Do you dream?
Do you dream about your therapists?
Do you make any sense of your dreams?
I dream quite a lot and my T said once that I have good dreams (that made me sort of proud). There are some messages in these dreams. I don't quite know or I might be wrong about what they mean but they do mean something.
Last night I had a second dream about my therapist.
He looked like a hippie, very feminine, had breasts, long hair and earrings (?!), was very needy towards me, wanted to be physically close, hug and touch.
Another time in the same dream he was himself, a man, and was sitting behind a huge desk, that was separating me from him, it felt very distant.
Third time, I though it was reality, in the session room, was himself again, sitting opposite me in his chair. I was relieved that he is a man, and there is no massive desk separating me from him, he looks and listens, but then I noticed that he's still wearing women's earrings...!?
There must be some meaning in it.

I only had one dream about my former T. It was shortly after the termination. I dreamed that my family and I were hanging out at a party with my former T and his family at this huge Spanish hacienda-looking place. And there were a lot of dogs roaming around (my former T told me a couple of times that he's a "dog" person). I had the distinct impression that we were going to be friends, and I was happy about that.

SG

echo, that is such a beautiful dream, I'd like to have one like that.

Deja Vu, I'm going to tell him about the dream, it's a bit freaky with the earrings in his ears. They must mean something feminine, maybe also something about listening?

The first dream about him that I discussed I got myself into trouble. When I told him that I had a dream about him, he must have thought "Aha, here we are!" and started to question me about my feelings about him in the dream. I nearly got away without telling him how I feel about him. Nearly...

I dreamed (after just a few sessions with my T) that she was really young, and was making me help her rearrange all the furniture in this church hall. But the furniture was all half-rotten cane, and was falling apart as we moved it. At the end she showed no concern, just wanted me to join her Christian youth group! (I'm an atheist...)

It drew to my attention that I was feeling just a LITTLE suspicious of her!! But I didn't tell her.

Thanks for starting this thread, Amazon! What struck me about your dreams is that they started out with two opposite extremes, and ended up with something in the middle. Maybe the extremes represent your fears about what you don't want him to be, such as too clinging or too distant. Maybe the third one represents what you want him to be for you. I like your idea that the earrings represent something usually associated with femininity, like listening. I will be curious to hear what your T says about it.

Summer, your second dream gave me chills. Considering what happened soon after, it sounds very premonition-like! And what you said about the dreams since then makes a lot of sense.

Echo, your dream reminded me of the scene in the movie City of Angels where Nicholas Cage (an angel) stays with Meg Ryan all night and helps her sleep. I wish it would have helped you like it helped her.

I experienced something with my former T that wasn't exactly a dream, because it happened when I was awake, but it wasn't exactly fantasy, either, because it was unbidden. Many times I felt him kind of hanging around and watching me, like a guardian angel. One way it manifested itself is similar to Echo's dream, with him holding me as I fell asleep. It manifested itself in a few other ways that I'd like to discuss in more detail with my current T, but in general his "presence" always felt protective, like he was guarding me, watching over me, making sure I was okay.

The reason I distinguish this from fantasy is because when I first noticed his "presence", I tried to make fantasies out of it, but they always turned out badly. Kind of weird when your fantasies go bad...I mean, if I'm going to fantasize, I should be able to make them feel good, right? Who would want to think up bad fantasies? But I couldn't make these feel good, no matter how hard I tried (and believe me, I tried ). When I stopped trying to turn this into fantasies, his "presence" didn't leave, but went back to the guardian angel type thing I described.

Maybe I just have an overactive subconscious.

Anyway thanks everyone for sharing. This is a really interesting topic and you all have a lot of insight as to what your dreams mean.

SG

During the time I first started thinking about leaving my exT permanently, I had the same dream about him for a couple of weeks.

In the dream his wife rang me and asked me to babysit their daughter as an emergency had come up. (I do know his family, they go to the same school as us). I was having a lovely time with their daughter and we played games and read stories and finally he came home and said I can look after her now. But he just ignored her and then went into another room and since she was only little in the dream (about three) I stayed and kept looking after her because she was obviously unsupervised until the Mum came home.

After I had the dream for a few nights I thought that their daughter represented me in our therapeutic relationship and he was ignoring my needs and it was up to me to look after myself. The dream actually helped me to make the decision to leave because I did know that by him constantly breaking his boundaries he was never going to put my needs first.

Good topic, Amazon. I like reading other people's dreams about their therapy. Interpretation is sometimes difficult, but it is irresistible not to try! SG, I like a lot of your possible interpretations - you think deeply about it.

Echo, I liked your dream about your T staying by your side and watching you all night. It sounds to me like you knew he was still there for you and still cared and wouldn't abandon you.

quote:

originally posted by Summer:
I had this dream and woke up feeling as if something was terribly wrong - couldn't shake the feeling.

Summer, wow, it must have been so hard to go through that! When your bad dream turned out to be a true premonition. I think it would make me afraid to dream again.

quote:

originally posted by Summer:
I think it's a fascinating topic? Be interesting to know if they dreamed about us??!!

Surely all T's/P's occasionally dream about some of their clients. After all, they are human (sometimes I have to remind myself of this) and need to dream to process their daily stuff just like the rest of us -- and practicing therapy is a huge part of their stuff. But most probably don't disclose it because it might not be good for us to know it. I think most of us want to feel (at least secretly) that we are as "special" or important to our T's/P's as they are to us. So if we knew they dreamed about us, it would sort of give us a feeling of power or equalization in the relationship.

I actually had my first dream about my T just a few nights ago. It is kind of embarrassing, but I'll share it anyway. (Keep in mind that my T is an older female that I tend to look upon as a mother figure). In the dream, I was late for a session that was supposed to take place in a new location - a huge, modern multi-level office complex. We were going to meet this time in a hot tub/spa area on one of the floors there. Except that by the time I arrived, T was already conducting a session in the spa with another client -- a female closer to her own age that actually resembled one of her real clients I saw in passing a few weeks ago. My T and the client stared at me when I first got in the water, but didn't say anything. I remember thinking to myself, "Was this supposed to be a group thing, or am I so late that I entirely missed my own session time?" Soon my T just seemed to ignore me and went on with her discussion with the other client, while I just soaked and sulked off to one corner of the tub in my own little world. It was then that I finally looked down and saw my ugly breasts floating above the water and realized I was naked. I realized I had come to the hot tub thinking of it in terms of getting a bath, and it was only then that I recognized that my T and her client had initially stared at me because I had been naked, and also they had probably seen some unsightly scars on my body. They were both dressed in modest one-piece swimming suits, and I felt not only embarrassed but angry that somehow I had not understood the "rules" of this spa session and had over-exposed myself. There wasn't really anything sexual about it though. And that's all. Like I said, a bit embarrassing!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Cipher,

MH, really interesting! Being in the water and revealing yourself. Like being in therapy and showing your scars there. ??

Well I'm no dream analyst, but I have to agree with you, MH - it's irresistable not to try! So I hope you don't mind if I do. Your dream seems to be symbolic of the hopes and fears you've expressed on this board. And I totally get that it's not about sex. It's about vulnerability. Maybe it's about what you want from therapy, and what you're afraid of in the therapy.

When I read your dream, something immediately came to mind that you said today on Hals "Stuck" thread:

quote:

for me I think the thing holding me back from being completely honest with my T is that I don't fully trust her enough. I don't trust that she will genuinely be there for me, that she will allow me to be dependent without being shamed for it. I don't trust if she is being 100% real, because we all know that T's/P's encounter countertransference which they try to hide from their clients.

Hot tub/spa = water, cleansing, healing, what you want therapy to be
Your nakedness = honesty, trust, genuineness, vulnerability, dependence
Your T in a modest swimsuit = holding something back, hiding, not being 100% real
The other client in a similar modest swimsuit = maybe fear that you are revealing too much compared to other clients, fear that your T wants you to hide some things
Their staring at you = Judgement or rejection, shaming you for revealing too much, for being too dependent

Thanks for sharing this, MH.
SG

Halo, your dream made so much sense, the way you described it. What an awesome insight for you to have, to realize that it means you already know how to take care of yourself better than your old T does. And powerful, that it helped you decide to seek out a new T.

I love how you describe the time you spent with the little girl, that it was "lovely", that you played games and read stories. Every little girl deserves a "Mum" like that.

Thanks, Halo!
SG

Wow, SG, you are really good at this!

And Halo, I agree with SG's assessment of your dream and your amazing insight. So true that "every little girl deserves a "Mum" like that"! I am glad you recognized that truth in your dream and were able to move on.

Thanks, MH! You all have such interesting, detailed dreams, with so much symbolism. I am a little envious I only had the one about my former T, which didn't have much symbolism at all, and none yet about my current T. So I'm enjoying reading about all your dreams very much.

There is more I'd like to post about the "unbidden" thoughts I've had regarding my former T, because I think there's lots of symbolism there too, but I'm reluctant to share them because they weren't technically "dreams". I'm afraid that the surface details will be seen as strange. But ultimately I think they point to a deep-seated desire for a protector, a guardian, a hero, a father, and a desire to be "seen" and treasured. Basically a longing for the things I didn't get growing up. Maybe I will get up the courage eventually.

SG

quote:

Originally posted by strummergirl:
There is more I'd like to post about the "unbidden" thoughts I've had regarding my former T, because I think there's lots of symbolism there too, but I'm reluctant to share them because they weren't technically "dreams". I'm afraid that the surface details will be seen as strange. But ultimately I think they point to a deep-seated desire for a protector, a guardian, a hero, a father, and a desire to be "seen" and treasured. Basically a longing for the things I didn't get growing up. Maybe I will get up the courage eventually.
SG

SG, I know some people have already shown interest in your idea to start a thread about fathers and what we need from them (myself included). It sounds like your unbidden thoughts would fall nicely into that conversation. Whenever you're ready, we are too...

Hi All,
I know I'm late to the party (real life keeps interfering with my posting ) but I hope you won't mind if I chime in.

First MH, I want to add to SG's very insightful interpretation of your dream. The thought that hit me was twofold. One aspect was the hot tub which I associate with relaxation and soothing away hurt which is our expectation of therapy. But when you climb in the tub, you find yourself naked and exposed instead. When we enter therapy, we often find, especially in the beginning, that things get harder (your embarrassment and exposure) instead of the comfort and improvement we expected.

I also found the bathing suit to be telling because of the one way nature of therapy. I once got angry at my T and told him that even though I knew the boundaries are necessary, he gets to hide behind them and not expose himself while I have to throw my raw exposed heart into the middle of the room to be examined. Your T was wearing a bathing suit, so she was protected and covered in the water (therapy) while you had to enter the hot water naked and exposed. And the other patient was clothed because you also don't get to know her exposure.

The really interesting thing about dreams in therapy is that there isn't a right answer. Exploring the meaning of the dream can lead you to uncover feelings and thoughts that you otherwise might not have.

While not being the main thrust of therapy, I have always found my dreams to be valuable in my recovery and have often discussed them with my T. With my first T when I was recovering the memories of the abuse, many of my breakthroughs came in the form of dreams (most of them not a lot of fun). When I discussed the dreams it would often connect me to another fragment of memory (I actually remembered being also abused by my brother because of a dream of both him and my father as vampires!).

With my present T, I've had significant dreams both with him in them and not in them. There was one point in therapy where I was really struggling with wanting him to be my father or to somehow belong to him, I kept having dreams of being at his house with his whole extended family. The weird thing was, his kids were really welcoming, but no matter how hard I tried, even though he was there, I could never spend any time with my T.

I had a dream once about running into my T as a restaurant that my husband and I go to that is very close to my Ts office and we had discussed with him once. He pulled into a parking spot and got out of the car and went around to his wife's door and held it open for her. The whole time he had his back to me and my husband while facing his wife the whole time. When I thought about it the next day, I realized that his wife sees a side of him that I can never see. I think it was the beginning of my accepting that I could have nothing beyond therapy. But also a recognition that I do have my husband. Its the only dream I've ever had in which both my husband and T were present.

Last but not least, I once had a really bad nightmare about showing up for a session and my T never showed. He finally came after I waited for him for hours, but didn't apologize and told me he couldn't see me. It haunted me so badly that I actually called him on the way to work. He was really great about hearing it. I remember when I hit the part of the dream where I told him about him totally rejecting me and not feeling bad about leaving me waiting, he actually verbally flinched. He was really reassuring because he recognized that on some level I was really wrestling with a fear of abandonment (kind of a theme with me.)

Great question Amazon, thanks!

AG

I have read all of the dreams/comments on here and you are all very brave and honest to post them. I'm glad they were of some help to you AG for piecing things together though I can only imagine how horrible it was to have to go through some of those experience again in a way.

Mh-your dream is so rich in symbolism. And will hopefully help you to understand your relationship with your T better.

I find it funny how vivid and detailed my dreams are as I don't usually see myself having a strong imagination or creative side. But mine have been so varied-many are just plain mad-I've had ones about various politicians, sportsmen, celebrities-usually anything that is one my mind I seem to work it out in my dreams.

As regards to my T I have had a good few....while I remember them well directly after and sometimes throughout the day after-I find it hard to recollect details now. However, just as I was finishing up with my ex-T I had a dream about meeting a new T. He was in a room and when I went in I think he was playing a violin and just kind of ignored me. As I tried to leave the centre I was knocked over passing by reception and was really shocked by this. I remember feeling very unsure of my new T. I have had some of my ex-T too-not erotic as far as I remember but he has popped up-most recently I got stuck in a room where I knew i would have to face him and just wanted to escape.

Last week I had a dream practically every night about one member of my family or another. The most symbolic one was me sitting in my brother's car. No matter what I did the car would shift forwards toward another car or backwards towards another car...likely causing serious damage to both cars. I was so anxious.

I could go on. i have had many dreams about my sexuality-erotic ones which have left me wondering.

@SG: I would love to hear your "unbidden thoughts". Though I wouldn't want to push you. I think the father thread is a great idea...I would definitely have some material for it provided I get the nerve to post some of the stuff....as for unbidden thoghts...I had those about my ex-T too and still do. I know what I want from him in a way but I find the erotic feelings are quite intense too...besides the emotional side. I still think about him that way, practically everyday. I walked past his office deliberately yesterday and i longed to go inside. i knew he wasn't there but I just wanted to sit in the waiting room and pretend. How pathetic.

Mrs. P