Weird Dreams

The dream started when I was in a space suit aboard my friend Richard's space ship. I don't remember exactly how I ended up there, but it was as if they had simply come and gotten me one morning, threw me in a space suit and launched me into space. In the dream, I hadn't had a chance to take a shower before getting into the space suit and I felt all dirty and grimy. And weirdly, Richard's space ship was not aired up inside, so everybody had to stay inside their suits. Of course, you can't take a shower inside a space suit, so I knew I just had to stay dirty and grimy for as long as we were in space.

There were lots of people on board, about thirty or so. In my dream, I knew them all, but other than Richard, I don't actually know any of them in real life. But strangely, even with all these “friends” around, I still felt very isolated. The space suits effectively kept me from making contact with anyone else. I could talk to them, but I couldn't touch them. The suits were built in such a way that you couldn't even feel pressure through them.

Everyone else was very excited about being in space. I was sort of excited, but I also just felt grimy, out of place and alone, even in the midst of all these other people. And for some reason, one of the girls was trying to convince me to let her highlight my hair.

It was a very weird dream and I felt very grimy, unprepared and isolated.

Then it morphed into a sort of jousting tournament, renaissance festival sort of thing. I was supposed to be camping with my husband, but I couldn't find him. I kept wandering around trying to find him, but no one knew where he was. Someone finally told me where my tent was, and this insanely good looking young man led me and a woman and her child to our tents. The woman was falling all over herself because of how good looking the guy was, so I teased him about being treated differently because of his looks. He grinned and didn't seem to be bothered by her attention.

When he finally pointed out my tent, I went and checked and sure enough, Hubby's and my name were listed on it, but two girl's names were also listed. When I tried to get inside our tent, I ended up having to through two guy's tent where they were already asleep in a pair of hammocks. Then once I got to “my” tent, I had to get on my hands and knees and crawl into it. There was this heavy blanket like thing pressing down on my back as I crawled. It also hung down around me in such a way that I couldn't see where I was going.

I could hear the voices of the two girls that I supposed were the other two names on the tag in front of the tent, but I couldn't see anyone. I just had to keep crawling underneath that heavy blanket.

And then I woke up.

In both dreams, I felt lost, unprepared and isolated for the most part. I have to wonder what exactly is going on in my subconscious.

A Lie And A Dream

My husband lied to me on Wednesday. It was a lie of omission, but it was a very important omission and a nasty little lie. He did it to manipulate me into doing something that he knew I would not want to do if I knew the truth.

I feel so betrayed. 

He's lied to me before about little things. Mainly things to protect his own feelings. (He obviously doesn't feel the same way about lies that I do.) And I've let him get away with it. Because they were little things, and I could tell he was lying, and I thought he could tell that I knew he was lying. I guess maybe he couldn't. And so he thought that lying to me this time wouldn't be a big deal.

He was wrong.

I was FURIOUS. So furious that I could barely speak. My body was shaking and my throat was so tight, I could barely breath. My eyes burned and watered and didn't want to focus properly. My heart beat so hard that every pulse hurt. My mind might have been able to rationalize what he had done, but my body knew that I had been betrayed and responded with a massive panic attack. It took hours for my physical symptoms to calm down.

I'd trusted him. I'd trusted him more than I have ever trusted anyone else in my life. I thought that he would always look out for me, the way that I look out for him. I used to feel so safe and protected with him.

Not anymore.

Lately, I haven't been feeling safe and protected at all. In fact, I've been feeling sort of neglected. And I told him so several weeks ago. I told him that I felt that he had given up on me. That because my problems hadn't magically gone away simply because I was now in a loving relationship, that he had simply given up on even trying to help me when I was in one of my funks. He apologized and insisted that he hadn't given up, that he simply didn't know what to do to help me.

I don't expect him to “help” me. At least not in terms of healing me. But he used to give me lots of emotional support and attention when things were bad, and even though that didn't heal me, it did make me feel better. Now, I feel like he just says the words he thinks he should say, but he doesn't really mean them. He's just going through the motions. It doesn't feel real, and it leaves me feeling even more hopeless.

And now, he has betrayed me. 

This is only the second time that we've really fought in the eight years that we've been together.  My husband is generally a good man and usually there is no need to fight. If we disagree about something, we simply talk it out.  If it looks like it's going to be a real problem, I usually just give in.  I don't like fighting.  It triggers my anxiety attacks.   But this time, I was not going to just give in.  It wasn't a simple disagreement.  He used a lie of omission to MANIPULATE me. He KNOWS how I feel about manipulation.  And he did it anyway.  To get something that HE wanted, without any regard to my feelings.

I feel so alone.

Last night I had a dream that Foxfire, I and some older man were part of a military excursion in a middle eastern country. The man was in a big truck, Foxfire was driving a truck and horse trailer and I followed behind them on a little motor scooter. As we were leaving the place we'd spent the night before, I told them that I needed to fill up my scooter because I was on empty. But they didn't hear me, and they didn't stop.

I rolled my scooter over to a makeshift little booth that had a gas pump and started to fill it up. Then I realized that my purse with my id and money were all in the truck with Foxfire. I apologized to the woman running the booth, and told her that I didn't have any money, that my companions had taken everything I had and left me behind with nothing. She kindly allowed me to finish filling up my scooter, saying that surely they would come back for me, and I could pay her then.

I waited and waited, and they never came back for me. However, a group of Australian men and women showed up and they paid for my gas and hung around with me, waiting for my people to return. When night came and still no one had come back for me, they allowed me to bunk with them in the large crowded room that they and a number of middle easterners were sharing for the night. As I lay on the floor, one of the men in the group, curled up next to me and held me, comforting me. I had been feeling horribly alone and deserted by my husband, and this complete stranger made me feel safe and secure.

And then, of course, the middle eastern army attacked the building, looking for the Americans who had been there earlier. All the middle easterners that had been sharing the room with us ran out a window and were mostly killed. The Australians and I hid under the bunks. The man who was holding me protecting me with his body.

The next morning, we looked out the window and saw that the little booth where the woman had been so kind to me had been completely destroyed. Probably because she had helped the enemy American. I felt horribly guilty that her business had been ruined because of me.

And then I woke up.

Not exactly a subtle dream. My sense of self has been taken from me. I feel empty, abandoned and alone and must depend upon the kindness of strangers for my well-being. However, anyone who helps me is put in danger and/or destroyed.

Midnight Panic Attack

I woke in the middle of the night last night having a panic attack so bad that I was literally shaking. I crawled out of bed and downed a valium as quickly as I could, then crawled back into bed and lay there hoping the valium would kick in soon.

I don't know why my anxiety attacks are so much worse lately. My mother-in-law was recently diagnosed with breast cancer, but it didn't seem to affect me that much. At least not consciously. I was more worried about providing emotional support for my husband than I was about my mother-in-law's illness. It sounds heartless to not be worried about someone with cancer. But I grew up knowing that both of my parents and my brother had terminal diseases. (Turns out my brother's wasn't terminal after all, he's still alive and kicking, but one of my cousins did die from the same thing.) I think my parents' long term illnesses and eventual deaths wore out all the circuits in my brain that are programmed to worry about parental illness. Or maybe somewhere deep deep inside I am worried, but it's just not making it to the surface of my thoughts. Who knows.

Or maybe the anxiety is simply about my husband. He is emotionally torn up about his mother's illness. He is also stressed about being emotionally torn up. I've tried to tell him that it's normal to be upset, but he keeps beating himself up about over-reacting. Personally, I think that he's handling it extremely well, but it's what he thinks that matters. I just try to be there for him. Which means I'm back to hiding how badly I feel so as not to put any more stress on him.

Someday I'd like to run around screaming at everybody, telling them in graphic detail exactly how miserable I am. I suppose this blog is my more subtle way of doing that. I may not be telling the people in my life, but I am telling someone. Even if they are complete strangers.