OK so I don’t know if I’m alone in this. Maybe I am, or maybe somewhere out there in my readership is another person who also gets Mango Nightmares. How do you tell if you have Mango Nightmares? It is not, in fact, having nightmares about mangos, but the other way, where you get nightmares after eating mangos.
So here’s the thing. Every year, usually in the summer, I go crazy over one type of fruit. It changes from year to year, but whatever fruit it is that year, I eat dozens and dozens of pounds of it until my thirst for that particular fruit is slaked. One year I had dozens of pineapples. Another, golden kiwis (far superior to regular kiwis, try them!).
…Side note, why are we calling Pineapples Pineapples?! 
?
Anyway! So one year, my glut of fruit was mangoes. And not the red and green kind like I thought were mangos. I mean, they are mangoes, but they are not the best mangoes.
I’ve gotta say, Haden mangoes have got nothing on Ataulfo mangoes!
Once I discovered how good these were I bought them by the bagfull. I learned a quick way to peel them using a glass:
And from there I was processing them and freezing them, then bagging them up in individual portions for smoothies! But always I was eating them straight up, sometimes having four or five for a meal.
…That’s when the nightmares started. I noticed a dramatic shift in my dreams on nights where I’d had a ton of mangoes during the day. I began having vivid and distressing nightmares. I did some experiments and found that they were directly correlated to having a bunch of mangoes.
So, the Year Of Mangoes ended and I eventually went back to a sane equilibrium with them, having one every now and then when they looked good. Then, at a games night at a friend’s last week, a bunch of fresh, ripe mangoes were brought out. I gleefully showed them the glass-hack and prepped them in no time. We feasted on the delicious golden flesh. One of my friends joked that it probably wasn’t enough to bring on The Mango Nightmares. I laughed. That time it wasn’t. But now…
A couple of days ago, I only had one mango. And that night: vivid nightmares. It could have just been regular nightmares. I like to have more data before I make a hypothesis…
Yesterday I only had one mango, I swear. It was good as hell. But my nightmares last night… Lordy lordy! Awful! Here’s what my sleep looked like (I use Sleep Cycle to track my sleep quality!):
I didn’t wait for the alarm to rise me and I alighted right quick to try and shake the dream of an old Asian lady coming for me with an AK while I ran upstairs (NO YOU FOOL! What are you thinking, UPstairs!!! Your friends are in the basement and she’s going to KILL THEM AHHHHHH). So yeah I got up.
And I will try another experiment. One mango today. I’ll see how I fare.
So, dear readers, am I alone? Are Mango Nightmares a thing of my own personal physiology? Or do I have friends out there who know the struggle between choosing to taste the delicious golden sweet honey flesh of a glorious Drupe, or having a peaceful sleep?
I will keep you posted!
Heidi out.
H.G. Bells 
