What do my nightmares mean?

[Depression = 72% of members]

So I keep dreaming I'm on a sinking ship and everyone's survival depends on me.  I try to save the ship but I keep getting distracted by having to collect my baggage literally, clothes, my kids toys, family photos, etc.
 
I wake up terrified. 

Any thoughts?

[Zabava]

So I keep dreaming I'm on a sinking ship and everyone's survival depends on me.  I try to save the ship but I keep getting distracted by having to collect my baggage literally, clothes, my kids toys, family photos, etc.
 
I wake up terrified. 

Any thoughts?

[Turkish]

Do you think that the ship might represent you, and that you are unable to save yourself, being distracted by and beholden to everything else?

[Kwamina]

Hi Zabava,

That's not a pleasant dream to have, quite unsettling indeed.

How long have you been having this particular type of dreams?

When did these dreams start, can you link it to any particular event or change in your life?

The Board Parrot

[Zabava]

Hi Kwamina,

I have had them for about a year now. I think Turkish is onto something...it was a year ago I started really examining my past and working with a therapist.

I started to remember some really bad things as I've shared on these boards.  I get scared of losing my mind to be honest because I've experienced loss of time and delusions in the past.

[Kwamina]

I had a feeling you starting to have these dreams might have coincided with you reaching another stage in your healing process. Call it my Parrot Sense ;)

Is this dream/nightmare the only recurring dream you have? Or are you also having other recurring dreams?

I get scared of losing my mind to be honest because I've experienced loss of time and delusions in the past.

Getting scared at times is normal, but as Pete Walker says: "Feel the fear in your body without reacting to it. Fear is just an energy in your body that cannot hurt you if you do not run from it or react self-destructively to it."

What kind of delusions did you experience?

That sense of loss of time, did you experience this before or after you started seeing your therapist?

The Board Parrot

[Zabava]

The loss of time and delusional thinking happened before therapy and haven't recurred for a while.  I have a lot of recurring dreams about trying to pack suitcases and leave my parents house but I can never collect everything in time. 

I actually dreamed last night that I was trying to rearrange my childhood bedroom and my mother was yelling at me.  It was very vivid down to the colour of my desk which I had totally forgotten. 

[JNChell]

Our bodies and minds store trauma. It will eventually try to find its way out. It’s not natural for us. The nightmares can be very unsettling. When they wake you up, try to look at them instead of feeling them. I used to feel traumatized at times by my dreams, but those dreams are the past. I’m safe now. I understand the feelings that are attached to what you describe.Those feelings are pivotal.  Old ghosts. When your bad dreams wake you up or try to ruin the next day for you, what tools can you implement to take your power back?

[Zabava]

JNChell,

I actually bought myself a journal today and I think it might be helpful to record my dreams.  It's a strange experience to be transported back to childhood, but I think it may be a way for me to access some repressed memories.  The physical details like the desk and the green shag carpet in my room bring back the feelings too.  I was a very scared little kid in that house and my mum was very angry.

[JNChell]

I understand being that scared little kid. Recognizing that along with the feelings that we have allow us to know that that little kid is still in us. It is us. Knowing that allows us the opportunity to nurture that little kid that wasn’t nurtured by their parents. Our spirit needs attention and mending.

I think that a journal is a great idea. I’m terrible at things like that, but I bet when you’re feeling certain things like doubt or guilt, you can reference your journal and validate yourself. What you experienced was real. You’re going to be ok, you just have to figure out how to grant that for yourself. It’s not easy, but it’s doable. If you’re comfortable with sharing, what is the first passage that you’re going to write in your journal?

[Zabava]

JNChell,

I am going to try to work through the exercises in a book Pete Walker recommends for helping to silence the inner critic, it's called It Wasn't Your Fault by Beverly Engel.  Cheesy title but actually a really helpful book.

[JNChell]

 

[Woolspinner2000]

Hi Zabava,

Sounds like quite the unsettling time you are having lately! I have had a reoccurring dream for years, and as I've moved through T, it has changed. It's interesting that yours is about a sinking ship that you are not able to escape. Mine is about a tornado coming right outside my childhood home. I can see it, I open my mouth to tell everyone but nothing would ever come out, and I couldn't run away from it, as if I was frozen in time yet the tornado kept coming. That's about the time that I would wake up, heart pounding, fear coursing through me.

As I have processed and worked through much of my childhood, the dream keeps changing. The tornado is still there, sometimes there is more than one tornado, but now I am able to warn people. The last few times I've had the dream, I find that I am now able to get to safety and the tornado doesn't harm me. It seems a picture of my no longer feeling so helpless against the trauma of my childhood, and my ability to get safe has blossomed, not only in the dreams but also in my life.

I have a suggestion for you that may seem strange. Do you have a stuffed animal, like a teddy bear? Or if you have children, maybe they'd loan you one. As our inner child tries to process the trauma we went through, sometimes it is a help to hold a teddy bear for comfort when you go to bed, and somehow it touches places inside of us that we don't know how to reach, but a comforting little friend can aid in that. I thought my T might be going crazy when he suggested this, but he knew what he was doing!

 
Wools 

[Zabava]

Wools, your suggestion is not crazy at all.  I was at the dentist the other day having xrays and they put the lead apron on me and it made me connect to the weighted blankets and stuffies we use for special needs kids at the school where I work.

I couldn't sleep last night cause I booked a trip home (first time back to my hometown in a year) to visit my bpd mum who is 79 and deteriorating.  I had a long nightmare about weird details like my 80s ski jacket I wore when my mum was at her worst and the green shag carpet in my bedroom.  I hugged my pillow all night and it helped.

[Woolspinner2000]

Ah, this is good Zabava! Just so you know, my teddy bear has a name: Merriweather. I'd love to hear if you find a stuffed bear that really needs a home with you. They may have some at the airport when you travel...

 
Wools

[Zabava]

Wools,

I am actually kind of freaking out about about going home.  I don't have a stuffy but if I did I would call it Bunburry.  Oscar Wilde invented a character in one his plays called Bunburry.  Whenever the protagonist wanted to avoid his relatives he would say he had to visit his sick friend Bunburry in the country.

All joking aside I hope I can come here for support during my visit...last time I lost my grip.  I'm hoping I have better tools from the work I've done in therapy and the wonderful support I've received here.  Wish me luck!

[Woolspinner2000]

Hi Zabava, 

I always became very anxious before a visit to my uBPDm, and I hadn't started T concerning my childhood until two weeks before she passed away. Something my T encourages is that I practice getting out, getting safe, and staying safe. The getting out may mean getting out of the house, or it may mean getting out of a room, whatever that means to you. Getting safe can speak to emotional and physical safety. For me it often means finding emotional safety. I would plan ahead on my options that were available to me when I would go and see her, such as getting outside when I needed a break, offering to go to the store for something, taking a walk, etc. All elements of getting out and getting safe.

Have you thought about what options you may have for practicing safety for yourself on this trip?

Love the name for your stuffy!
Wools

[Zabava]

Wools,

I  made it through 4 days and I'm home now;  I know I need to process my visit home intellectually, but right now I feel very upset and I don't know what to do with these bad feelings.

[Kwamina]

Hi Zabava,

Well I'm glad you made it through and are back home now

How did it go? What is it that you are most upset about?

The Board Parrot

[Zabava]

Hi Kwamina,

I think I am just really angry.  There was no major drama, but I found it very difficult to be cheerful and happy, which has been my role in the family.  My sister gets angry at my mum and vice versa and I am supposed to absorb it from both sides and then be unscathed.  It's very depressing at my mum's because she doesn't clean and it's filthy. I felt I had to stay and I had one of my kids with me so it was even worse.

Experiencing my family through my kid's eyes makes me realize how not normal my childhood was.

I've been thinking about all the time and energy I've given to family drama and I realize it's held me back, not just emotionally, but in terms of my work life too.

Over the years I have had to quit jobs and left school to go home and deal with my parents' problems.  I feel like I never fully committed to  a career because I had to be available to deal with crisis after

I feel very sad too to think about all the time I've sacrificed to their needs.  I am in my 50s and I don't want to do it anymore.