Dreaming in Motherhood.
April 2018
This is my third night in a row of nightmares and waking at dawn...
Before I had kids my dreams were fairly predictable and quite useful actually. I started having stress dreams during my pregnancy with Arden. But they were somewhat mild and I tended to move on ok after waking. During that time in my life it made sense. I was in fact stressed badly.
After I had Amara I had night mares every damn day for a straight year during postpartum. They weren’t just stress dreams they were horrendous nightmares. I finally went to my herbalist and she made me a strong tincture and it worked.
Now I only get these same nightmares when my cycle is arriving, like right now. I just woke up panting and feeling incredibly happy to wake because I watched Amara fall from a twenty story open sliding door...it was so vivid and horrifying on so many levels. There are some solid reasons that being a parent feels plaguing, this is one of them. The sheer, sharp, and raw vulnerability.
After I calmed a bit I sat up in bed feeling defeated. These nightmares have plagued me for four years now. The exhaustion and stress it causes is ridiculous. The strange thing is Amara has them too. She always has.
I remember having bizarre dreams about her when I was pregnant with her. Almost every night I hear her wale or cry out and then go back to sleep on her own.
It’s all together one of the strangest things I’ve ever experienced. Maybe it’s just hormones? But then how to you explain Amara’s nightmares too??
So I’m up before the sun rises while everyone else sleeps soundly. My body aches from tensing and lack of sleep regularly triggers my migraines. At this current moment I am at a total loss as to how to move through my cycle like I move through the rest of the month. A mother of two, homeschooling One kiddo, running a business, still teaching college, with four jobs and endless days It feels impossible at times. I want to understand why this keeps happening, almost feels like something foreign is in my system. I want my old dreams back, the ones that were filled with clairvoyance and foresight.
