Chapter Text
Sleep has become a stranger to me lately, and on the rare occasions we meet, it brings only nightmares. My doctor recommended I start weaning off the meds months ago. It has been almost ten years, she’d said, hoping the nightmares would have eased. Besides, they were never meant to be a cure or so she told me as she walked out the door.
Even I could have told her that. I am a doctor, after all.
Yet, here I sit on the edge of my bed, reaching for that all-familiar orange bottle hidden in my nightstand. I glance at the clock and groan. It reads 3:00 a.m. I have to start seeing patients tomorrow, starting at eight, and even though I have gotten very good at working with so little sleep, I can only take so much. I pour three of the little white pills into my hand and swallow them dry. Then I lay back against my pillow and close my eyes while I wait for sleep to come. I try not to think, to wipe my mind like my therapist has told me so many times, but even I am not that lucky. Memories flash before my eyes, bright white lights, operating tables filled with sterilized tools, the pungent smell of the poppy gel hanging in the air in the operating room, and blood so much blood. I curl up in a little ball atop my blankets, counting backwards from ten over and over again until my mind is stilled and peace comes as the medicine kicks in. It is the only kind of peace I know.