Hi all, I posted this in my diary but wanted to post it to a forum in hopes of receiving some more feedback. I apologize as it may be a bit of a lengthy post...
To start, I used to have this recurring nightmare as a kid. The content of the nightmare itself wasn’t all that scary, but I’d get this sense of impending doom and very intense fear every time. Basically it would begin with my cousin and I in a room together sitting in a pile of stuffed animals. Then all of a sudden, a sense of impending doom would hit me. After the first time having that dream, every time after I would become terrified when that scene started, even though there’s nothing scary about playing with my cousin (a girl my same age) in a room full of stuffed animals. Then everything would go dark and it was as if I was floating through outer space. I would see the earth and all kinds of random things floating by me. Then I would see a knife, and my (then) uncle’s face, and then I would wake up terrified.
Anyway. I haven’t had the dream since childhood. I remembered it about 2 years ago and got so terrified that I would “finish” the dream. That didn’t happen and I hadn’t thought much about it since because I never had the dream again.
Then I started this trauma therapy stuff. My therapist recommended the book The Body Keeps the Score for me to read. I was reading this book at the same time that I was experiencing a ton of flooding and not really functioning, dissociating all the time, etc. I would have panic attacks while reading, but I was also just having panic attacks regularly throughout the days. I was reading a lot about repressed memories and stuff too, some of that being in the book.
During this time I was thinking a lot about this dream and just general childhood stuff. I know that I grew up being emotionally and mentally abused by my father, somewhat by my brother, and that I experienced several traumas during my teenage years. But for some reason none of that felt intense enough for how f*cked up I’ve felt throughout my life, even before the trauma as a teenager happened. So I began to wonder if this dream meant something more, and if so, what it was.
I had this flash of me as a young child, maybe 5 or 6, in a closet, crying and terrified with the feeling that there was an adult standing over me. I think my mind just made it up in an attempt to assign some meaning to that dream and find a reason for why I turned out this way. But then I was telling my t about the dream several months after all of this and she was telling me how dissociated memories may come up if something actually did happen. She said it wouldn’t all flood in at once, and it probably wouldn’t feel too powerful since it’s dissociated and would likely only be a little piece.
Now I’m wondering if perhaps my mind didn’t just make this up in an attempt to fill in some blanks and if it was possibly a dissociated memory? I don’t know how I’m supposed to figure any of this out. I feel like I should just ignore it and not search too hard for anything that may or may not be there.
To start, I used to have this recurring nightmare as a kid. The content of the nightmare itself wasn’t all that scary, but I’d get this sense of impending doom and very intense fear every time. Basically it would begin with my cousin and I in a room together sitting in a pile of stuffed animals. Then all of a sudden, a sense of impending doom would hit me. After the first time having that dream, every time after I would become terrified when that scene started, even though there’s nothing scary about playing with my cousin (a girl my same age) in a room full of stuffed animals. Then everything would go dark and it was as if I was floating through outer space. I would see the earth and all kinds of random things floating by me. Then I would see a knife, and my (then) uncle’s face, and then I would wake up terrified.
Anyway. I haven’t had the dream since childhood. I remembered it about 2 years ago and got so terrified that I would “finish” the dream. That didn’t happen and I hadn’t thought much about it since because I never had the dream again.
Then I started this trauma therapy stuff. My therapist recommended the book The Body Keeps the Score for me to read. I was reading this book at the same time that I was experiencing a ton of flooding and not really functioning, dissociating all the time, etc. I would have panic attacks while reading, but I was also just having panic attacks regularly throughout the days. I was reading a lot about repressed memories and stuff too, some of that being in the book.
During this time I was thinking a lot about this dream and just general childhood stuff. I know that I grew up being emotionally and mentally abused by my father, somewhat by my brother, and that I experienced several traumas during my teenage years. But for some reason none of that felt intense enough for how f*cked up I’ve felt throughout my life, even before the trauma as a teenager happened. So I began to wonder if this dream meant something more, and if so, what it was.
I had this flash of me as a young child, maybe 5 or 6, in a closet, crying and terrified with the feeling that there was an adult standing over me. I think my mind just made it up in an attempt to assign some meaning to that dream and find a reason for why I turned out this way. But then I was telling my t about the dream several months after all of this and she was telling me how dissociated memories may come up if something actually did happen. She said it wouldn’t all flood in at once, and it probably wouldn’t feel too powerful since it’s dissociated and would likely only be a little piece.
Now I’m wondering if perhaps my mind didn’t just make this up in an attempt to fill in some blanks and if it was possibly a dissociated memory? I don’t know how I’m supposed to figure any of this out. I feel like I should just ignore it and not search too hard for anything that may or may not be there.
