The first couple of days weren't so bad. I was used to going without sleep at this point, so I kept myself busy. I read my Classical Latin textbooks, I fucked around on the computer, I watched the same Chop Socky and cheesy horror flicks I grew up with, and waited for daybreak to go to school, interact with people my own age, and then go home to do the same things all over again. Lather, rinse, repeat. That is, until I remained awake for the fifth day. The fifth dawn caught me off guard. I was used to ignoring my sleep cycle, but I figured that I would finally crash and succumb to the silent succor of slumber. But nope, there I was, awake on the fifth dawn, and wearily reticent for it.
I went to school, and did the daily tasks, but by noon, I was starting to feel rather uncomfortable. I could feel a tingly sensation, like there were thousands of insects crawling on me. I spent the next 3 days in that state of discomfort. I would rub my shoulders and legs, I would scratch my back, anything and everything was done to remove the sensation. In fact, by the time the ninth day dawned, I was almost in agony. I was starting to scratch myself raw in some areas, and I was starting to show a twitchy, anxious persona that people knew wasn't what I was. The closest I could compare it to is someone you can tell is obviously abusing Methamphetamines, with the bouncy gait, sunken eyes, and slight shaking. I was starting to become a wreck, and it was obvious to anyone who could see me.
The ninth day was a Friday, so I just put my head down, and powered through all the itchiness and feelings of discomfort I was going through. If you want to know torture, be buried up to your neck in sand, and then realize that you have an intense desire to scratch your nose. Now, apply that to your entire person. The entire day, I was pulled aside by my teachers, who were making sure that I was okay. I told them that there was some issues at home, and that I wasn't getting sleep because of it, but I was used to that, and told them not to worry. Let me tell you now: anyone tells you not to worry, is the exact point that you should START. Cause while I was talking with my World Religion teacher, I saw that there was something on his shirt. Not a stain, mind you. But there was something MOVING, like it was inadvertently sewn in, and was trying to escape.
It wriggled and jostled, moving the entire time he was talking to me. I stared as it moved inside his sweater, bulging and sliding along the weave pattern across his chest and up to the collar. The sound of the chime for my next class shocked me out of my state, and I apologized to him if I had zoned out, and quickly made my way to class. I didn't see anything else that day, but I knew I wasn't entirely right in the head. I needed sleep, and I needed it BADLY. Come Hell or high water, I would force myself to sleep that night. I made it through my day, made it home, and immediately set myself on exhaustion. I went walking. I piled firewood. I skipped dinner. I exercised like mad. I played my PS1 for hours. I did my homework. And when I felt the first twinge of tiredness, I immediately jumped into bed. And then, I WAITED.
I was in bed for several hours. I just couldn't fall asleep for the death of me. So I started to do what I was taught in the 4th Grade: I closed my eyes, and I began to meditate. I spent a solid hour just shutting myself off from the world, and I could tell it was working. My mind was falling out of overdrive, and finally letting myself relax. I started to feel good, that I had accomplished something I may never have before. A full night of sleep, under my own terms and nothing to stop me from actual rest. Feeling great would be the simplest way I could claim it.
The sensation of something on my arm made me react. I moved to deal with whatever was there, but as I reached for it, the feeling of something creeping up my leg began to show itself. I was willing to write it down as nerves, until the mattress beneath me began to roil and squirm. I could feel myself lifting and falling with each movement, as the crawling sensation began to spread across me. I grabbed the blankets on top of me, noticing their squishier pliant nature, and flung them off. And I noticed that I had nothing on me. But the sensation underneath me would not cease. I jumped out of bed, to see what would be big enough to force me, a 215 lbs. teen at the time, to fling themselves out of bed, and ran to the light. And as it flickered on, I could see the bed quickly settle down, the lump underneath where I laid rapidly fading until it seemed there was nothing there. And that was only further compounded by the fact that I tore the bed apart, looking for any clues of what may have been large enough to move my entire person off the bed.
So I remade my bed, and spent the next 4 days avoiding my bed entirely.
But it wasn't just my bed that writhed with a life only I could see. Over those next 4 days, I saw clothes beginning to move and squirm, walls began to bulge and recede, floors lifting and the bulges they made sliding along and then recede, and even pieces of wood that I would gather for the fireplace breathed with the sensation of life in my hands. I couldn't read, I couldn't play games, I couldn't even sit anywhere or wear clothes without the sensation of movement and the tingle of invasion of my person. It was getting stronger and stronger, and I couldn't stand to ignore it for much longer. I was shaking badly, my appetite was essentially gone entirely, and I was pale to the point of illness. I couldn't think, couldn't eat, and definitely couldn't sleep. I was already going through a severe depression at this point, and this lack of sleep exasperated things to the breaking point. I was starting to believe that the only relief I would get would be if I died, but I wasn't going to give in that easily.
On the fourteenth day, I pulled myself up from the wriggling floor, dressed in the clothes that showed the least activity, and powered through my day. I didn't speak, I didn't eat, and I didn't do anything other than do what I needed to do, and get home. I had one goal in mind: find out whatever was there, and get rid of it. I waited until nightfall, when I would try to once and for all find what was bothering me and get the sleep that I desperately needed. When my parents went to bed, I took a knife from my kitchen and cut open a corner of my top blanket. The wave of bugs, all types and sizes, poured out of the hole I made, crawling all over me. The sensations on my person from before exploded with activity, madly thrashing and wildly wriggling to escape the confines of my clothes. From head to toe, I felt the entirety of my person awash in the sensation of insects exploring my entire person. I dropped the blanket, and moved to rid myself of these things.
The floor moved. The bed was moving. The walls were moving. Everything around me, and on me, was alive with movement, and the sounds of these invaders was deafening. I stumbled in my panicked state, feverishly moving to rid the insects on me, when a sudden movement on my bed caught my attention. I stared at the hole I had made, and was aghast at what was coming out of it. Long, flat tapeworms began to squirm out, rushing to move themselves off of the bed, and pouring themselves towards me. The movement in the walls seemed to push me towards them, as I futilely attempted to escape. They quickly wrapped around my leg, sliding themselves around and up it, slipping underneath my shirt. I could feel them, teasing my torso, looking for entry into me. I began to cry, for I openly feared this incredible violation that I was about to experience. They slid up my neck, and seemed to stare at me. As they slowly began to move inside, I did the only thing I could: I passed out in fear.
I was awoken by my parents, found on the floor, covered in sweat and tears, babbling in my unconscious state. My parents were startled by the sounds that emanated from my room, and checked in on me when the sounds stopped. My dad helped me up, and told me that it was probably time to sleep. I twisted my head, staring at my bed frame, scared of what awaited me if I did. But there was nothing. No insects. No worms. No signs of entry, outside of the hole I made in one corner of a blanket. The walls and floors stayed still, and my clothes refused to move. My dad told my mom that I was seriously distressed, and that I might need a bit of time to recover. So I was forced to take over a week from school. Five of those days I spent asleep, the longest period of exhaustion I had ever experienced essentially forcing me into a mini-coma. When I came back to school, everyone wanted to know where I had been, but I refused to answer.
I had essentially gone made from insomnia, and I still feel it to this day. In fact, I'm currently on day 6. I'm itchy again, but this time I can tell it's different. The sensation isn't ON my person, anymore. IT'S IN IT.
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