In the dark hours of this morning, well before dawn, I felt a movement on my bed. Too heavy for Kitsune, our cat. Too light for Nick, my eldest who at 12 is 51 kg of rugby-toughened muscle.
It was Chris. In a soft voice that trembled slightly he said ‘Dad, I had a really bad dream.’
‘Come and cuddle’ I said. ‘There’s nothing to worry about, my darling. It was just a dream and everything’s fine’. He snuggled against me, his head on my shoulder, my arm around him.
In a minute or two he gave a few little twitches and was asleep.
Chris is 9. Creative, with a vivid imagination. Funny, deeply loving and remarkably considerate. For nearly a week the nightmares were a problem. They were started by a murder-movie trailer on TV at his mother’s home. Two days later Chris phoned to ask if he could sleep at my house. The boys divide their time equally between their divorced parents. Chris said he kept waking his mother and she was now so sleep-deprived that she needed a break from him and his bad dreams in her bed.
While I collected him from his Mum’s my housekeeper laid out his pyjamas, put on the light on “his” side of my bed and a glass of water there so he knew he was welcome. That first night he woke twice, trembling. He managed to sleep through the next. The third night he went happily back to sleeping in his own bed, just as long as I cuddled him to sleep in it. The nightmares were gone. Today’s was an anomaly.
At Chris’ age I had nightmares too. I tossed, turned and talked in my sleep as well. In one nightmare I was falling from a high cliff that a school bully had pushed me off. I was falling at a terrible speed and knew I was about to die on the rocks rushing up at me. I braced for the impact, the pain, the end.
Then I stopped falling and awoke in my father’s arms. They were warm, strong and smelled of family. Of safety. Of love. He had heard my restlessness, came to check and caught me as I fell out of bed.
Since my sons were born I too have slept like my father, one ear tuned to the sounds of my family. In the beginning it was the anxiety of a new dad. That and listening for the fussing that called me to give a night feed when I was back from travelling and giving their mum a break.
These nights I listen for Nick on his phone at an hour when he should be asleep and for Chris’ occasional nightmare. As I do I often remember the night my father saved my life. Thank you, Bruce. Always. For everything.
Living Loving Learning 