Immersion in darkness?

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I just hoarded tangerines, frosted flakes, and whatever else occurred to me, then stay glued to my hallucination machine for three weeks. I think the tangerines were because I kept getting dehydrated.

I find darkness very relaxing, at least compared to regular light (especially artificial light). It's even more relaxing in social situations, but that's probably just because I'm less visible and shy. I enjoy cloudy and stormy days because of the darkness. Bright light really annoys me when I'm not wearing my glasses (they are the kind that darken in sunlight).

I'm lucky since I can turn the lights out at work in my little portion of the lab and put on my little lamp.
I do leave the door open when I'm on the clock though and the hall light comes in a bit.

People walk by and do a double-take when they notice I'm sitting in there in the dark... seem to think it's a bit strange... I love it though.

Growing up, I would often retreat to darkness and had my special places to go.
But, I also lived out in the deserts and spent many days of summer hiking about.
Maybe it's more about artificial lighting... haven't thought about that before....hmmmmm.

I'm like this too. Too many bad experiences being in the sun, including during a 6th grade school picnic where my dad refused to let me go home while I was getting sunburnt... that took about a month to heal. I'm scared of sunburns. I can't stand the way they feel, they itch so badly while they are healing, and when I have them, sleeping becomes very difficult. The itching is the worst part though.



“Hallucination machine”. I love that term. Never heard it before and I think it's all too accurate, and funny.

Wow! This is one that I actually did think was just me.

I had black construction paper taped over my window under the blinds for years (still there, actually- I just don't live at home right now) and would close all the curtains to be able to walk around the house. In the car, before I drove I would sit in the backseat with the aluminum sun shield unfolded over me. My parents used to yell at me for that so much... it just got too weird for them I guess. I've had a few periods where I didn't leave the house in the day for months as well.

In highschool, I used to get so upset when all those florescent lights in the classrooms were on, and especially if all those windows were open with sun streaming directly on me. .I actually dropped out partially because of that.


I always figured this was just a weird fear I had from having malignant melanoma as a kid, but maybe it's an aspie thing as well. Or maybe, in my case, it was the combo that made it so severe....

I like the natural darkness; I blanket myself in it whenever I can. I feel "safe" and comfortable.

The professionals say it's a "sensory" thingy, i.e., the light hurts me, and it's one reason why I prefer to stay up all night and sleep during the day.

You do that too eh?

I've been recently correcting that pattern of behavior(persisted since childhood), with only marginal success. Circadian rythm is "all f****d up", for lack of a better way to describe it at the moment.


What does the light feel like to you when you are in direct sunlight? Is there any kind of sensations you could describe?

For me, sunlight bothers my eyes(on top of the sunburn fear), but I've always figured it did that to normal people(and probably does).

I have periods where I simply cannot sleep at night: some say it's due to those with Asperger's/autism having a switched sleeping pattern, which is true in my case. Some also say it's due to light hurting one's eyes more than others; I have dark blue eyes, and the light affects me far more than it should (it induces migraines too in some situations). I've tried correcting it, but no matter how "normal" I am for a set period of time, I gradually start staying up later and later until I'm going to bed in the morning. I have a very good reason now to try and at least have a somewhat normal pattern (2 AM. or so to 10-12 AM/PM.; I like my sleep).

The light feels...draining, as if it saps my energy, and I feel the need to then rest; I chalk this up to my sensory system being overloaded from the light and this overwhelms and fatigues me. At night, in the darkness, I don't feel this draining, this vampire's touch that the light gives me. And as the sun goes down, I wake up.

It bothers my eyes too (see above); more than it should do, my eyes aren't that light, i.e., gray or light blue, they do have some melanin. It gives me headaches in the least. Sunburn doesn't bother me, and I've had my moments of peeled skin (out on the water).

Ironically, I live on the Eastern coast of Australia, one of the sunniest places in the world (typical).

My family will always ask me why on earth I am sitting in the dark. For some reason they have trouble accepting "I like darkness!" as an answear...
I have been subjected to quite a few vampire-jokes because of this

Yup. Me too. I feel tired and drained during the day, and unexplicably feel energized at night. I happen to have light blue eyes, which might better explain my sensitivity to sunlight.

My default sleep pattern is to sleep from 6AM to 6PM, but lately I've been trying to maintain a 1-2 AM to 9-10 AM cycle, without much success.

Moreso than night, my own thoughts keep me awake. I cannot stop them even when I want to, and I've always had this problem(as a child ages 6-9, my mother would want me to go to bed at 8PM to wake up at 7AM and go to school; I'd commonly wait 30 minutes in bed, and then go back to playing with the city I built out of all my toys trying to add to it new things I thought of earlier...). About ages 9-10 when I got heavily into role-playing games, the "up all night, sleep all day" pattern began to persist, and ever since then with some relapses back to normality as a teenager(almost exclusively during the course of school). As an adult, I can't get this pattern back to normal. Being awake during the day tends to make me more depressed than staying up all night.

Too much light can be overwhelming, but natural light, and not artificial light, tends to be the cause of the problem; I have no significant issues with artificial light(even if I can just barely hear flourescent lights.), unless it is a bunch of small lights flashing from a large assortment of places in all directions(eg. casino, but it takes a lot to overwhelm me).


I especially love wrapping myself in my bed covers, including my head. It makes sleeping easier for some reason, at least it used to. Since I'm larger than I was as a child and thus breath more, it's much more difficult to get enough air when I'm completely wrapped. Wrapping cloaks me in plenty of darkness and feels good. Blocking out light of all kinds makes it a LOT easier to think. I like to lay in bed imagining things quite a bit, and it helps a lot to stay covered as much as possible.


Despite the large amount of direct sunlight, Australia must be a nice place to live. I'd love the heat(feels good) and humidity(easy on my sinuses). That, and the spiders, scorpions, snakes, crocodiles, and lizards. You do have Perentie Goannas down there!

I once scared the wits out of a neighbour when she found me sitting in the basement in the dark! The dark feels cozy to me - might be a memory from the womb, but more likely a throwback to my teenage years when I would film spaceship models or stop-motion animation in my blacked-out room. Ah, the smell of hot dust (and the occasional kamikaze fly going sizzzle) on the spotlights!

I'm in two minds about bright sunny days - on the one hand they do cheer me up, on the other hand they tend to make me feel guilty about staying inside.

Those moments are to be cherished.

I have black trash bags pinned over my bedroom window to keep the light from seeping in. I should probably replace those with no-leak curtains sooner or later, my current setup is not exactly classy. When I was self-employed for 2 years, my sleeping hours were approx 7am-3pm. Unfortunately, now I work like a normal person and I'm up before 8am.

On the other hand, a doctor has told me that there have been studies that proved that night-shift workers have higher rates of car accidents, mental illness, and all-causes mortality. Kinda scary if you think about it.

I LOVE darkness. When I was a kid I would climb into the top shelf of my closet and close the door, staying there for hours on end, day after day. When I get really stressed out I lie down and sandwich two pillows between my head to block out sound and sight, which usually calms me in a minute or two.