160mg of caffeine at 4pm seemed like a better idea at the time. The time of 4pm. But here we are at almost 5pm and I’m curious to see how I sleep tonight. I would have to imagine it’ll be better than last night. Although, some strong CBD gummies with a smidge of THC really made Nyquil look like the white belt of sleep aids. In fact, I enjoyed the sleep so much so that I’m going to have to up the dosages on each. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

One thing that did concern me last night (or this morning, depending on how you want to look at the hours) is that at 5:30 I woke to a searing pain in my right side. I got up to use the bathroom and could barely even stumble into it. As I tried to urinate, the pressure on my side felt like it was going to tear into my bladder. Everything hurt and I thought for sure that I had a failing organ. And if an organ really did fail, then I’ve made it almost 12 hours without a particular organ. Seems like literal “dead weight.” I must be a superhuman.

Not really.

But for the 10 minutes that I was awake and enduring this pain, I was thinking about what it could have possibly been caused by. Initially I thought that it had to be intestinal cramping as I had overdone the caffeine from the day before and then decided that bourbon would be the perfect dessert after dinner. There was also a ton of physical activity yesterday. Then I also peered over at the water bottle I had filled for jiujitsu at 6pm that was resting upon my nightstand…it had only a few sips missing from it. So logical Kris said to himself, “This has to be just some severe dehydration paired with the inability to take a ginormous poop.”

REM sleep Kris, with his imagination at full bore thought to himself a little differently. He wanted to take the problem and run with it, granting full access to any anxiety that was laying dormant. He thought to himself, “What if an organ is failing?”

You’re such an asshole, Anxiety Kris. No need for you to rear your head at 530am. It serves no one. You can wait until we’re fully awake to attack us with your insanity. But the thought became real. It grew legs of it’s own. Maybe the bourbon I had that night was the straw of hay that broke the camel’s back, it was the nail in the coffin, it was the drink that did me in? Could my liver be failing? Is this what it will feel like? Panic ran through me like a bull in a china shop on cocaine and steroids. Am I dying? How long do I need to see if this will pass before I wake up Erika and tell her we need to go to the hospital? Should I try and poop? Should I just close my eyes and hope it goes away?

This is where that version of my mind was running to. Just thinking the worst possible outcomes because why wouldn’t you at 530am? Seems like the most productive thing to do with your early AM hours.

But how can one have control over their subconscious like that? As I’ve been reading the Myth of Normal, one thing that the author discusses is how the brain and human are based purely on feeling long before they can have any actual thoughts. So none of us actually think when we’re infantile, we’re just forming how our subconscious thinks through our emotions. If the subconscious is formed before you can actually think, and all of its’ patterns are formed before you can think…how can you actually be in control of your subconscious? This is such a perplexing question because while you’re just barely awake in the morning, you’re really not able to direct any of your thoughts. They fire at you like an automatic paintball gun, leaving you covered in pretty colors and welts. There’s no possible way to think rationally when you feel like your insides are trying to crawl out of you.

This is another “subconscious manifestation” with Halloween right around the corner: What if you have an attachment? You’ve been sad all day for a reason that you can’t understand and you’ve been taking people down with you. What if you picked something up somewhere and it’s draining you of your energy? What if it’s trying to claw its’ way out of you right now? How can you be sure that you’re not fighting some sort of possession?

Again, totally logical.

But in my defense, I wasn’t dealing with the conscious mind, I was dealing with the subconscious. The same subconscious that was formed when I had zero control over it. That part of the mind and the brain formed when I was just coming into the world and everything was based on what I felt, it was all based on the experiences that I lived through. Which experiences left a part of my brain to seek the absolute worst possible outcome of situations? Holy shit, as I type this, I’m learning I do this more frequently then I’d like to admit. Am I manifesting my life through my subconscious? Am I only seeing the worst possible outcome because that’s where my brain goes? What in the actual fuck. Where did this come from? Where did all this fear come from? I guess I’m going to have to read more of the book and delve deeper into my mind.

That’s quite a scary thought. How are we supposed to reach our ultimate potential when we’re limited by something that sits in the depths of our minds and controls so much? There’s obviously the conscious override that we can hit while we’re within waking hours, but once we’re asleep we’ve given up our control to whatever is kicking around in there. We can take small babysteps daily to assure ourselves that we’re going to become stronger, more positive human beings, but what happens when we sleep? Who’s driving the narrative there? Is this why we need to prioritize our sleep schedule? Is there something we should read, a chemical we need to ingest, or an activity we should do before we sleep? Or should we just hop behind the pillow-wheel and hope for the best? The pillow is driving the car at that point, not us.

If it’s the subconscious, then I’m not responsible until I’m awake. So is the conscious mind the designated driver for the drunk subconscious?

Fuck…I guess I need to read more of this book and cross my fingers there’s an answer, because I need to sleep tonight and I don’t need demons jumping in and out of my liver. That’s what the bourbon is for.