okay, show of hands, who still sleeps with a teddy bear? who carries a "blankey" around? any thumbsuckers out there? c'mon, you can tell us. what childhood security item or habit still reassures you/calms you?

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

Answers

I sleep with a pillow over my head. Why? to keep out the vampires. Do I still do it? hell yes.

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

I stopped sleeping with my pound puppy and teddy bear a couple of years ago (I had been sleeping with them for about 15 years). I found I still needed something cushy to hold at night, and I have cuddled with a soft stuffed animal-sized pillow since then.

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

I sleep holding onto either a pillow, my blanket, or my dog - whichever doesn't make me sweat that night.

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

when I was a teeny lil thing, we had a blanket with satin edging and I liked to rub the satin together, luxuriating in that smooth feeling satin has when you put the two shiny sides together. I didn't carry the blanket around (it was a double-bed-sized blanket ;) ), but for my 3rd birthday, my grandparents gave me a little white slip set, and the slip was made out of faux-satin. I promptly adopted the slip as my security object, and from then on, I have always been comforted by and attracted to the feel of satin on satin.
My "slips" have had a long history, spanning 3 decades. Over the years they've changed shapes, sizes, colors, and fabrics, but regardless, each has always been referred to as "my slip". In the beginning, I only slept with my slip, but a decade ago, as I graduated from university, I started carrying small satin squares in my pockets to fiddle with during the day and whilst driving. (This was due in no small part to the fact that, as a Theatre Arts major, I was working in the costuming dept at UCSC at the time, and I had access to satin by the bolt. ;) ) Included in my legacy of slips are inside-out-fake-satin pillowcases, satin camisoles, and satin ribbons (my stuffed animals' neck ribbons always ended up thrashed and threadbare, *grin*).
I endured good-natured teasing from my parents and friends as I got older; where it had been easy to hide the fact that I slept with a "slip", it was increasingly difficult to keep from being busted for carrying one around in broad daylight. And when I requested a satin prom dress, my mom initially refused, on the grounds that I'd stand around playing with my dress all night long. *snicker*
(She was right. I did. ;) )
I'm 33 2/3rds-years-old now, and as I sit here at work typing this, my jacket is hanging on the chair behind me. In the left jacket pocket is an inside-out, stretchy, black satin t-shirt, which I periodically (and discreetly) reach back to fiddle with. (Hooray for easy-access cargo pockets!) The black shirt is my latest slip (and I daresay the best one yet); I've had it for 2 or 3 years, and-- thanks to the Miracle Of Lycra-- it's still as silky as the day I bought it.

But I'm always on the lookout for reserves. ;)

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

I don't sleep with them any more, but I have several stuffed animals sitting on the chest under my bedroom window, keeping watch.

I sleep hugging a pillow. (I prefer to sleep hugging a man, but I haven't had any volunteers for that job recently.) I also have to be buried under the covers.

The covers and the pillow (or the guy, if available) and the animals are all there to protect me from The Monster Under The Bed.


-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

Wubbie-girl! :)

Ever since Mouse died last year, I've been sleeping with Simba, my 20- some-odd-year-old (and WAY pre-Lion King) stuffed lion. I'm not a stuffed animal person, mind; Simba is one of only two stuffed animals that I own, and the only one I've ever kept out consistently, for sentimental reasons. But he's roughly the same size as Mouse, so I'll either put him on my pillow where Mouse used to sleep, or hold him with my chin on his head, like I used to with Mouse. Believe it or not, I only realized I was doing this as a Mouse-substitute fairly recently....

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

Gardanna, I know what you mean about the pillow over your head! Only mine is to keep the Joker (from Batman) from pouring poison in my ear...don't ask.

-- Anonymous, July 11, 2000

I hug a pillow and all closet doors must be firmly closed to keep all "Boogs" at bay. (Boogeymen)

Thankfully my boyfriend is very kind about this - he will even get up and close the closet doors to keep away the Boogs.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

I keep the covers pulled up to well above my shoulder so rats won't bite me. No stuffed animals, though.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

I have had a, furless now, stuffed donkey named Jerry since I was very small. A few years back, when I was in grad. school, I house sat for one of my advisors. Jerry went with me, but I forgot him when she got home and I had to retrive him which was rather embarrassing. Jerry is still close by in a closet, but my seven year old dd and I share my bed and she is such a bed hog and snuggler (which I relish until I'm ready to fall asleep) that I love any free space which I can get. I use to do the pillow thing too.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Like Gwen, I am not comfortable unless the blanket covers everything but my head. Have occasionally slept so that just my nose was exposed.

Am slightly less freaked about it if I have company in bed with me, but apparently I frequiently & unconsciously snuggle up all night until my bed mate is plastered to the wall or clinging to the piping on the edge of the mattress with his fingernails to keep from falling out. I don't get overheated easily, so it is worse in the wintertime. I find a source of warmth and zone in on it.

Turn about is fair play, however, and I have no problem if someone squashes me or lies on one of my arms or legs all night. Then again, I can sleep through just about everything.

Still have my first bear and a pile of cuddly toys but none sleep with me these days. Many of my cats used to sack out with me but my current cat seems unable to sleep through the night and I like my bedroom door closed. Didn't suck my thumb, it was my right pinky finger. Also loved satin (ribbons, primarily), and my maternal grandmother still talks about how I'd put myself to sleep rubbing the ribbons on the front of her nightgown.

To be frank, with up to seven full-size pillows and shams on my bed, there's no room for cuddly toys. When I'm not alone, I am forced to find a place to put the pillows.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

My Mom used to yell at me for sleeping with the covers over my head, telling me it would give me headaches. I don't think it ever has, and I still do it.

Last night I slept in our spare bedroom for the first time (we've lived here for nearly two years), and it was so weird. It was like the first time you spend the night at a friend's house, and everything feels a bit odd. But it was nice, and did calm me down after an insect-related trauma, and I slept from 9PM to 8AM this morning -- pure bliss. I think it'll be my special treat from now on, because I'm just that wild and crazy.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Oh yeah, and my husband didn't boot me out of the bedroom or anything (I'm bigger than him); that insect-related trauma was a bunch of little flying ant-type things that flew in our bedroom window and onto some clothes I had on a chair. They were also in the window frame and on the floor, so I squealed a lot and sprayed them with a gallon of Raid, making the bedroom uninhabitable. But my husband vacuumed up all the dead bodies and let me go to sleep in the other room, which was nice of him.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Well ... I've very attached to my pillow - it's only the third one I've had in my life (the first one fell apart, and the second one is back home in NZ). And I sleep with two teddy bears, a small elephant and a giraffe. And a husband. One of the teddy bears - Little William - has slept with me since I was about 7, the other ones are more recent additions.

My husband gives them funny voices and distinct personalities to crack me up. He's funny.

I can see I'll have to have children in the next few years - then I can put them all in the kid's room and finally look like an adult. (They're not getting Little William though).

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

In addition to my slip, I sleep with three teddy bears: Jack, William, and I still haven't figured out the little orange guy's name yet. I got him last November so you can imagine how distressing this is. I apologise to him a lot but point out that if he would just tell me, it'd be a lot easier. ;)

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

I keep a flashlight right next to my bed, for when that shadow just doesn't look right. God knows what I'll do if it ever turns out to be more than a shadow...

-- Anonymous, September 23, 2000

Beat it to death with the flashlight!

-- Anonymous, September 23, 2000

I've got a 9mm under the mattress so I don't need a security blanket but my mom and dad have these two little mice in their motorhome. They started traveling around the west in a small travel trailer years ago(35) and somewhere my mom made these two tiny(1.5") little mice. She made different clothes for them and they have bathing suits when it's hot and big long snuggly overcoats when it's cold. She can sew like crazy. Anyway, when they are out traveling in the motorhome or staying at their 5 acre place in NoCal called Ladybug Acres they can't go to sleep until my dad finds them and puts them on the sill over the bed. Sometimes they are out helping in the garden and my dad forgets them so he has to go find them with a flashlight. And once a bluejay tried to kidnap one of them. My dad was furious and got the shotgun out and when the jay saw him it dropped the mouse and flew away. My dad moves them all over the place all day long. He's too cool. Wish he would have been like that when I was a kid. Their gettin pretty old now. I hope they enjoy themselves for a long time to come. They're happy. The Son

-- Anonymous, September 24, 2000

Jackie, that cracked me up! I have several small beanie-baby-sized stuffed animals that I sleep with. My boyfriend has attributed voices, names and personalities to all of them and treats them as members of the family. If he gets home from work first, i find him watching TV with one of them, because apparently they get mad if you go in the house and not go up there to say hello to them.

-- Anonymous, September 25, 2000

ooh yeah can you guys top this.. I have a picture of one of my stuffed animals at work!

-- Anonymous, September 25, 2000

I sleep with my teddy bear, Radar. He squeaks when you squeeze him, and he has a bib with an apple on it. I've slept with him for as long as I can remember- my grandmother gave him to me when I was born. It was six months into my last relationship before I could sleep over at my boyfriend's without bring Radar along, in fact.

I also cannot sleep with the closet doors open or with any clowns in the room. And I don't need all the blankets over me, but a part of a blanket has to be covering a part of my body. I don't know why.

-- Anonymous, September 25, 2000