Somnambulist

SOMNAMBULIST

When I first saw them, I thought sleeping in a sleepsack would be like sleeping in a coffin, only more comfortable. Turns out it isn’t. But not for the reasons I’d imagined. Maybe it would be without electric pads up my doodad and on my nipples. They send shocks at random intervals. It’s ironic complaining so loudly though – ironic because I put them there myself.

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September

Ever since splitting with my boyfriend a little over three months ago, I’ve had strange dreams. At first they gave a feeling like I’m being held down, other times I felt constricted. Nothing too unusual, at first I put it down to the break-up and work stress. I work in an office and there’s been a lot of deadlines lately. I read when you’re over-stressed, you sometimes dream strange things. And these dreams sure were strange.

And truth be known, I blush when I say that sometimes it’s nice to be held down. Letting go of control during sex is sexy, the same way I feel sexy wearing a nice tight corset and heels, seeing guys look at me out of the corner of their eyes when I walk by. Political correctness be damned, it’s nice being noticed. Being 27 years old simply makes me knowledgeable and even more sexy, in my opinion.

So I continued sleeping the sleep of the innocent, anticipating each night where the dreams would lead me. I remember night by night they became more intense. Then I remember one morning I awoke with my arms stretched out towards the corners of the headboard. Strange. A few mornings later I awoke with arms AND legs spread‑eagled towards the corners of the bed, and flushed as if I’d just had a good bout of sex. Stranger still.

I’m not an innocent girl – I’ve seen adult magazines and porn on the Internet. Like I said, I’ve worn corsets and heels before, and even own a catsuit bought from a company called “Winter Fetish”. The boyfriend bought one for me as a Christmas present – he said it was a “House of Gord” spandex catsuit. I don’t know who “House of Gord” is but I know that black catsuit makes my ass look fantastic, and the seamline running down the back of the legs makes me feel like I’m wearing a full-body pair of tight stockings. It even has a zipper in j-u-s-t the right place for j-u-s-t the right times. Sexy sexy sexy. He showed me bondage pictures where the girl is tied to a bed with her arms and legs spread, just like mine were when I was waking up. I was too shy to ever allow him to tie me that way, but the fantasy of me tied down while he undid the lower zipper of my catsuit … well, it embarrasses me to say it made me a little wet and I’d probably have let him do to me it if we’d stayed together a little longer.

I started to do a little research - I noticed that the more tired I was when I went to sleep, the stranger the position I would wake up in. If I wasn’t really tired or was having a short afternoon nap, I’d wake up on my back with my wrists crossed up near my throat, as if my wrists were chained together and to and to an invisible collar. If I was tired to a normal level I’d wake up with my arms and legs outstretched to the corners of the bed, sometimes on my front and sometimes on my back . If I was really tired, for some reason I’d wake up on my left side, with both arms relaxed behind me (my left arm uncomfortably underneath my body) and my legs pulled up behind me.  It’s a position I’ve since found out is called a “hogtie”. I never awoke sore or in pain, but always refreshed and a little flushed. As my flat-mate Kim says, “…strangerer and strangerer…”.

Again, I’m embarrassed to say that sometime I’d lock my door then purposely go to sleep wearing my “House of Gord” spandex catsuit, just so I could live out the fantasy of waking up flushed and tied in a fake spreadeagle. All the fun of kinky sex, without the ropemarks. I’m so naughty!

But the most embarrassing story of all was when Kim and I went for a girls night out. We drank way too much wine, swapped too many stories and stayed out way too late. That was fine, except that we missed the last train home and had the choice of a $95 taxi fare from the city to home in the suburbs or a wait for the first train of the morning. Truth be known, I was kind of curious to see what would happen if I missed an entire night of sleep so I talked Kim into saving the taxi fare and waiting for the first train.

It wasn’t fair not warning Kim of my … err … sleep “condition” because in my tiredness I’d not closed my door properly and when she passed my room in the morning I must have been quite a sight. She had woken early with a need to go to the toilet, and through the slit in the doorway, seen me lying in what can only be described as a “sleeping strappado”.

As when I was tired, I had rolled onto my left side into what I now call my sleeping hogtie with my arms behind me, but in my tiredness my shoulders had also rolled back bringing my elbows close together. My arms had also raised behind me to point at the top, corner bedpost. In contrast, my legs were together and pointed straight to the opposite, lower bedpost. This tension between my strappadoed arms and extended legs had forced my body to bend to accommodate. My head (according to Kim) was bent back forcing my mouth open, and looking to the whole world as if my hair had been tied to my elbows. A small dribble of drool was leaking from my open mouth onto the sheets beneath me. Geez, I m-u-s-t have been tired!

Poor Kim obviously saw me and thought I was in trouble somehow, because she immediately ran in and shook me awake. I’ve heard a rumour that you should never wake sleep‑walkers (and I guess sleep-bondagers) because it’s a hell of a shock to the system. To be forced out of a deep, warm sleep where I felt enclosed and held tight, to an image of a terrified friend and to the feeling of my body being contorted into a strict bondage position, was awful. I screamed – naturally – and then Kim screamed. And then I screamed. Then we both screamed. It must have been quite a sight, I’m sure all our male friends would have laughed their asses off at the girly-girls if they’d been there.

But the circulation in my arms and legs hadn’t yet caught up with me, and my brain was still foggy from sleep. So it took a few minutes for my limbs to come back to their waking positions. Kim sat concernedly next to me, and I explained how my sleep had changed recently. I explained that though my positions looked strenuous, there was no rope or straps holding me in place and that I had no explanation for it, yet at no time was I hurting or suffering.

To this day Kim is a cynic, but thank God she also doesn’t think me crazy or psychotic. Respecting my desire to not see a doctor lest I look like a loon, she did some research on sleep disorders and found a term I’d heard of but never investigated – “somnambulism”. She says at a very general level it means sleepwalking, and what I’ve got is apparently a strangerer form of that, in a very roundabout way.

Kim is a very good friend, and of course she’s concerned about me. I gave her a big scare that morning. Her research also found that electrical stimulation can be used to disrupt brain waves and restore normal function. Kind of like the way people suffering from Parkinson’s Disease can have their symptoms reduced via implanting an electrode in their brains.

I’m not q-u-i-t-e at the level requiring brain surgery (yet!), but I followed her research and found a small TENS unit on the internet. They’re harmless if used properly and some people use it for sexy play so I tried it and was surprised to see it seemed to reduce my symptoms. Then oops - I started using it for sexy solo play too. Naughty! These days I combine the two, and use it for sexy play as I sleep. Heh!  It also turned out that the same place that makes my catsuit – Winter Fetish - also sells a thing called a “sleepsack”, as well as sexy fetish gear such as armbinders, PVC catsuits and more. The sleepsack though was the damndest thing I’d ever seen – it’s like a sleeping bag had sex with a pair of spandex tights, and the happy baby born was a sleepsack. My logic is that being restrained during the night in that will stop my arms and legs moving to some weird position through the night.

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January

So far, so good – I’ve found a combination of electricity and sleepsack at night is working wonders for my somnambulism. The trick was convincing Kim to zip me in and out of the sleepsack every night and morning. She made me promise to permanently accept responsibility for taking out the garbage, sigh. But between me and you – though she says she doesn’t like zipping me in and out of the sleepsack, I think she secretly does! I miss waking up all spreadeagled and feeling flushed though…

06.04.10