I think I made a breakthrough with this dream

[Marco]

So yesterday shortly before I went to bed I had a very enlightening conversation with a fellow FDR listener. (Thanks so much, you know who you are!) We talked about my family and me defooing from my grandparents. It's difficult for me to evaluate my parents objectively and to connect with the experience I had with them as a child. With my grandparents I don't feel ambivalent, because I don't like talking to them and they beat my father with the belt whenever his grades weren't to his parents satisfaction.

 

I'm away from my parents now because I am doing an internship. My mother has asked me to call my grandmother because "she wished that". I said no, I'm not going to call. When she asked, I just told her I have an bad feeling whenever I call my grandparents and she didn't pursue the matter much.

I was very sure I was going to have a dream after the conversation with the FDR listener and sure enough, I had one and woke up at 4:46 am. It's very short and most of it I think is very obvious, but maybe you see even more than I do and hopefully it helps some of you out there.

 

 

The dream:I am in a forest with my family. My father says, "We'd like to make an important announcement." He takes me and somebody else to be at each of his sides and puts his arm around our waists. He starts singing a birthday song for my grandfather. I suddenly hang in the air, because apparently my father has lifted me up. I start beating my father in the ribs because I am starting to panic and want to get out of this situation. I am angry at my father because he knows that I don't like and don't want to speak to my grandfather.My father collapses and shows signs of an heart attack. He says, "You have broken something." I cry out, "Heart attack!", to alert the others and think (and maybe also say) "The time has come." - as if the heart attack has been anticipated in advance. I hold my fathers head in my hands and say "Look at me." or something like that so he doesn't loose consciousness. Somehow  I feel this is the most important thing, that he doesn't loose consciousness. My father sticks out his tongue like a defiant child. I feel like I am not taken seriously. My father looses consciousness.I wake up. I have deep compassion with my inner child.

 

 

More info:

My brothers birthday is this month and my father's birthday is in December. With both birthdays, I feel very unsure about what to do.

I don't know (didn't know) whether or not I should congratulate my brother, since he didn't respond to my last message and I don't like him that much any more. I will probably not congratulate him. The only reason I would want to talk to him now is to find out more about our childhoods.

My father's birthday is going to be his 50th, so the whole family (a couple dozen people) will be there, including my grandparents. (Also men in their 50s are prone to heart attacks and my father has a desk job and works long hours.) I don't know how I should act towards my grandparents then or if I should even go. I do realize on some level that it is a bad idea to go. I hear my parents in my head saying, "But it's his 50th!".

I go back to my parents when the internship ends in mid-October. I aim to learn as much as I can about myself until then, so I can be strong enough to see them as they are.

 

What I think about the dream:

The forest reminds me of the one my other grandparents regularly camp at.

Who is the other person he wants to sing with? Is it maybe that one is me as a child and the other me as an adult?

My father is clearly ignoring my wishes. Me hanging in the air means that I am a child and that he is preventing me from escaping. He is forcing me to participate in trying to please a violent person. I do what I feel in the dream and now to be totally justified: I try to get out at any cost.

I am the wronged party but then it's all about him. He collapses and has a heart attack. I try to save him. I do cry out in order for people to help me but nobody does. Nobody is even calling an ambulance.

"The time has come." Is this the anticipation I feel about what is going to happen when I go back to my parents?

Why is the dream making him have a heart attack? Is it genuine or not? This is very difficult for me because I still do somehow want to save my father. I have no idea of what it will do psychologically to him if I mention his parents violent behavior.

His sticking his tongue out makes me feel sorry for him because I feel like he is a child that is trying to mask great pain. But it could also mean that he is manipulating me with a faked heart attack and then mocking me for believing it. In the dream I did not feel at all like that but rather forgot about the situation he put me in before that.

I am glad, however, that I felt such a deep compassion for myself in the dream after I woke up. I rarely had such a deep emotional connection with somebody from a dream. I am very relieved that I am starting to connect to my deepest emotions.

[Wesley]

Hey Marco, I think it is good how you are beginning to explore the role your parents play in your interactions with your grandparents.

 

The main questions seem to be around once he starts dying from the heart attack and acts like a defiant child.

 

I think it is no coincidence that the minute you realize you are a victim is when your father collapses. This simultaneously tries to pull you away from realizing you are a victim and makes you instead try to save your father. This lead you to trying to care for and empathize with your father as a child instead of focusing on your negative experiences in the situation.

 

You can tell that your desire is to save him. Yet his defiance seems to show that he does not want to be saved. Instead, it seems to me like attention as to what happened to you has been over-taken by your father being the victim of a heart attack.

 

The defiance very much reminds me of times where kids have tried to get a parent's attention and when they succeed they turn to their sibling and stick out their tongue quick so the parent couldn't see, but the competitor could.

 

My view is that you cannot save your father. He can only save himself when you express the problems you may have with the situation. That you do not like being the tool of appeasement to violent people. When you express this, then his response will tell you a lot.

 

Sorry I went on a bit of a ramble there, hopefully some of that helped. Let me know!

[Marco]

Oh, it did help! Especially the second to last paragraph.

[Lens]

Hello Marco,

 

Congratulations for this breakthrough. It is amazing that we really can know feelings only by experiencing them and the same thing for dreams. I am also very grateful we had this talk all together and thank you for sharing your thoughts and your feelings with us.

 

Your dream is really powerful and moving because in it you can see the type of relationship as a kid you had with your father. It looks to me that this relationship is based on fear, deceit and a mix of guilt and shame. It also shows that you got very very wise inner child and smart. You didn't lose a second, we had the talk in the evening and in the night you got this gift. Bravo!

 

In the dream you wanted to get away from your father but he didn't let you so he grabbed you and controlled you. When he sensed that you insisted to go he was afraid that you'd see the truth that he is using you he started to victimize himself to trigger in you the feeling of fear of abandonment. Kinda if you do not do what I want you to do I will die and you'll be left alone and you'll be responsible. This situation brings a lot of confusion in the mind of a child and terror. Most of the time children are afraid to say the truth because they are afraid to lose the "love" that their parents have for them. In the case of your dream I think that possibly your father could have said to you when you were very small child something like "You gonna kill me if you insist, I'm gonna have a heart attack now, stop talking" That is a horrible threat for children the child literally thinks that he is responsible each time his parent has a health issue. So the child will never speak to not to kill his dad or mom.

 

The child within you felt loved and understood in the morning. I think you took a step in the right direction in my opinion. Keep that dream in mind if feelings of guilt come back and when they come back stand up for them and fight them. It is a battle that will make you strong. You will know more about yourself and you will know yourself and true feelings and the false feelings that your parents induced upon you when you were small without your consent because you were naturally depend on them.

 

Those were my thoughts

 

Thank you for sharing this dream with us :-)

 

Good Luck 

 

Lens

[Marco]

Well, thank you for sharing your thoughts! I think you're right.

I'm preparing a sheet of paper with reminders for me to bring in to every conversation with my parents and there I wrote something to remind myself of this dream. The more I think about this dream, the clearer my relationship with my parents gets.