Carolyn's Blog

Alan is a sleepwalker. I discovered this the very first time we spent a night together at a flat in London. It was not a terribly classy place, the windows were nailed and painted shut which was probably a bit of a godsend…….. The bed was pushed up against the wall and there was a window at the head of the bed. I woke to see a pair of feet on the pillow beside me, glanced upwards to see my love standing stark naked (interesting angle btw) attempting to open the window and yelling about the wolves. The wolves? What wolves? I asked him. He looked down at me like I was totally stupid and said ‘Those wolves! I am trying to save your life here.’ I looked around the room. I have very bad eyesight but even I could see cruddy 70’s wallpaper, cracked ceiling, musty smelling furniture and not a wolf in sight. This was London after all. I doubt there have been many wolves roaming through 4th floor bedrooms for a while, not for……… maybe…….. well not forever. Even though Alan’s eyes were open and he seemed to be rational when I spoke with him I began to realise that he was not actually on the same plane or planet as me. So then I started to try to remember everything I had heard about sleepwalkers. ‘Don’t wake them, they might die.’ Then I flashed over to the next day’s headline in the News of the World. ‘Naked man found dead in ally. New girlfriend says ‘He jumped!’. ‘ After a minute or so he got back down from the window and snored his way through the rest of the night.

We moved in together and subsequently married. Over the years I have had these lovely experiences:

When I was nine months pregnant with Matthew and therefore not exactly light, he picked me up and threw me out of the bed, I really did sail through the air until I hit the bedroom wall and slipped down to the floor. Why? To save me from the oncoming train. In an upstairs bedroom. Nowhere near a railway line………..

Another time we had just finished putting new wallpaper up in our bedroom. Admittedly it was hideous. We have bought it on sale. It was the ‘70’s. But it was very cheap and covered the cracks in the plaster on the walls. Did I mention that it was hideous? Anyway Alan leaped out of bed and stated that he is going to get a knife. I leapt out of bed too. I went to the boys’ bedroom, pushed the chest of drawers against the door and waited. A while later there was a timid knock. ‘Carolyn?’ ‘Yes you awake now’. ‘Yes’. ‘Promise?’. ‘Promise’. We went back to our bedroom. ‘Why did you cut into the wallpaper?’ ‘Because I thought I had wallpapered someone behind it and I needed to rescue them before they suffocated.’ ‘Right……………… ‘

The funniest one was this: Alan sat bolt upright in bed and said ‘Look at the state of that!’ (Translation – it was obviously a very attractive woman who was, shall we say, well endowed.)

Since I am not in the least insecure or worried LOL I barked ‘WHO???’ Alan rolled back onto the pillow and with a naughty boy grin on his face he said ‘Well if you can’t see her, I’m not saying.’

His bruises faded within about ten days or so.

We went to the doctor many times in the early years. He kept insisting that people couldn’t act out their dreams because there is some kind of paralysing effect that stops all that. Really? I beg to differ. We tried sleeping pills; hot chocolate; sex; scotch; combinations of all of the aforementioned. They work for one night but no more than that. In the end our doctor actually said: ‘Well I have it here in my notes, so either it’s real or Alan is building up the perfect alibi to kill you and get away with it.’

I’m still here so I guess it’s real.

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