The material presented
here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method
to exchange
information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
After mentioning on Raven's post that I'd go to bed and focus on making a gratitude list instead of thinking angry thoughts about the A, I did so.
My list went something like this.
1) I'm grateful that the A got angry and locked himself in his own room because he's snoring so loudly the walls are vibrating. At least it's not my bed.
2) I'm grateful that the cat has gone to sleep and isn't in here yowling at me for once.
3) I'm grateful that the dog is under my bed farting constantly and filling the room with this delightful fragrance to sooth me to sleep...
you get the idea. I went to sleep full of unhappy thoughts and didn't bother trying to turn them around.
What followed was, I think, the worst nightmare I've ever had. It was one of those very long, detailed ones (it seemed to go for the entire 3 hours that I was asleep) that made sense and had a plot, like a horror movie. I'll write out the plot as briefly and g-ratedly as I can because it doesn't take much to find the meanings/ fears in it.
I was in a huge derelict house, and I was walking around discovering that I had pulled off all the door handles the night before when sleepwalking. The AB was telling me how stupid I was and that I had been drunk when I did it and we wouldn't get our security deposit back now. So, I wasn't able to secure the house's many doors from intruders (a common dream theme for me). A heap of people arrived to stay for the weekend, we were going to have some sort of big party. I went into a room and found the tv was playing a court case, and it was about my AB's computer game- he had been accused of cheating. I sat and listened gleefully while people accused him of being a rotten unfair cheat. Then the judge told them that they had no evidence and he was aquitted even though he hadn't shown up to his own hearing. I was very unhappy. He came out and I told him all of the rotten things people had said and then got angry about him getting away with his terrible crime (lol) while he sat there smugly and laughed. Then I joined the party and someone eventually asked me, where was my daughter? I searched and searched (no-one would help) in a panic and finally realised, she had been playing downstairs in the basement earlier, I had gone down to get her and didn't remember seeing her since. So I made myself go down into the very dark and horribly scary basement with a torch and finally found her lying in a corner staring silently at me (super creepy). I got her upstairs and she told me that in my fear earlier I had gone on ahead of her with the torch and left her behind and she had gotten lost. Oh, God. Then, she convinced me to go back down there to get something she had lost. But she tricked me and ran off with the torch laughing and I was trapped down there. Well the there were very horrible things down there and the rest of the dream was just straight out of every horror movie I have ever seen, complete with a scene where I escaped and then had to go back in there to help someone who was calling for help and I ended up trapped again..
It was nasty, hands down the worst nightmare I've ever had. But the themes are pretty obvious eh?
And in the end, what woke me up and stopped me from meeting the gruesome end that was about to claim me? The cat, yowling in my face. LOL.
So, when I went to bed, I had a plan. I knew what I needed to do to have a peaceful sleep but instead, I let all of the irritations put me off so after talking the talk, I did the opposite to what I knew I should do...a lesson for me. It's no good knowing all of this stuff if I'm not going to practice it.
You can weave a tale that keeps me reading and just waiting for more, you could be a writer and I would buy your novels! Sending you better dreams, love and support!
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Sending you love and support on your journey always! BreakingFree
Al-Anon/Alateen Family Group Headquarters, Inc. 800-344-2666
" Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional."
"Serenity is when your body and mind are in the same place."