutes. Sometimes two hours. When I finally put the book down, in the dark, in the quiet, I notice I’m usually still holding my breath. I don’t know when I started. Did I ever stopped. It’s like I’m still waiting. Those few seconds before something breaks the silence.

I don’t make regular appointments for massages. I should, if just for the forty-five minutes someone else will be in charge of what happens next. I can just drift. Maybe I’ll find something under all the quiet. Maybe I’ll just sleep.