Friday, 24 January 2014

Welcome to my nightmare

Are you scared?

Yeah, me neither. But I admit, it’s taken me a few years to stop looking for monsters under the bed. Mom used to say a spritz of Windex would chase them away—but I’m old enough to know that’s not true. (I think that’s how she tricked me into cleaning. Ha!)

Nightmares are normal, but for kids like me, with overactive imaginations, bad dreams can come a little more often. And I can tell I’m in full-on creative mode because this past week, I was awoken by THREE nightmares—one even included my sister coming back to life as a zombie!

So, how do I deal with nightmares?

Well, the first thing is, I should probably stop reading scary books right before bed. I know, I know. I promised to read more books this year, and I do love a good scary story (did you know R.L. Stine is writing new FEAR STREET books? I’m so excited!) — but I think I need to keep my reading to right after school, or on the bus, or even in the morning while I’m eating breakfast. I also shouldn’t watch scary movies or TV shows right before bed.

I’ve started writing in my journal about my dreams, too. Mom and I talk about them, of course, but when I write down what scared me about the dream, or even some of the details from the nightmare, they don’t seem so scary. AND, some of those details are great for stories I may want to write sometime…because for me, the best way to get over a nightmare is to write about it!

Obviously, I’m still going to be scared sometimes (spiders, for instance, give me the creeps)—but that’s okay. I think fear can be healthy. You just need a strategy to conquer that fear. What do you do?


Gotta jet!

- Chase Superman Duffy

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