***Triggers for abandonment***

Just had a nightmare about dear T and it keeps playing through my head. I spent 20 minutes curled up in a ball afterward, like a little kid. Usually would ask H to hold me after nightmares, but I am on the floor because of his condition and don't want to confuse him by getting in and out of the bed or trigger one of his episodes when I'm sure to freeze...

My appointment is at 8:00 pm tonight. In my dream, I went to my appointment to meet T. I got there early as usual. It was a different building, taller and on a sloping street, though the lobby was similar to reality, except very dark, like it was closed. It was raining outside. I got there a bit early as usual and right away, a woman approached and told me my T had arranged for me to see her. She knew his name and mine and my appointment time. I just believed her, figuring that is why my appointment was at 8:00, so I could do whatever T wanted me to do first, like maybe some testing or something.

I followed her and we went to another building, down the street and around the corner. It was like my childhood apartment building (ages 3 to 9, when my dad moved out the last time), except instead of a garage beneath, there was an underground lab-type area. When we got there, she explained she was a P and had me sit down in a medical chair, like the kind I had blood draws in during my pregnancy. She had a large male assistant with her who helped hook me up to some monitoring equipment (to my head, hands and chest, to monitor brain heart and lungs). I think I was strapped in with a seatbelt type strap, not too constricting, but meant to keep me in place in case I forgot where I was.

I couldn't look at her. I was scared. I shut my eyes very tight and pretended I was somewhere else. I was feeling very little. She asked me a few basic questions, though she knew most of my story from her files already, so she started pushing on deeper stuff really quickly. When she did this, I felt this 4-5 year old "part" I have been dealing with, the one who always has the bad (I'm not sure if they are real) memories of Ken (mom's abusive boyfriend at that age) surface. I felt like, inside me, someone was after this little girl me, chasing me. She asked me who it was and I could only reply in a child's words and voice, "I dunno. I'm just scared!" She asked me what he looked like, but leading questions like, "Does he have blond hair? How about his eyes, are they golden brown?" I was feeling like that was supposed to be the right answer, but that wasn't what kept coming up in my head. Later, when I woke up, I realized all the descriptors the P used are what Ken looks like.

I was feeling a bit bigger, still in the fear of that little child, but able to talk better, and told her, "No...his hair is really short, not like it's buzzed, but not too much longer either...and it's dark. His skin is dark, but not very dark, like olive-tan. And he has facial hair." So, also didn't realize this in the dream, but I am describing my dad here, except he started wearing his hair short like that when I was older, maybe in my teens. I guess it's possible he had it short as a young kid, because I don't have any pictures and although I have "story" memories, they don't include pictures of how he looked at the time...I always fill them in with how he has looked when I've seen him more recently. And you know what? I JUST NOW realized I don't have a single childhood memory of my dad that isn't just a "story." Wow, OK, whatever. Anyway, in the dream, I thought it must be some stranger I was describing. I could see myself running down these strange streets from this guy, but knew these streets were parts of my mind.

I started shaking all over and her instruments detected I was in distress. She was trying to ground me. She asked, "I know this might be hard to do right now, but I need you to try...do you have a safe place you can go to?" She sounded really worried, like if this guy got me in my head, he would really get me. I told her, scared she would lock me up for being crazy, "Well, there's different parts and so...there's lotsa places, but none for everyone." My voice was so quiet and trembling as I shook. I knew the "right" answer should be that Jesus was my safe place, like my real T has told me and I wanted to just give the right answer, but I knew the truth was that the little ones couldn't get to that place and be safe there right now and I was too scared to try. I wanted my T very badly right now and I started to wonder why I was here doing all this.

The little part I had been experiencing ran to the closet in my head (like she has done recently in my real, waking life). I was able to stop shaking and the P said we should stop there for now and we would continue more next week, which made me scared...why was I coming back net week They unhooked me and I got out of the chair and she had her assistant, the large man, draw some blood for some tests she needed done. He just grabbed my right arm and stabbed me with a needle, pulled the stopper back and wrapped it up unceremoniously. I looked at the P for the first time, really, horrified. She had a very feminine face, wore a very nice black dress, high heals and a lab coat. I couldn't see her eyes at all, because she had glasses that the light bounced off in a glare, no matter where she was in the very dark room.

The P told me not to pay this week, that she was going to work things out with my insurance and then tell me what I owed. I told her, "But I have ___ HMO and they don't cover mental health." She said not to worry, that they were going through a special referral process for my "condition" and she was pretty sure it would be approved. She started to write up an appointment card for next week. I asked, "But, I will still get to see Dr. _ [my T], right? Do I go see him right now?" She paused a bit and I could tell she was lying, afraid to tell me, thinking someone else should have already let me know that the answer was no, that she was to replace my T, because I needed more intensive help, maybe even to be admitted. She didn't say any of this...but said, "Well, gee, I don't know. I think you are seeing me now, but you'd have to ask him..." and something about needing to make sure I was safe if she was going to release me.

I started crying quietly and told her something like, "You have to warn me. You can't just bring on me that I don't get to see him!" And as these words came out, I felt hysterical crying inside, but instead of being able to keep it inside like I usually do, it just came out. There was a child with another technician on a computer and everyone in the room just turned and looked at me, horrified. I kept insisting that I did not want to see her, I only wanted my T, and I didn't think I had the will to survive my current impulses to hurt myself if I couldn't see him.

Her big assistant had gone to run my bloodwork, so I took the opportunity to bust out of there, while she called after me about calling the cops. I ran back around the corner, and texted T as I walked back toward his office. It was already 9:30, but I hoped maybe he had scheduled another person at 8:00 pm and was still there wrapping up paperwork...or maybe I had been tricked and he was wondering why I missed our scheduled appointment. I texted him, but I could barely type or spell on my phone. I typed something like, "Plese call! Realy need you. help." I knew it was wrong, but I just wanted to send it and hear from him as soon as possible.

When I got around the corner, I realized that the only way back into his building was through this attached library. I climbed up to a balcony, walked around the side and used a key I had to get into the library. There were students there and I realized I was on Stanford's campus (where I went and worked). They were going to call security, but I showed them my employee's master key and lied and said I still worked there (I used to work in the medical library as a student and after I graduated). I was going to go to the bottom floor and hide from the P and her thug while I waited for T to text me back, but then realized my battery on my phone was about to die and signal at the bottom floor would be too low for me to get his call.

So, I went out the front of the library, which actually looked like the entrance area of my high school (side note - T attended my high school, obviously many years before me). I went outside and was back to the cold, sloped, rainy street. I looked around and wondered, since it was so late, which of the few cars there might be T's and thought of just waiting at it. I got a bunch of texts all of a sudden, three from T and two from some random name who, in my dream, was T's supervisor or something. I couldn't open them yet, but I see the first line of each of their texts displayed in my list. T's says, "Yaku. What is it? I'm a bit busy right now..." as if he has no idea at all why I would be texting him, freaking out, expecting to see him. The other guy's text says, "I'm very sorry. I was supposed to tell you..." I started panicking, trying to get T's text open to see what it all says and reply to it, but my battery is so closed to dying. I was afraid, soaked, bleeding a bit on my wrapped arm, hearing sirens that I assumed were people called to get me. I realized I would probably never see or talk to my T again.

I woke up very startled at this point and, as I said, curled into a ball. It took me at least a few minutes to remember that it is just now Monday, I will be seeing my T at 8:00 pm tonight. I had a huge desire to text him, but not going to do so this late. The dream really lingered quite a while, so even though I knew it didn't happen, I felt very stuck in the certainty of his abandonment. I wasn't going to write it down, because writing dreams makes them stay with me, but I felt like I really want to tell T about it (so I need to remember it) and also that if I didn't, I would just be lying awake for hours, trembling like I have been.

So, that is it. It probably sounds stupid. I wish I were capable of capturing how dark and ominous everything felt (and looked), but turns out that I am not a very good writer at 1:00 AM after only 1.5 hours sleep. Anyway, if you read this whole thing, thanks for your time! Hoping I can sleep now...