BY KRISTEN LAMB

I started sleep-walking even as a small child. To this day, family members tell tales of finding me (as a toddler) passed out in the laundry room. When I was a bit older, they’d awaken to me wandering around in the front yard or even the street. My cousins were particularly alarmed to discover me walking down the diving board of their pool at 2:00 in the morning.

After that, everyone was diligent to double-lock the doors to at least keep me “contained.” They’d discover me wandering around, eyes open, talking as if I were wide-awake. The lights were on but, clearly, no one was home.

This odd behavior subsided for a while only to resurface in my twenties. I once called my long-time boyfriend at 3 in the morning and chewed him out and broke up with him. I awoke the next morning and called him as I always did, and was completely clueless why his demeanor was so icy.

I had NO MEMORY of the conversation hours earlier.

Later, when we became engaged he’d catch me sleepwalking and try to talk to me. To add to his consternation, I happened to be fluent in German and spoke conversational Arabic (lived in Syria for a spell). Much to his dismay, apparently when I talked in my sleep it was either in German, Arabic or Germabic.

So much for prying any secrets from my subconscious .

After a couple years, we broke up, and, for the first time in my life, I lived alone. I’d wake up with all kinds of strange injuries–bruises, cuts, black eyes—with no memory how I’d been hurt. Even weirder? When I’d get my phone bill. This was back in the days that phone companies raped all of us regularly for any long-distance calls. I’d have $400 and even $700 bills filled with calls to people in states where I didn’t know anyone.

And yeah, there were probably a lot of pissed off people in Tennessee being woken up at three in the morning from some crazy woman rambling. At the time, I didn’t realize I was probably back sleep-walking.

I was even certain someone was breaking into my house. For instance, I had one of those large gallon jugs of Seagram’s gin leftover from college. I hate hard alcohol (especially cheap stuff) and had somehow inherited this bottle from a former roommate. Yet, I discovered the bottle each week getting emptier and emptier, which, of course only fueled my paranoia.

And in a way it’s funny. In my mind someone was breaking in, leaving the purse, cash, jewelry, electronics, and stealing cheap gin and using my phone to call Tennessee?

O-Kaaaayyyyyyy……

Then, as suddenly as it began, I stopped sleep-walking. I think the sleep-walking was brought on during times of intense stress (and if you met my ex, you’d understand). When I moved out on my own, my father had passed away suddenly and I was exhausted from working in sales. I drove about 1200 miles a week and was so tired I didn’t couldn’t have found my own butt with a map and a flashlight.

Anyway, once I ditched the evil-ex and the dreaded sales job, the sleepwalking went away and seemed to stay away.

Fast forward to this past month. Apparently my husband and I owned the Mattress Forged in the Hell Fires of Mordor. Hubby had “forgotten” his mattress was purchased during THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION. Anyway, after a week and a half excruciating back pain and NO SLEEP, I emptied our emergency fund and bought a new mattress. We waited with baited breath for the delivery people to arrive.

Even though I was practically hallucinating from no sleep, I made myself stay awake until a “normal” bed time.

So, Hubby and I are relaxing on the couch as we always do before bed. Then Hubby tells me it’s time to go to bed….

I bolt straight up, wild-eyed and yell, “I have a THEORY! It all makes sense now!”

To which my husband replies, “Um, what the hell are you talking about?”

Instead of going to bed, I apparently went to my computer and opened it to start working (but not before taking off my pants). I suppose whatever theory I was working on was encumbered by wearing PANTS.

Anyway, Hubby forced me to get dressed and made me return to bed and THIS IS WHY THERE IS NO CURE FOR CANCER!

The world will never know what my theory was. And maybe the reason there is global warming and ebola is because scientists insist on working while fully awake…while wearing pants.

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Kristen is the author of the new best-selling book,  in addition to the #1 best-selling books We Are Not Alone—The Writer’s Guide to Social Media and Are You There, Blog? It’s Me, Writer. She’s a contributing humor blogger for SocialIn, a blog that reaches 2.5 million and blogs for The Huffington Post. You can also follow her author blog here. She is also the Social Media Columnist for Author Magazine. Feel free to follow her on Twitter at and on