PTSD and Fear of the Dark

I feel silly just saying I am afraid of the dark because it’s something we are supposed to outgrow as children, isn’t it?  And anyway, it’s not always true.  Sometimes I have no fear of the dark.  Sometimes I even like it.  Sometimes I feel safe in the dark; no one can see me.  And it’s restful for my eyes.  And I have always been comfortable moving around in the dark; I can find my way around my house in the dark without bumping into things, for instance.  I can take a CD out of my CD player and put in a new one, without turning the light on. 

But then there are times I am afraid.  I relate it to my PTSD, although I’m not really sure that’s always what it’s about.  There are plenty of nights I sleep with a light on, usually with a blanket pulled over my eyes to shield them from the light, because the light bothers me when I am trying to sleep.  And yet, I am afraid to turn the light off.

One of the tasks I want my service dog to be trained to do for me is turn on lights.  I may need to replace the light switches in my home, or some of them, at least, with those switches that are like touch pads.  You just push them and the light comes on; push them again and the light goes out.  I’ve read that they are easier for a dog to operate than the typical light switches that have to be flipped up and down. 

Also, I often sleep on the living room couch at night and the lights in the living room are not operated by switches at all.  There is no overhead fixture, only two lamps, one at either end of the couch.  I saw a video about a service dog recently and the dog was stepping on a round switch on the floor to turn on a light.  When I say switch, in the this case I am not talking about a light switch like you would have on a wall, but the type of switch a disabled person might use to turn something electronic on and off.  I tried to find a picture online of what I’m talking about, but the closest I could find was this plate switch which is rectangular instead of round.  When I worked with kids with disabilities, though, we always had round ones.  Anyway, my dog will need a way to turn on a light in the living room.

I want my service dog to be able to turn on a light in the room when I have a nightmare, preferably without me having to give the command to do so, because it can take me a while to wake up enough to realize what’s happening and that I need a light on.  I also need my dog to go into a dark room ahead of me and turn a light on.  As I said, I can find my way around the house in the dark just fine, and sometimes I have no trouble walking into a dark room.  Other times, though, I’m terrified of walking into a dark room. 

A couple nights ago, it was the middle of the night and I had to pee.  Normally when I’m up late at night and Mike is already in bed, I don’t turn on the hall light when I go down the hall to the bathroom because the light shines into the bedroom and I don’t want to disturb him.  I walk down the dark hall and into the dark bathroom, where I might turn on the light and close the door, or I might just leave the door open enough that a very little bit of light comes in from the living room. 

But this particular night, that hall looked too long and too dark.  I started to walk down it a couple times, then stopped and returned to the living room, where it was light.  I could not bring myself to walk down that dark hall.  By that time I really had to pee and I was trying to figure out what to do.  Briefly I considered my options; there really is nowhere else to pee in my house but in that bathroom at the end of that dark hall.  Waiting until daylight was not going to work.

I finally decided to turn the hall light on.  Don’t ask me why it took such as long time to decide to do that.  When I am anxious or other PTSD symptoms are bad, my problem solving skills go down the drain.  Even with the hall light on, it was hard to walk into that dark bathroom.  You have to go around a corner to get into the bathroom and light from the hall does leak into the bathroom, but it’s dim.  You pretty much have to step into the bathroom before you can turn on the bathroom light.

I finally made it to the bathroom, but it was a time when I really wished I had my service dog already.