A recent study from the Sleep Center of Albany shows that almost no women across racial, class, and party lines find any amount of sleep to be a sufficient escape from their lives.
“My dreams are like mash-ups of my real life,” says a 22-year-old NYU student and participant in the study. “I’m looking for more of a ‘leave this plane of existence’ kind of escape. I want to escape from my escape.”
The study, which was conducted before and after the U.S. presidential election, saw the desire for escape grow significantly after November 8th.
“Something will always slip in, like when I’m having a sex dream and Trump is on TV in the background,” explains another study participant, who has asked all of her personal information be kept private. “I don’t want to die or anything, but I need something better than this.”
“Someone drew a swastika on the wall in my dream last night,” said another participant. “I really see no point in sleeping.”
According to the study, 85% of the dissatisfied women say they have tried other forms of escape that were nowhere near effective enough.
“I’ve watched all of Scandal, I’ve taken up a dozen different trendy forms of exercise, I’ve even tried base jumping without looking to see what was down there first,” says another participant. “Nothing is enough to rip me from the tirelessness of reality; not even the fantastical nature of dreams.”
Another participant claims to have recurring nightmares about her everyday life.
“I keep having these dreams where I have to go to work and take care of my responsibilities and I’m still a woman of color. I wake up screaming every single night.”
When asked to describe their ideal form of escape, nearly half of the women requested a kind of Inception-style dream-within-a-dream where one never, ever wakes up.
