3:55am April 26, 2015

Delirium dreams, and question about objects not behaving as they should in dreams

Hither and yon [E E E E–]
Thither and yon [B B B B–]
Hither and yon [E E E E–]
Thither and yon [B B B B–]

Hither and yon [E E E E–]
Thither and yon [B B B B–]
Hither and yon [E E E E–]
Thither and yon [B B B B–]

Hither and thither [E E E E E–]
And yon and yon [B B– B B–]
And hither and thither [E E E E E E–]
And yon and yon [B B– B B–]

And hither and thither [E E E E E E–]
And yon and yon [B B– B B–]
And hither and thither [E E E E E E–]
And yon and yon [B B– B B–]

Repeat infinitely and rapidly in a chorus of bass voices, with cartoonish things that look like men in top hats but ain’t so, in repetitive motion coming from the hats, and you could get one of my delirium dreams from the hospital.

I don’t know why I find things like this scarier than nightmares of the usual sort, but I do. A lot of my more ordinary nightmares still have to do with ordinary objects not behaving in ordinary ways. My brother told me he once had a, nightmare where turning off the tv with the off knob wouldn’t turn it off and neither would unplugging it. I instantly knew why that was terrifying. More terrifying than getting chased by zombies, which has happened to me a couple times in dreams.

Also note #actuallydelirious tag. Because the #delirium and #delirious tags are full of delirium as a metaphor, or else references to the Neil Gaiman character Delirium.

Posted to #actuallyautistic because I’m curious if the kind of dream my brother had is an autism-specific form of nightmare, a neurodivergent-specific kind of nightmare, or a nightmare no matter who has it. I have reasons to wonder if dreams of objects behaving in ways they shouldn’t are scarier to autistic than nonautistic people, but no evidence either way.

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