A few days into the semi-freak-out process I had last week, I had a dream.
I was
chasing T, my 2-year-old, down a hallway, yelling for him to come back.
I sensed danger was near. Sure enough, near the end of the hallway, a
door on the right opened up, and I saw the face of a bearded man whom I knew,
for some reason, to be a pedophile. He saw T, and grabbed him, to
pull him into the apartment. I screamed at the man to stop, and ran as
fast as I could to the door and got there just as it was closing with T
inside. I knew the man was about to lock the door, so I urgently turned
the doorknob and slammed myself against the door. Fortunately, I was
able to open the door just in time. I managed to grab T's arm and pull
him out of the apartment. I held him close to me.
The scene then
switched, and I was in a dressing room, like they have in the back stage
areas of theatres or concert halls. I was naked and
looking into the mirror, but I could only see myself from the waist up. I was holding my right arm straight up, and was
leaning it against what I
thought was another mirror on my right. However, I felt a kind of
tickle on my armpit, and I looked over, and realized I was actually
leaning against the arm of a man. The tickle was his armpit hair. He
was in the same posture as myself, though reversed--his left arm was
straight up, and he was leaning it against me. I peered my head around, and the man peered his
head around, and I saw that his face was someone I admire (who shall
remain nameless on this blog). I said, "Oh, it's you." He started saying loving admiring words to me, like "You've always impressed me," and "I think you're amazing." And soon we were down on the floor... At this point, I became semi-lucid and said, "I don't need to continue this dream, because I already know what sex feels like." It was almost a bored feeling. So I woke up.
At first I chided myself. I'm not "getting any" these days, why not let myself enjoy it in a dream? Ha. But I know that dreams are symbolic, and even my rejection of going through the actual experience of sex was part of the meaning of the dream.
In a way, though, this is huge progress for me. As far as I can remember, I have never had a sex dream end well. Usually I'm just burning for a guy, and he ignores or rejects me. Or there have been dreams where a guy and I will start to kiss, but then he decides he's not interested, or something else happens to stop it. So at least this time, I had someone very interested, and we were actually well into the process!
Unfortunately, I've also had quite a few pedophile dreams in the past. This has really freaked me out, but I've decided that the pedophile energy that spooks my dreams occasionally has to do with my judgmental attitude towards pedophiles in waking life. I'm opposed to the death penalty, except in the case of pedophilia. There's just something about that crime that infuriates me beyond reason. As far as I know, I wasn't molested as a child. But I relate to the innocence and vulnerability of children, and for anyone to take advantage of them just puts me beside myself with rage. There's also the issue that child sexual abuse seems to be a perpetuating cycle. Many victims grow up to victimize. So why do we let these creeps out of jail, ever? The only way to stop the cycle will be not to allow any more children to get molested. Lastly, my association with pedophiles is "they can't change." As far as I know, pedophilia has an abysmal recovery rate. Another reason to never ever let them out.
So a pedophile, as a personal symbol for me, is an energy that "deserves harsh judgement," has a history of destruction, and is impossible to change. It's probably how my dreaming mind portrays my Shadow. My Shadow is so repulsive to me, and it feels so impossible to change, the closest figure to describe it, one that will generate strong emotional reaction in me, is a pedophile.
I think that T, as a dream symbol, calls upon a very special moment in my life. T was born at home, and the birth experience was one of the highest points of my life. I'll post the whole story later, but for now, one of the major things that I took away from the experience was a recognition of my power. "If I can do that, I can do anything!" This inspiration was what gave me courage to divorce my husband.
How appropriate that after a few days of fretting about not being able to fight cancer on my own, I dream about T running away from me. I'm losing a hold on what I used to understand viscerally via giving birth to T-- I am more powerful than I give myself credit for. This revelation is in danger of being absorbed back into my Shadow in the dream, but I manage, barely, to snatch it back to myself.
Good work, Abigail!
Dream sequencing should usually interpreted with a "because A, then B" approach. Meaning, what happens in the first scene "causes," or "leads into" the second scene, and so on. That's not always the case, but it's a pretty good rule of thumb, and I'm going with it in this dream.
So, because I managed to remember my power, then comes the scene where I am seeing myself as I really am, and this leads to an integration (which is what sex usually symbolizes in a dream) with an energy that has long evaded me.
I look back on all the guys I've ever fallen in love with or had crushes on, and most of them were guys who did not (seem to) have the struggle that I deal with the most--isolation. Most of them were very outgoing, and magnetic, and everyone liked them. The guy in my dream is like that. I very much associate him with charisma and a magnetic personality. And yet, if he's showing up in my dreams, I must have that energy inside myself somewhere too! It gives me hope that I'm seeing myself start to integrate it at the dream level. Dreams are usually ahead of our conscious minds--I certainly don't feel any more magnetic or charming than I used to be--but I've worked with my dreams long enough to know that this is indicative of a new beginning.
It's interesting, this dream showed up the day after I told a few friends what I was struggling with. Their positive, supportive attitudes must have been what inspired the dream. I may not have a partner, but I have good friends and the ability to draw them to me (magnetize) when I need them. And I have my inner strength (represented by T).
The only problems I see in the dream are:
1) I saw myself only from the waist up. Could there be a pun on the word "waste"? I've often felt like I have wasted a lot of my life, which gives me shame. And not seeing the lower parts of my body indicates a disconnect between my higher and lower "selves."
2) I didn't feel the need to actually go through with the sex, because "I already know what it feels like." Again, there is a disconnect between thought and action. I can mentally agree to something (the higher self--head in the clouds), but walking it out (the lower self--feet on the ground), I'm apparently not too sure of. Or unwilling to engage with. I guess I need to embrace materialism more!
(Oh, and eventually I'll get around to facing my Shadow, because I don't actually believe that anyone is fully hopeless, including myself. I'll need to work through those feelings, fears, and issues at some point. It's on my to-do list... ha...)
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