How you sleep in grief

Sleep is an inherent basic need, without it your health fails, you go buggy, and you decline. But in grief sleep becomes a weird cycle of pitfalls, solace, frustration and dreams. Since losing Michael my sleep has been at times all-consuming or nonexistent.

 The first week that my son was gone, I didn't sleep more than 2 hours at time. I know I would jerk and move in my sleep violently. The next week was undoing what to me was 3.5 years of muscle memory. My life with my son was my partner worked nights and Mike would either come home or text me where he was staying the night. My pattern had been get sleepy and then once the text or the kiddo came in, go to sleep. I still have a hard time sleeping in bed, my angle lets me see the hallway to his room and subconsciously I still wait for him or the text that is never coming. 

My dreams have been to this point nightmares that rattle me to the core and make the next day anxiety and fearful. The setting is always different but the outcome is the same. Ty and I looking for our son, never finding him. Its panic, where I wake up with chest pains, sweat and tears. Its longing that will never be resolved while you are alive in this world. I wake most nights 2-3 times in the process of vomiting or coughing up burning acid, inner pain erupting out. That is I think for parents who have talked to me about losing a child too, this deep burning searing inside you as you grieve. This memory of taking care of your child and no place to put that routine. If you have faith you know your child is now in supreme safety and joy, but as a mom you are parenting an empty hallway. Parenting an empty hallway fatigues you to the core. It makes you question why all this hate erupts in the world, all this violence, all this racism when at the end of the day, another human being is doing this mourning of a child.  How do we as children of God do this to each other no matter what the race, profession, sexuality or religion? How do we not wish this pain on anyone but create it and try to justify with so must careless excuse. 

The world is a scary place right now and sleep should be solace. Grieving parents grieving families get no respite at night, so how do we survive the day? 

I have many pictures of my son asleep, maybe because he came to us at 16, I was making up for the baby years. Maybe it was because my child lived in chaos for so long that once he came home sleep was peaceful for him. He could relax and let go. He trusted we would keep him safe. It’s hard for me to feel like I have failed him in that. I know kids drive, I know accidents happen, however I am the mom and my son was not in the moment of death safe. His room was also a place where we could talk, really talk. Many times I would say to him I was proud of him or loved him and would rub his head or hug him and you could see him shift and shuffle. Once in a while I would ask him if when I loved on him or told him he was awesome, I made him uncomfortable. He would always tell me know, he loved when I did but at times it overwhelmed him. After being without love for so long in his childhood that now to be loved so deeply he was "still amazed” by how much we loved him.

But when he struggled or was moody and did not want to talk, I would go in his room. He would be laying on the bed and roll over, face the wall and act like I was not there. I would prop myself up on pillows next to him and sit down and just talk. Talk about what I was seeing, what I though was going on, if I was concerned and that we were there when he needed us, he just needed to let us in. I would rub his back and eventually he would roll over and smile and start talking about what was truly going on with him. He would let me sit on his bed and chat nonstop to me while he "cleaned ' (aka moved piles about) his room. I go in his room now as sleep salvation. In great insomnia I can lay there and get at least an hour of dreamless sleep. That lets me survive the day.

My child had the knack of being a stubborn teen nudge right to the moment of pure frustration. And then he would pull back and let us in. The past 3 nights have been waking up choking on bile and burn and nightmares of deep fear and loss. Last night though gave me that moment of peace that once awake let me weep tears of love and loss not terror and emptiness. In the dream I walked through the house dark and feeling trepidation. And then there he was, my Michael in his favorite shirt lying in bed, listening to his iPod. Down to each strand I could see his hair, the clear blueness of his eyes which always meant he was peaceful. And I sat on the bed and stroked his hair and kissed his forehead until for a while my heart did not hurt. And I don't believe it to be a dream but a reminder that he is ok that I love him and even in death we as family still need that.

So if like me you are in a sleep hell cycle, remind yourself that dreams are fleeting. They can be painful and scary but fleeting. Memories are real, love is real and it is what will keep you connect to life.