It can be a scary world out there––and there are plenty of things that can bore themselves into your brain if you think about them long and hard enough.
There are all sorts of unsettling statistics out there––go look up how many serial killers are active in the United States at any given time––but that's not the only thing that could worry you. Job situations and family troubles are common stressors. And then there's always that embarrassing thing that happened when you were eight!
After Redditor marchionetta asked the online community, "What keeps you up at night?" people shared some of their thoughts with us.
"Even though I know..."
My brother died suddenly 9 years ago. None of it seemed real until they opened the casket. He looked like he was asleep but it sunk in at that moment that he was really dead.
For some reason the other night, I was thinking about basketball, and Kobe popped into my head. Even though I know how he died, I pictured him the same way until I read the autopsy. If you haven't read or seen it, don't.
Because of the Kobe thought, I started thinking about my brother lying there. Extremely sobering moment for me.
"The sense..."
The sense of impending doom, the amount of responsibilities I have, the fact that the day isn't over if I don't sleep, knowing I'll have to do the same exact thing day after day until I die....
"The inevitable end..."
The inevitable end of my athletic career and whether or not COVID will end mid level professional sports.
"Turns out..."
My unhealthy eating and drinking habits. Turns out drinking 3l of Coke keeps you wired.
"Now I can't sleep..."
I had three dates with a really awesome guy, i asked him for another date and he said that the spark just wasn't there for him. Haven't talked to him since then. I miss talking to him, because over a two month time period we exchanged 10k+ text messages and he was just the first person I really felt comfortable talking to. I wanted this to work.
Now I can't sleep thinking about all the things that I think are wrong with me and why it did not work out...
"So..."
I can't sleep right now because my partner pissed me off because of a lack of understanding that a relationship is a partnership not just what works for one person. So I'm filled with slight anxious rage.
"Tonight specifically..."
Tonight specifically, found a tick and my first reaction was to flick it across my room. Now it's in my room somewhere waiting for me to go to sleep.
"But there's still many more people..."
All the people I've wronged and things I haven't been able to fix. I've made a ton of mistakes in my life, but I had a life changing event and decided to change for the better. But there's still many more people out there I've wrong and need to set straight.
"I'll be laying there..."
God, so many things. The stuff I've done wrong. My best friends doing things that have resulted in so many trust issues and pain. The people I let in who ended up just being idiots.
But most of all homesickness. I've been debating on venting on a subreddit about this. It's getting really bad. My home state is on the other side of the US and it's tearing me apart. When I say that it's constant, I mean it. I swear to you a minute doesn't go by that I'm not thinking about being there, seeing the sky there, seeing my family there. It's eating me up. These things really do keep me up at night. I'll be laying there at four or five, sometimes six or seven, just trying to get some sleep and then I'm thinking about it and I haven't slept so I'm way more emotional than normal and I just get so bad. Im starting to worry myself. :( And also the cringey things I've said and done, but I'm pretty sure everyone feels that way.
"The constant thought..."
The constant thought that someone I considered close at one point leaving me and pretending like we weren't friends for years was somehow my fault, and thinking of everything that could have driven him away. And also going through any sort of depressive episodes where I feel I don't deserve the right to sleep.
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