October 06, 2007
Another dream, and my anger.
I had a dream about my grandmother last night. Not the sweet grandmother that has alzheimers disease. The grandmother that acted as if I was trying to break into her house when I took Christmas presents to her house in 2006.
The house she lives in now was my great grandmothers house. Some of my earliest memories are there, and I know that house like the back of my hand. Some of my most cherished memories are there, and some of the "things" that I would say I value the most in this world are inside its walls. (My great grandmother was an artist, and her paintings decorate every room.)
The house has always been very special to me, and it's always been a safe place. Not too many years ago I had a key to the front door, and was welcome there any time, any day, no matter the reason. Now, the doors are locked to me, the activities that are held there are off-limits to me.
All that being said...now for the dream.
I dreamed that I was going there for some reason that is now forgotten. When I got there, the front door was open, and I could see into the dining room through the screen door. (From the front door, you can look in through the living room, through the dining room, and through the sliding door into the back yard.)
I looked in and saw my grandmother and my youngest cousin. I decided not to knock, that I would just stand there for a moment and listen to their conversation. After a few seconds, my cousin saw that I was standing at the front door, and pointed at me. Then, he and my grandmother began walking towards me.
Whatever reason I had for being there suddenly didn't seem so important, and I started walking back across the yard to my truck. My grandmother quickly caught up to me and started shouting at me for parking my truck in the grass. I began to apologize to her for doing something so thoughtless, which just enraged her.
I let her yell at me for a minute or so, but then felt my own rage begin to build. I wanted to shout at her, but I couldn't find my voice. (I hate that in dreams!) So, I began this raspy, hoarse sounding sort of whisper-yelling at her about how she was a huge hypocrite. That she preached Christs love and compassion, yet turned her back on her own family.
I said things to her in my dream that I would never dare say to her in real life, because she's got enough Choctaw Indian in her 5'2 inch body to lose her temper and teach me a lesson. However, just saying them, even in a dream, was rather therapeutic.
I woke up shaking like a leaf, angry tears on my cheeks. My head was pounding, I was breathing hard, and I had indentations in the palms of my hands where I had obviously been digging my nails in. I woke up absolutley pissed off.
This November will be four years since I lost custody of my kids. It's been that long since I've talked to most of my family as well. I've already been through the five stages of grief. I've long since accepted that what has been done can't be undone. However, when I have dreams like this, it's a window into a part of my subconscious that I don't deal with.
I don't deal with anger very well. I can't stay mad. I get angry, and then I stuff it away, and move on. Notice that I didn't say I "deal with it" and move on. I don't deal with it.
Usually what ends up happening is that my anger gets misdirected towards some little insignificant situation, like someone cutting me off on the highway or a snarky cashier at the grocery store. I'll smile in the face of the person I'm truly angry with, while ripping some innocent bystander to shreds.
I think I need to find someone to talk to. I don't mean a friend. I mean, someone professional.
My insurance doesn't cover "mental health", so going to the shrink I'd like to see is out of the question. There's a place here that has free counseling services, but to get in requires a grueling pre-interview, a lot of testing, you have to buy their book, and you have to agree to come to 8 group counseling sessions.
I don't want "group" counseling. I want to sit in a comfortable chair in a dimly lit office and shred Kleenex while I spill my heart out to someone with a compassionate heart that isn't looking to charge me $200 an hour for my trouble.
I don't want someone that is going to try to "fix" me by prescribing me pills to help me sleep, and pills to help me wake up, and pills for depression and for anxiety and for whatever else they decide to diagnose me with. I also don't want someone that is going to make me dredge up every painful childhood memory and then not help me deal with it. (I've had that already.) They don't call them "repressed memories" for nothing.
Anyway, counseling. That's what I need. Either that, or kickboxing classes.
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jktty at 11:25 p.m.