I often face immense difficulty falling asleep. It’s hard to get my legs to stop shaking. The machinery in my mind won't stop grinding their rust covered cogs into one another. On rough nights I will put on a video just to focus on someone else's thoughts. On rougher nights I put on a guided meditation and listen to someone talk me through the basic human function. The narrator always compares my body to a cloud or a river. Sometimes it’s easier being a tree than it is being a woman. On the roughest nights I use a sleep method that my sister taught me in childhood. I travel through my body. I am not an audience member unattached to myself. I am not a blue sky. I am myself, falling asleep from my toes to my scalp. This is Tuck Me In.

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My toes have weeks old white nail polish on like blankets too small for their beds. I crack the bones inside by curling them under my foot, and pressing my weight against hard surfaces. I do this once to let them rest. Now they are asleep.

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My feet have been walking all day. I'm blistered from the pink flip-flops that I wear throughout the summer. When I walk uphill, the sole of my foot faces friction. I think of my best friend, how she made fun of these shoes the last time I saw her. The flip-flops are not between my toes now, they are soundly asleep in the closet. My toes are wrapped in much more than two thin neon straps. Covered by a duvet, they fall asleep in my bed.

 

My ankles have been through quite a lot. Sometimes they require extra thought to put to sleep. I give them a few rotations to lovingly remind them that they are not broken anymore. I'm grateful for my enjoyment of symmetry as I've broken each ankle thrice. This helps them to fall asleep at the same time.

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My calves are the most prominent muscles in my body. They grew like this over time. Mostly after the physiotherapy to keep my ankles functioning. I had a dance instructor who informed us that the calf was in fact two separate muscles. She split the appendage in front of us. I think about this, and how good it felt when she chose my limbs to demonstrate. I had hoarded tension inside them like a drawer before guests arrive. When she dug her fingers into the flesh, it all flew right out. They remember this feeling and sprawl open, emptying their things on the nightstand before lounging to sleep.

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My knees relax easily before bed. When I first learned how to hate my body, I learned how difficult it is to shave curved surfaces. The knee was my first victim. I lifted a patch of my skin with a pink disposable razor that I technically wasn't allowed to be using. I looked at it dangling from the forbidden tool, my only thought: I'm going to be in so much trouble. I recall the story to my knees and the way they dimple almost emulates a smile. Unscarred, healed, and hairy, they fall asleep.

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My thighs are where my muscles built up most over the past year. Sometimes I hate them. The way they flatten far too generously. How they warm an entire seat without letting an inch of material peek through. Sometimes I love them. The way they bulge outwards. The right angle above my knee. My mother told me not to shave up there and I still did. I don’t think about my thighs too often. But now that I am, they know I admire the strength in abundant generosity, and they can finally sleep comfortably.

 

My vagina and I are not close. Somewhere inside is a plastic T that made me sob during insertion. I'm supposed to regularly feel for the strings, but I don't know her well enough. There are men I loved for years who know her better than I do. There are men I loved for minutes who know her better than I do. I take comfort in the woman I'm going to become. As does she. One day, I’ll be one of those widely criticised artists who writes letters to her and isn't afraid of hand-mirrors. She falls asleep with ease knowing this, and waiting for my correspondence.

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My rear has cellulite dips. That is unless I pose like I’m in a fashion magazine. My friends and I went swimming and took pictures in our bikinis. I note how different I look when I know that a picture is being taken. In the water, we played mermaids. While my body was submerged, I wondered how nice it would be to live flubbery, warm, and scaly. I puffed myself up and made everything bigger to float. When I came to the surface, I had to change my procedures immediately. Lake water was dripping off of me under a sunset full of warm laughs and all I could think was: Does my ass look okay? Now that this part of me is asleep, I recall the memory of the lake. I let myself wonder: What would it be like to have a tail instead?

 

My hips are wide. Sometimes when I fill out modelling applications I realise that they are abnormally wide. I had an ex lover who upon learning the term love-handles lit up with glee. That's exactly what they are! he grinned, grabbing them as if they were handles on a pot of soup, and my lips were his to taste. Sometimes thinking of his hands makes things worse, but when I think of this moment, he helps my hips fall asleep.​

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My stomach has little red bumps all over it. I chose to shave it to meet with a friend. I wanted to wear a crop top, but my belly button keeps sprouting these oddly thick hairs. Under the surface she houses a panini that I ate for dinner. I met my friend at the old plaza. Everyone used to walk there during class breaks. My stomach was out, and nobody looked at me the way I thought they would when I was fifteen; Or the way my mother thinks they would now. My stomach still feels in love with this moment. Blushing and acne-ridden, she falls asleep, full and spotty.

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My fingers have nails that are too long for their own good. They look pretty, but they break off so quickly. I work hard. I garden, I cook, I wash, I build, I write, I draw, I play music, I love. It makes me uncomfortable that I often choose divine gesticulation over passion. My fingers wear rings that are currently tucked into the nightstand on my right. They fall asleep with their gowns in mind.​

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My hands have intricate treasure maps, or so I have been told. I used to have a friend who read my palm lines. Her mother was a psychic. I often looped through their crystal stocked walls. This all took place somewhere between rural and urban Ontario. My hands out. Hers tracing mine. I haven’t spoken to her for a few years and I wonder if somehow she saw herself in the intersections on my palm print. I wonder if the cards rendered me the Queen of Swords so often that she saw it all coming. I clasp my right over my left when I pray, stifling the bad. When I do this, neither of my palms are traceable. I muffle my mouth before blurting out that I'd have lived in an opalite tower with her. I scream it into my right hand before I close my fist and throw, not checking where the prophecy lands. At night I can't hide from my candid values. My hands know this better than anyone. My hands are lovers. They are vulnerable and kind to one another. They fall asleep under the sheets after reading each other's prophecies.

 

My forearms have visible veins. I have a faded tattoo of a stickman on the inside of my left wrist. I’ll stand by the decision forever, though the few shocks of laser say otherwise. I didn’t get the last treatment because I realised how much I loved looking like my own scattered sticker book. Friends and strangers used to write in a speech bubble with pen ink flowing from the tattoo's round head. They would use my forearm as a diary. When I cover my hair to pray, I also try to cover my tattoo. I like to always be wearing an evil eye bracelet. When I fall asleep with my skull on my forearm, my skin takes the shape of these eyes for only a few minutes out of the morning. I feel divine when this happens. It turns my body hair to whiter-than-white feathers. My forearms are like biblical angels. They’ve repented. They sleep with the confidence of a guaranteed spot in heaven.

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My elbows are rough; They need more lotion. I would set aside routine for it if I gave myself enough time to think about things like my elbows every day. The inside of my right has a bruise from a hospital visit. On a ridiculous amount of antihistamines, I giggle when the nurse calls my veins rubbish. In response she giggles at the order in which I recite my birthdate. She draws my blood and at my wince she asks if I have a fear of it. I respond I don’t, but I do have a fear of veins. She’s amused, but I am not joking. Whenever I wake up, I crack my elbows by pushing my arms away from my body. Right now, they hold no tension from the night, they have no trouble falling asleep.

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My upper arms are rounded. I used to hate this, and sometimes I still do. Another thing I learned from my sister is that this is an oestrogen based trait. Big arms are like big breasts, or wide hips. I have more upper body strength than most. There's a picture of a fairy sitting on fruit that my friend poked into me on my left. She grows and shrinks with me, and I always find her beautiful. She appreciates the small feminine things in my world more than I can. She falls asleep resting on a strawberry, wings high and mighty. My arms fall asleep knowing they are strong enough to carry her.

 

My ribs poke out when I lie on my back. Sometimes I count them as if I will make some sort of phenomenal discovery about the human body. Something about Eve’s ribs and whatnot. Sometimes I wish that sin didn't hold itself in my body. I wish I could have faith that my ribs have not been double agents this whole time. I have no choice but to trust a question of feminine sin to cage my heart. I have to remind myself that this body is mine and only mine. When stacked in their bunk beds with this incantation, when listening to fable instead of sin, my ribs fall asleep.

 

My back hurts, but when does it not? She folds over herself at certain angles. I have a tan line where my swimsuit top lives. I have a mole from the sun that brought nervous tears when I was young. I thought it meant I had skin cancer because of a Family Guy episode my sister had let me watch. In the static of the box T.V. She made me promise not to say anything. I often keep my shoulder to the ground and spin my knee to the other side of my body. When I am lucky, I feel each section of my spine crack from my tailbone up to my neck. When I put my back to sleep, I think of her in this way. Each section of my spine releases the persona it took on for the day. My back drifts to sleep in this line, using my organs as pillows, and my skin as a blanket.

 

My breasts, my tits, my boobs, yesterday they were referred to as the girls. They have had too many words spoken against them, and felt too threatened by too many. When I’m in bed braless and on my back, they fall to the sides with no support. This is the only time I really get to say hello to my sternum. I used to sleep in bras because the idea of confronting the way they relaxed was terrifying. Sometimes the way they’re talked about makes me want to scream. Sometimes they are breasts, like when they are covered in ultrasound gel. Sometimes they are tits, like when they’re touched by someone who pretends not to hate every other part of me. Sometimes they are boobs, like when my friends tell me they’re jealous, and ask me to lend them some. I say I would if I could and they roll their eyes. I want to say shut up and be grateful but I’ve written too many articles about body positivity for this to not render me a hypocrite. I went out with an old friend and he texted me saying that my posture adjustments were distracting. He thought in the tank top borrowed from my mother that I was maybe showing off the girls. I would scream at him if I had the energy but I find myself texting back: haha no just a sore back lol. My breasts don’t really ever fall asleep from finding peace. Most nights, it is because they are exhausted from being so social.

 

My shoulders are the reason I have looked up how to shrink trap muscles. Google showed me yoga poses that I practised for months. I used to get massages at a physiotherapy centre next to my dad’s workplace. I don’t think that any of this was useless per se. I just know that the problem isn’t in my body. It lives in the things that have been said to it. I used to be in a choir that made us sit up like boards every rehearsal. God forbid your back touch the seat, or the string from your head to the ceiling was cut. I had no trouble with this until I sat with a baritone that told me to stop tempting him. When my shoulders fall asleep I dig them behind me. I force them into my mattress and remind them that nobody is watching. They don't ever believe me. They usually fall asleep worn out. I trick myself by imagining how good it would feel to fall asleep if my tits were just breasts. My shoulders fall asleep still under disbelief that they will have no straps to carry for the rest of the day.

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My neck has a silver tree pendant wrapped around it. She feels so tense from halter tops. I don’t expect her to forgive me any time soon. There's stinging on every layer where the tension knot met my surface. At one point, I was in love, and he used to massage my neck in the directions that he learned from watching me partake in gua-sha in the mirror. When we broke up I noticed that my entire body suffered the consequences. At a dinner party once, he started absentmindedly massaging my lymph nodes. He performed his memorization of my routine, following upwards along the path of my jaw and downwards behind my ear. His friends mocked him for the niche PDA, but I had never been more enamoured. My neck hasn’t been pampered like this for a while, by myself or otherwise. I know we both yearn for routines that don't remind us of him. I feel her fall asleep when I promise to care like a lover.

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My jaw is tense. I used to grind my teeth into their neighbours while asleep. I wasn't really aware of it until I shared a bed. He said it was so crushingly loud that I woke him up. I had surgery on my bottom gums when I was with him. He froze ice packs for me and held them to my chin. He gave me my doses of painkillers and blended foods together when I still couldn’t chew. My teeth are straight now. He gave me all of this help in building a new mouth, and it’s so odd that he wouldn’t recognize my smile if he saw it. I had to throw out both of our toothbrushes because I wanted them to stay together. I don’t let my new mouth say his name the way it did when it had gaps between teeth and left space on the right side of the bed. My jaw falls asleep without its night terrors now. I don’t let myself ask if he would be proud. I have a new smile, one he would not recognize. My jaw falls asleep on a pillow in the centre of the bed.

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My lips are puffy. Sometimes cracked. They kiss and eat and speak all day. They wear lip-stick and lip-gloss and lip-balm. They hid under a mask for the last few years. Painting the inside with NYX Soft Matte Lip Cream in the shade Dubai. Sometimes they speak a Quran verse before bed. Sometimes they call a friend and fall asleep on the phone. Sometimes Dubai stains them for the night. I’m not sure why, but in the morning they’re full of volume, and throughout the day they deflate. They fall asleep after a full day of running verbal marathons, nourishing, and loving.

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My nose is pierced in three places. My roommate made the third incision through my septum on my 20th birthday. I have a nose that I thoroughly contour. When I take off my makeup this is probably the biggest illusion I create. The pillowcase I’m resting on was saved from a nosebleed with hydrogen peroxide. My best friend once responded to an image of me with blood down my face saying it’s not exam season until you get a stress nosebleed. But my nose is not stressed now. There is no blood or concealer around her territory. My piercings have healed, they hold my favourite jewellery. She sleeps elegantly, with a hill in her bridge.

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My eyes are my favourite feature. We used to have name one thing you like about yourself assignments in elementary school, usually when the topic of self esteem came up. My sister once told me to stop repeating that I liked my eyes because it was boastful. I constantly got the compliment that they were a photocopy of my mothers. When we walked together, sometimes we would get compliments of how gorgeous we both were for it. In high school, we were assigned to turn to the person to our left and compliment them. A boy who eventually had to beg me not to take legal action turned to me and told me I had good dick-sucking-eyes. I wear glasses, but only sometimes. I get headaches from seeing too well for too long. My eyes are rested now, closed without fear of what that vulnerability looks like. They fall asleep, my eyelids fluttering closed like a fleshy camera lens powering off.

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My eyebrows are bushy, and take up a lot of my cosmetic time. I pluck them so that they don’t claim an entire eighth of my face. I think every brown girl knows this tale. The ultimate makeover happens when the age comes that you can trim and pluck them. I remember being allowed trimming privileges over the summer between fifth grade and sixth. My sister, holding tiny silver scissors, begging my mom to let her grab the tweezers. My mom told her to wait. She never let me live down the way a classmate ran up to me in early September, immediately making note of the change from a distance. Sometimes I let them grow out and emulate the lawn suburban neighbours scoff at. They fall asleep like caterpillars, marvelling at my bone structure as if it is the first suitable biome they’ve found in ages.

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My ears have done a lot of listening. They have two piercings each, and I wear a gold thin chain that loops through them like a bound book. I want to get this niche cosmetic surgery to make my ears smaller because I have always felt like they’re a tad too big for my head. I shared this thought with a friend on the first of many shared Value Village trips. I had one piercing per ear at the time. She bought me bargain priced earrings to overcome this fear of my large ears, and it worked. I remember all of the times I listened to her to bring me back to reality. I remember her childhood house getting sold. How we used to be able to hear the farm animals harmonising with the wild animals all night. My ears fall asleep with bargain jewellery in.

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My scalp has a history. It takes about three hours on average to straighten my hair. I burn my scalp and barely flinch now. My sister was the first to straighten my hair and gasp as if my potential of beauty could finally be conceptualised. I cried after she did one strand and begged her to dip it in water. I was scared it would never go back to the way it was. She responded with something along the lines of that being a blessing. My mom didn’t know how to work my hair, so she morphed it into two braids for several years. When I stopped wearing it that way, it was a shock to my classmates. At one point I chopped it all off and my mom cried. I almost cried too, but I wanted to pretend I was capable enough to know what my blessings were. I had lice once. I was visiting my sister in her apartment and she spotted it within minutes. She single-handedly killed every bug feasting on my scalp. She even let me look away when she washed them all down her shower drain. My strands barely fit through the gaps in the thin rake. Tonight my scalp rests my curls against a silk pillowcase. It falls asleep without fear of what the morning will look like.

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I encourage you to engage in this exercise before bed as well. In all honesty, I don’t typically get past my ankles because this trick has always worked so well for me. If you struggle with sleep like I do, I hope this journey helps in some way! If you choose to take part in this practice to gain a deeper connection with your body, I really hope this method from my childhood resonates with you!

 

Goodnight. And thank you for tucking me in.