So there is this drug that they have tested to see what occurs to you while you sleep. The studies are pretty amazing actually, worth checking out for sure. A large majority of the people who were in the study said they’d never take it again, it was just “too much”. That’s saying something considering those tested were very familiar with psychedelic drugs to begin with. More or less all found that shortly after waking, they forgot everything they saw, felt etc. it is the same as when we awaken, and most of our dreams kinda of fuzz out and fade away. Rarely do we actually recall them. There are those dreams that seem to stick with us for whatever reason, good bad or indifferent for whatever reason. Same essential effects of occurred to those in this study.
Now I am as many who know me well, not an avid of fan of sleep. I rather detest it, can’t really stand it and would greatly prefer to be sanding drywall to sleeping. I dislike them both to extreme proportions though I think sanding drywall I may like only slightly less. Not by much mind you, but to a slightly ever so slightly lesser degree. Root canals rank in this group as well, that seems to be along the same lines. Fortunately I rarely need a root canal, and unfortunately my propensity toward building leads me to sanding drywall far more often than I’d like. Sleep however is something I do the most, and sadly it occurs about every other day. I try to avoid it as long as I can, but eventually exhaustion does give in and I have to get at least a few hours.
I don’t sleep well; I haven’t in so long I can’t recall when it was I actually had a good night’s sleep. If Matt is not sleeping when my exhaustion hits and I am forced to sleep alone, I sleep even worse, mostly because I can never generate enough body heat not to be utterly freezing. I suppose I dream when I sleep, though normally I do not recall the dreams. I usually awaken shaking, or screaming, or frantic unless Matt is in bed with me. I am prone to nightmares, and he’s gotten used to knowing when I’m having one and wakes me. He asks me sometimes what it was about, most of the time I just refuse to say and work on catching my breath. The limited thing he does hear is simply that, “It was bad.” That shard of information is not exactly conclusive by any means. They did get worse after I moved to sex crimes, but they were rather horrid long before then.
A few dreams have stuck with me, a handful at best, but one in which I stood in a cemetery, absolutely terrified, freezing, and it was gray and windy. I knelt there praying. I can recall the terror in me, the more scared I was the louder and harder I prayed. Much like when I was on the job, though this was before I joined the department. I was maybe 11 or 12. I’m not sure who I had gone to the cemetery to see, merely that I had to be there, for something, something drew me there. I knew it wasn’t safe to be there, but I had to be, for some inexplicable reason. I saw something coming for me and I shut my eyes tightly and prayed and was suddenly filled with warmth, and I was safe. I was still there, in the cemetery, still dreary, gray, and windy, but something was with me, keeping me safe, protecting me. I continued to pray, and as I did it became brighter, and the warmth spread to a heat. (I love heat, it’s never hot enough for me, ever.) It was a weird dream. That was it; it was a nightmare kind of but yet not. Ended well, so I put that one in the win column. For me, this was a good dream.
Another dream I had was chasing someone on the job. I was overly conscious of my flashlight, holding it away from my body, as they were armed. No sense giving them a target ya know? “Gee look a nice bright light to tell ya exactly where my body is, brilliant.” I chased them through the moonlit woods into an abandoned house. I recall a set of steps up and a set down. I heard noise downstairs and went down, to find a stone altar, not a good kind of altar, a scary kind of altar. I was grabbed by like 20 hands, flung upon it and then the house literally fell in on me. That’s a normal sort of dream for me. Now ya see why I despise sleep?
Well it seems to be that this drug replicates sleep. Those tested say that it’s a much more intense sort of thing than sleep. Some have said that they suspect it’s also what you experience upon initially dying, as the pineal gland, which secrets this into your body goes into overdrive and floods you system with this stuff. Matt found that interesting as well and we both laughed when he said, “No wonder you keep coming back! It’s like sleeping!” I’ve been clinically dead a fair number of times. If it’s like sleeping, I’m just going to keep coming back like a superball, no way I’m staying there, eww. I guess for some that wouldn’t be so bad, I know a fair number of people who actually enjoy sleep, seriously enjoy it, and look forward to it even. It boggles my mind. I can’t even begin to understand that.
Matt likes sleep, but he tries to fight it somewhat too. He’s of nearly the same mindset that if you’re sleeping you’re missing stuff. Not sure what stuff exactly, but ….stuff. I figure with the amount of time I’ve actually not slept I’ve lived likely 2 lifetimes in one. Kinda cool actually.
As a kid I liked sleeping. I had a lot of flying dreams. I can recall telling my Gram about buzzing through and over the barn regularly. She was pretty sure I’d grow up to get a pilot’s license I flew so often in my dreams. I don’t recall doing that in a long time though, although it’s hard to say as I don’t recall my dreams really, rarely, one maybe 2 every 5 years or so. Someone told me once to keep paper by the bedside to write them down upon waking. Apparently upon waking I was lucid enough to write simply, “You don’t want to remember this.” So I’m not sure what it was just that it was better not to know.
In a majority of my dreams I’m running. I run instead of walk pretty much everywhere I go all the time, and even when walking I have a long quick stride. I’m not much for meandering unless I’m in the woods with my dog, then we meander in between loping about like deer. It saves me time to run or walk fast. Weirdly though in nearly every dream I’m either running after someone or away from something, usually the proverbial “bad guy”. Guess who gets the drop on the other changes, can’t win ‘em all I guess.
I find the DMT studies interesting but also kind of creepy. Matt thought it was awesome, for him a new facet of life to explore was for me really awful news. Imagine my chagrin to know that right before you die you are faced with all the same things you see when asleep? Bleh. It would explain a lot though about white lights, and that sort of thing so soon after death. I don’t believe the soul leaves the body until after there is no chance of you coming back. I’ve felt a person’s soul leave their body before. There was no way she could be saved.
We were called to an auto accident, SUV vs tree. A woman, 54 years old has driven at a high rate of speed into a tree, air bag did not deploy. In the back seat was a gift for her brand new baby granddaughter. Pictures were strewn across the back seat from the folder the photo place had given her of her holding the newly born infant. My partner and I knew the EMTs would not have time to get there, she was already gone, we had to pull her from the car and begin CPR. He worked the chest; I worked the bag for air. I was bent over her, my knees equidistant to her ears. As I yelled at her to come back, to her baby granddaughter, to fight for her life there was still nothing. The defib charged and went to no avail time and again. She was gone, truly gone. We continued to work on her, we didn’t loose people, we were called the “bring em back alive” team. It was too long though, she was gone too long and I was beginning to worry what if we did bring her back. I looked up at Tommy, my partner while I kneeled over her and was suddenly thrown quite literally back onto my rear, my legs straight out in front of me, jaw dropped and wide eyed I asked him “What was that?!?” I was quite literally thrown back. I had felt a heat so intense it was like touching the rack in the stove, and it passed through me in an instant. He had a serious look on his face when he told me the times that had happened to him; he always believed it was their soul. I asked if he had felt it too, he nodded and we both whispered a prayer for the woman. We had never lost someone before. We both attended her autopsy to find out why we couldn’t save her. In her trench coat we found both insulin and a candy. Her hand was in her pocket when she crashed. She was in diabetic shock. The sweet apple scent of her breath was the telltale sign. When she hit the steering wheel she ruptured her aorta. There was no saving her, no matter how hard we tried. We had lost the battle before we’d even begun. She had taken her seatbelt half way off to reach into her pocket.
That was my singular experience with this. We never lost another person, so I don’t know how often others who deal with death come in contact with this phenomenon. Tommy said it was pretty rare for him. In his 20 years as an EMT (he worked full time as an EMT as well, like most law enforcement he couldn’t survive on a 40 hour officer’s pay) he’d only experienced it a handful of times.
So does the DMT flood your brain in order to prepare your body or your soul? I don’t know, and I am not sure which to even guess at really. Matt wasn’t sure either. He does believe all people have souls, he believes your soul chooses the body 49 days after conception. There’s a reason, though I don’t honestly recall why, that’s just the number I know he’s always referred to. I’m not sure what in his religion it’s tied to. I’ll have to ask him why again.
This study both intrigued me and kind of scared me. The biological aspects of it fascinated me, but the implications within my own logical steps scared me. I imagine those who enjoy sleep though would find it rather fascinating and even somewhat a relief. Interestingly, dogs as well as cats also experience the same effect while in REM sleep. So the next time you see your pooch or your cat having their dreams of sauntering through a field, or climbing the tree, or suckling as is the often heard dream of my three dogs, know that their dreams are induced by the same things ours are. All three of mine seem to favor the suckling dream, noises and little feet kneading at the air and all. It’s rather adorable. They always wake looking so content. I must say I rather envy that. My little female Pug also intermittently sighs these teeny little happy sighs. It’s so cute it’s almost too much to take. At present she’s having one of those very dreams, which is what reminded me of the whole dog and cat connection. If I was sleeping I’d have missed this moment, watching her little feet pad at the air in rhythmic measure, her tiny pink tongue dart in and out of her mouth. It is times like these I’m rather glad I don’t sleep much. It’s just one of those moments in life you savor, store away for the incredible cuteness factor, and store away when you’re having a bad day, it’ll always make you grin.
Of course she awoke the second that I tried to get a photo of it, but I have gotten one in the past when she was younger. Now this is a fine example of a happy sleeping pup.
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