Haiku You

Wrap you in my love

Laughter, the best medicine

I sleep in your dreams

Dream

I had a dream last night about the friend I let go of. She was an online friend but in my dream I went to visit her. That’s something we had always talked about. In my dream we went to the store and in the store there was a section of stuffed animals. I told her not to look, and I picked out a stuffed bear I thought she’d like and I was going to buy it for her and surprise her with it. I ran up to the cashier and asked how much it was. She said one hundred pounds. I asked how many US dollars that was and the woman said “$125”. I was shocked at how expensive it was and said nevermind. I was sad that I was unable to get the bear for her.

Then we were driving on the highway and I noticed that this big truck was following us. When we got to where we were going – her house I think – the truck followed us off the highway and parked right behind us with his headlights glaring. I got out of the car and told my friend to wait there. I’m not sure what I was planning on doing, but all I knew was that I needed to protect my friend.

I don’t actually remember any more of the dream. But I woke up with these strong feelings of love and connection toward this person.

Did I do the right thing in ending the friendship? I don’t know. I do know that I miss her. I miss the connection we had.

But… It was just a dream right? The real world is right here, right now, staring me in the face, and this is what I need to focus on.

3 Dreams

I would like to share three dreams that I’ve had over the last three consecutive nights. They all seem to follow similar themes: me connecting to beings (whether they be animals or humans) who were in some way or another misunderstood by the people who cared for them. In all three, I was able to love and nurture them, and wake up feeling a sense of connection and fulfillment from our interactions together.

Dream 1

We were training elephants. I was with a group of children, and we were each on an elephant’s back. I had the pleasure of being given the baby elephant to help train. What we were doing, specifically, was sitting on their backs, and teaching them to reach up with their trunks and take food from our hands when we said a certain word or made a certain sound. We were feeding them bananas.

After some time and effort, I was able to teach the baby elephant to lift its trunk on my command and take the banana from my hand while sitting on his back.

After the training session was over, I stopped to speak to the instructors. They told me they were surprised and amazed that I’d been able to train the baby elephant and have him respond to me, since they’d been having trouble up until that point. They said he usually got so excited that it was hard to get him to do anything. That made “dream me” feel really good. 🙂

The most important aspect of this dream was the feelings it evoked. I felt such a tremendous amount of love, care, and connection to this baby elephant. And those feelings persisted for a long time after I awoke.

When I told my T about this dream, she asked if it gave me hope. I said I wasn’t sure. I mean, it was a heartfelt dream, no question about it. It’s just… Give me hope about what? It’s the first real “positive” dream I can remember having in quite a while, so perhaps that aspect of it is hopeful? I’m not sure.

Dream 2

Another dream about baby animals!

This one had baby birds in it. I was at this woman’s house, and I was holding her baby birds. They were tiny baby blue parakeets, and they were precious and amazing. Similar to the previous dream, I felt such love and warmth toward these little creatures.

The woman who owned them then said, “I’m sure I’m gonna forget about them when they aren’t babies anymore.” That struck a chord with me, and made “dream me” quite sad. Upon waking, I thought of that comment and immediately thought of my mom. From what she has told me, we were “deeply connected” when I was an infant and toddler. To the point where she’s said (on numerous occasions) she wished she could just freeze me at that age and keep me that way forever. Deep down, perhaps it does feel like she forgot about me once I wasn’t a baby anymore.

Dream 3

Last night I dreamt the third dream. There was a girl, perhaps ten or eleven (?), who was a big part of my life. I’m not exactly sure what my role was, but I know I wasn’t her parent or caregiver. It felt as though she were a close family member, like a cousin, or a niece.

She was different. How she was different is hard to explain or even pinpoint, but she didn’t process things the way that most children her age do, and also she had very extreme (and sometimes violent) reactions to seemingly minor things. Despite this, she wasn’t in a special ed class, but rather in a regular classroom with peers her age.

She felt like nobody understood her. She was teased often by the other students, and the teacher often would chastise her for not doing what she was supposed to be doing, or for acting in “inappropriate” ways.

I came to visit her during the school day. I’m not sure why I was there, or why I came to check up on her, but I did. I walked into the classroom right as the teacher was yelling at her for something, and the other kids were laughing at her. She was getting more and more agitated, to the point where she jumped up to run out of the room. She saw me, and I followed her outside and tried to calm her down but it didn’t work. In a state of complete emotional overwhelm, she began vomiting. I remember being repulsed, and tried getting out of the way so that none of it would get on me. Some did. I took her to the bathroom so she could be sick in there, but all the stalls were taken. We ended up going back outside, where I was able to help her calm down a bit.

And then something clicked in my brain, and this is what happened next.

I took her face in my hands, and I told her that no matter what anyone ever said, or anyone ever thought, that she was beautiful and amazing. I told her regarding the people who didn’t appreciate her, that that was their loss. I told her that her brain worked a little differently than other peoples brains, but that didn’t mean anything was wrong with her. And in fact, everyone’s brains work a little differently from one another. And that was nothing to be ashamed of. I told her that I loved her, and would always be there for her no matter what.

Tears soaked her face. Not sad tears but happy tears. I don’t know if anyone had ever said those things to her before.

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I feel these dreams are significant, but I haven’t quite figured out why. I have a feeling it may have to do with the fact that I’m beginning to love and nurture different parts of myself?

Perhaps this says something about how my psyche/inner being feels at the moment. Who knows.