The early dreams

[ARC]

The first dream I recall was when I was about five years old. I was hiding behind a tall redwood privacy fence that hid the junk in our side yard from the main road. I was using one hand to squeeze the other in such a way that it made a clicking sound. I could hear the neighbor lady in her front yard - she was saying, "What is that sound?" I would peek around the side of the fence to watch her skitter around in her high heels, fancy clothes and big hair. Eventually she saw me, and she said to me, "You'd better stop doing that or your hand will fall off". But I kept doing it, and my hand fell off. I showed my mother and she said, "It's no good now, just throw it away". But I couldn't bear to lose it so I placed it in a coffee can and carried it around with me, taking it out from time to time to hold it in place so that it appeared to still be attached. During this latter part of the dream it is all about the strong sense of loss, as though I'd actually lost a body part. That feeling one would get, like in the pit of your stomach.

A similar dream during that same era involved all of my teeth falling out. In my dream, I was about to be in a beauty pageant when my teeth suddenly started falling out - one at a time at first and then in gobs until they were all gone. Again, the strong sense of loss, making me feel sick in the pit of my stomach.

A couple of years later I was very sick, lying on my mother's bed with a high fever and I was delirious and in and out of sleep. My head was throbbing loudly and it was like the throbbing sound in the old scary movie "The Blob" - just before the blob rolls over someone and kills them there is that throbbing sound. I kept watching the doorway, waiting for the blob to come after me. I must have thought I was awake but then my younger brother and sister were suddenly on opposite sides of the bed where I lay, passing a softball back and forth very quickly, catching and throwing perfectly each time - not possible in reality since they were all of 5 and 3 years old, respectively.

I'm not sure how much longer after these dreams, probably around the fourth grade or so, I dreamed my older sister died and it was right before Christmas. Again, the deep sense of loss, and worse because now it was a close loved one, and also because she is my closest sister. I have a younger brother who is a few months closer in age and we are quite close, yet being a girl myself I was always closest with my older sister. This was a horrible nightmare and at the worst possible time of the year to lose someone close. In my dream, I lay on my bed wanting to talk to her. I would think of things I wanted to tell her and would just start to go look for her and then I'd remember
she was no longer with us. I tried to imagine Christmas and opening gifts and the thought of it seemed so bleak without her presence and yet I still considered the possibility of getting her presents, which made me feel guilty. But the weirdest thing was when I tried to confide this dream to my mother the next day - she called me a liar and accused me of having killed my sister for her Christmas presents, which didn't make any sense because it was only a dream and my sister wasn't really dead, plus in my dream I hadn't killed her, so I was very confused by her reaction.

Later on, in my thirties, I began having latent memories of my early childhood. I recalled having witnessed the brutal murder of a small child. I have never been able to discern whether this was something that actually happened, which might explain the horrible nightmares that caused me to scream uncontrollably in my sleep, or perhaps it was simply one of those nightmares. Whether a dream or reality, I had been the only one who witnessed the murder and I knew the man who did it. If it was something that actually happened it might explain my mother's odd reaction when I told her about my dream. Also, the incident, whether a dream or reality, happened outdoors on a hot day in summertime as I recall the way the other girl and myself were dressed in summer outfits and I remember hiding in some brush for a long time, even after the murderer was long gone, so I wouldn't think Christmas would be an issue since we lived in Ohio at that time, which is typically quite cold at Christmas time. There have been other signs in my lifetime which might suggest this incident actually happened, but absolutely nothing to suggest that the murdered girl was my sister or even a close friend, although I think I did know her, as in I had met her a couple of times at social functions - I think they were community picnics or something.

I'm sorry this is so long. I want to be as all-inclusive as possible as this is something which has been plaguing me for more than twenty years and I have never found anyone who is even willing to tolerate listening to the full story, of which this is not even the whole beginning. My parents and all but one of my oldest siblings have passed. The older sister in my dream is also still living but she does not remember much about our lives in Ohio since she was only about 4 or 5 years old when we moved to Florida around 1964. I don't know how much the dreams would have to do with anything, if anything at all, or if perhaps it has all been dreams, but I thought it would be a good idea to try to understand the dreams first and foremost.

Thanks for listening,

ARC

 

[mkrnhr]

Hi ARC,
Like many I suppose, I remember a few dreams from childhood. Some of them are triggered by a misunderstanding of those bizarre expressions adults say. For instance, at 5yrs old, I heard the school teacher saying something like "if you do that, you are among the kuffar". Kuffar in Arabic means unbelievers but I didn't know that, for me it was "cafard" which in French means cockroach. That night I had a nightmare where people, school friends etc., transformed into cockroaches. In the morning I was all about not killing bugs because they where children who transformed because they did something bad :)

I'm reminded of this because when your mother told you that you killed your sister, maybe what she meant was "you made your sister dead in your dream", which can be shocking for a child. Children very often dream of their relatives' death, mother, father, brother, sisters, etc. which is just an expression of the fear of loss of a loved one. It is so common that in my family they used to tell the little ones "if you dreamed that that person died, it means that he/she will have a long life".
One possibility, among others, is that you internalized that unfortunate expression at that age, and it keeps coming back later in life in different forms, especially that it conflicts with reality in some aspects.

Now the murder nightmare can have many possible causes. It could be anything from watching the horrible news of a similar murder on TV (which is very traumatic for a child) to something like an attachment. If it disturbs you, you can for example see if there is any murder of this kind close to where you were living at that time, which would have traumatically imprinted in your mind?

Maybe others have other possibilities that come to mind.

 

[Oxajil]

Hi ARC,

Usually, it's difficult to interpret somebody else's dreams, as dreams might be influenced by all kinds of factors, including experiences you went through at that age, your surroundings, and more, which we wouldn't know about. But here are my thoughts based on my own experiences regarding dreams:

The first dream I recall was when I was about five years old. I was hiding behind a tall redwood privacy fence that hid the junk in our side yard from the main road. I was using one hand to squeeze the other in such a way that it made a clicking sound. I could hear the neighbor lady in her front yard - she was saying, "What is that sound?" I would peek around the side of the fence to watch her skitter around in her high heels, fancy clothes and big hair. Eventually she saw me, and she said to me, "You'd better stop doing that or your hand will fall off". But I kept doing it, and my hand fell off. I showed my mother and she said, "It's no good now, just throw it away". But I couldn't bear to lose it so I placed it in a coffee can and carried it around with me, taking it out from time to time to hold it in place so that it appeared to still be attached. During this latter part of the dream it is all about the strong sense of loss, as though I'd actually lost a body part. That feeling one would get, like in the pit of your stomach.

Have you looked into the symbolism of a 'hand'? Sometimes dreams don't have a literal meaning, assuming they have one. For example, one time I dreamt about bugs coming out of the walls and getting all over me. Later I learned that it probably meant that something was bugging me (and there was)! Not sure if dreammoods.com is that reliable, but they say: "If you dream that your hands are detached or see disembodied hands, then it indicates that you are not getting your point of view across. You are not being understood or someone is not understanding you. The dream may also symbolize feelings of loneliness."

A similar dream during that same era involved all of my teeth falling out. In my dream, I was about to be in a beauty pageant when my teeth suddenly started falling out - one at a time at first and then in gobs until they were all gone. Again, the strong sense of loss, making me feel sick in the pit of my stomach.

Did you regrow any of the teeth? It may mean 'losing the old', and in case you had new teeth taking their place, it can mean some kind of 'transformation', or 'replacing the old with the new', in other cultures the loss of a tooth means the death of a loved one. But, again, that is assuming this particular dream had a meaning. Do you remember losing anything around the time you had that dream?

A couple of years later I was very sick, lying on my mother's bed with a high fever and I was delirious and in and out of sleep. My head was throbbing loudly and it was like the throbbing sound in the old scary movie "The Blob" - just before the blob rolls over someone and kills them there is that throbbing sound. I kept watching the doorway, waiting for the blob to come after me. I must have thought I was awake but then my younger brother and sister were suddenly on opposite sides of the bed where I lay, passing a softball back and forth very quickly, catching and throwing perfectly each time - not possible in reality since they were all of 5 and 3 years old, respectively.

I don't think this is unusual. Having high fever can do all kinds of things to the mind! Perhaps it was a side-effect from your illness. But I can imagine it must have been scary!

I'm not sure how much longer after these dreams, probably around the fourth grade or so, I dreamed my older sister died and it was right before Christmas. Again, the deep sense of loss, and worse because now it was a close loved one, and also because she is my closest sister. I have a younger brother who is a few months closer in age and we are quite close, yet being a girl myself I was always closest with my older sister. This was a horrible nightmare and at the worst possible time of the year to lose someone close. In my dream, I lay on my bed wanting to talk to her. I would think of things I wanted to tell her and would just start to go look for her and then I'd remember
she was no longer with us.

As mkrnhr said it's not unusual for people to dream about their family members dying. I recall a dream in which my brother died, I had another one recently in which a family member tried to kill me. And, a bit different one, I had one about entering some place where a shooter came in and shot everyone dead, except for me as I was hiding under a table. Each one of these dreams felt as I was actually there. In the end, I usually don't pay much attention to these dreams, but I do make sure if everyone is alright, and I always try to be as vigilant as I can be. In your case, to give one possible interpretation of dreaming of losing your sister, it could perhaps represent your relationship with your sister not being as well at that time? I also think that sometimes dreams represent our thoughts, rather than that of others, in other words, it may not mean that your sister is in any trouble, but that you have some kind of fear regarding her that translated in your dream.

Just some thoughts, I hope this helps you a bit. :)

 

[duyunne]

Hi ARC

This is best I can do (as i have limited time, I'm at work) is post notes i took while reading:

- Tall Redwood Privacy Fence (hiding things from view of the public/secrets) - EDIT: maybe... this is wrong. It's keeping you with the 'junk', hiding the outside world from you in some way, a barrier between you and the truth, definitely)

- Meddling with this privacy barrier made a 'sound' that drew the attention of a symbolic 'elite' (posh clothes)

- The elite made a warning.

- The warning occurred as an event via the lost of a hand - Mother (in dream) advised to throw away the result. Instead it was hidden in a coffee can (which hand? left or right?) (edit: is it your dominant hand?)

the hand that was broken and taken away is now reviewed in secret (assumed, as it was hidden and mum advised to 'discard' of this loss)

- loss continued through: teeth
- preventing the expression of the individual (thematic) via beauty pageant (your true nature is supposed to be beautiful)

Enter the Blob (occult-hollyweird)
- throbbing (fear of being usurped)
- obvious screen is obvious! as the age of 'familiar faces (siblings-children)' inaccurate for playing a monotonous loop of catch - using the faces of loved ones can placate/sedate the body (consider hypnotherapy)

***

burst ahead - grade 4 (age 11/12?)
- loss of older sister (in dream)
- guilt of acquiring her gifts (xmas gifts, gain through tragedy)

Conscious/non dream memory:
mother blamed you for death (in the dream,) accusing a child of murder of a loved one (bizarre), subliminally expounding on this guilt (most likely non intentional, parents can be cruel and not know it)

***

burst ahead - 30s (my current age, also a commonality of screen memories to DISSIPATE)
- recollection of past trauma. suspicion of it not being a dream... murder of a child - it could be a dream... it could also be a past life memory but it explains why a piece of you was hidden in a coffee can, all this behind the redwood fence (two mental barriers - to some degree)
- knowledge of who did it (a man)
- hiding, observing from cover of bushes

The internet can open some doors here. Research news from this time frame and this town. Search phrases such as 'City State Year and MO of the victim (age, appearance, hair color)... see if you get results.

It won't hurt, even if this is dream mulch as suggested (as result of movies, imagination)

Good luck.

 

[duyunne]

Don't ignore this. Please research the girl. I'd prefer you digged a bit and settled your suspicions by taking action, even if it is an armchair google session, instead of burying them in doubt over your capacity to hold on to this all those years.

 

[ARC]

Thank you so much for replying to my post with your knowledge and experience of this sort of thing. It is all very helpful and so much more than I expected.

mkrnhr - I was in the process of answering your reply when I noticed I had other responses I hadn't read yet. I most related to what you said about "worry" for family members being a possible cause for the dream of my sister dying. I grew up with 4 brothers and 3 sisters and I often worried about their welfare, especially at night before falling asleep since this is the time when all the noise of the day calms down and there is time to think about things. I always said I wouldn't have such a large family when I grew up because of how worrisome it was, and, as a child the thought of losing a member of my immediate family was a nightmare in itself - like, the most devastating thing that could happen.

I also gave careful consideration to some of your other insights as well. Thank you so much.

Oxajil and zin - I am blown away by the insightfulness of your replies. In answer to your question, Oxajil, my teeth did not grow back in the dream but what happened was my dad fashioned teeth for me from wood (my dad was an expert wood worker and craftsman in real life). The wooden teeth in the dream improved my appearance but did nothing to ease the deep sense of loss I felt over losing my natural teeth.

What is particularly insightful about your responses is that part of my latent memories include a strong suspicion that I had a different family and an entirely different life prior to the age of two or three. I have memories of this other family - I've actually had them all my life but never understood them until later on in life when I began having many more memories. In essence, I feel as though I have been "fashioned" to appear to be someone I'm not. I've actually had conversations with both of my parents about this before they died but neither of them were forthcoming with any information.

I am particularly impressed with your symbolizing of the detached hand as not being able to get a point across because there were actually several times that I recall trying to tell my parents about what I had witnessed but they never believed me. I guess I eventually gave up and as time went on I forgot all about it, but that dream always stayed with me (information hidden in a coffee can?). I also suspect that those continued attempts may be part of the reason those memories eventually returned the way they did. As in, if I had simply dropped the issue right after it happened, the memory would probably never have materialized in a way that would eventually make sense, but because I kept trying to articulate the explanation to the adults in my life, the memory became better instilled in my mind.

zin - What's funny is the neighbor lady really was a posh, high-fallutin' lady and she had a voice like breaking glass - high-pitched and sharp. Coffee cans were where people kept things in those days. I am right-handed but the question about which hand introduced a concept I'd never considered before. As I recall, I used my left hand to squeeze the right (producing the clicking sound), and then it was also the right hand which fell off. I might also mention that my mother never wanted me to talk about these things, so it's interesting that you mention the sound as a factor. Also, my mother (as many parents) constructed barriers between the truth and things she never wanted her children to know about. What I wonder about is whether she knew about the murder of the girl and blamed me somehow, or, more likely she feared one of my older brothers were responsible and worried that I would tell. I only knew the man as "Pa" and one of my older brothers was named Paul, so perhaps my trying to say that "Pa" had done it was actually like trying to force her to consider something unthinkable to her.

I will certainly continue to research old cases from that area as I have for years. I suspect I may be searching for a missing person's case rather than a murder as I have reason to believe the murder I witnessed may not have been known by anyone aside from myself, the murderer, and one of my older brothers who passed away before I began having the memories - he didn't witness the murder but he saw the deceased girl and quickly ran away. He must have been between 8 to 10 years old at the time and I guess I assumed he would have told someone, like his parents or other siblings, but that is not always the case with children. Sometimes they just want to forget about bad things and pretend they never happened. Or, perhaps like me he did try to tell someone but was unable to get anyone to listen since he was a child. However, this was not Paul, and Paul is actually the only one of my four oldest siblings that is still living.

At any rate I want you to know that I am extremely grateful for your help with this. At this point I think at the very least I can say the mystery of these dreams has been solved.

ARC

 

[ARC]

Afterthoughts,

Oxajil - I wanted to ask you about the dream you spoke of where you were hiding under a table. Is that also symbolic of secrecy? Hiding? Something hidden? I also have a similar revelation from early early childhood, so it's another one that I don't know whether a dream or a memory. There were two men, both armed with the long guns, like rifles or shotguns, not handguns (I don't know much about guns). It seems like there was something about a woman who was either killed or raped, or perhaps just subdued - and this was after the murder of the child but neither of the men were "Pa" and I didn't know them. I was under a kitchen table but not hidden from view of them at all. One of the men knelt down to face me and he said to me, "I'll give you to the count of ten (to get away)". The other man was not in the room at that time and I ran out the door and into a field of tall grass. They both pursued me and I hid in the tall grass, crawling around until I made my way into the woods and eventually hid behind a thick bush. The one man could have got me several times but it was like he was keeping the other one from finding me, leading him in the wrong direction. The other one was chopping at the tall grass with a machete while his gun was slung over his shoulder. He actually hit me with it once - I thought he had cut my leg off at first but it turned out to not be that bad. By the time he noticed the blood on his machete he had moved past me several feet - he looked back and would have found me but the other one picked up a dead squirrel nearby and laughed at him as if that was where the blood came from but truth be known it looked like it had been dead a while.

zin - One major problem that I am having with researching information from that region of Ohio at that time is a fire that destroyed many records and news articles from that time period. One thing I have found is an orphanage (now closed), and also my dad once told me about a home for wayward girls, like teenagers I guess, when I asked him if he knew of any home for unwed mothers or the such. Another thing worth noting is that the community was made up of mostly Amish - an area on the outskirts of Columbus called Plain City. I suspect Pa was also Amish and I think he spoke that Pennsylvania Dutch language, and probably some English also but he and I didn't understand each other very well at all (plus, myself being around the age of two, there would only be so much of any language I could speak). I've heard my parents and older siblings mention something the Amish were known to say, something about bringing up a child "until he is five" - I'm not sure exactly how it goes but it suggests these people thought of themselves as well-equipped for raising children and perhaps taking in foster children. (In my opinion "Pa" was an idiot but he thought he was smart.) There also would have been much to gain from taking in foster children - raising farm hands, help with chores, not to mention most states pay foster parents to take in kids. My older brother Paul remembers a foster home with two girls and one boy - he says the boy's name was Billy and was friends with our other brother who I mentioned had seen the deceased child and ran away. The home I remember was just me and Pa and the boy (whose name I can't quite remember but it wasn't Billy it was something more like Frankie or Jackie or something).

I also think Pa was trying to kill me when he killed the other girl by mistake, thinking she was me. In fact he was chasing me with a sickle and he saw where I ran to - I warned the girl to hide, but she didn't - I did and so with her being right where he expected me to be... I was so close I could practically feel it and I could hear the horrible sounds of it. I probably could have seen it but I think my eyes were closed. I was also screaming but it was like every scream was in perfect unison with her screams. He actually stopped and looked around afterwards as if he thought he'd heard something. I was praying he wouldn't find me, and I think it was like one of those things where you think you saw or heard something but you think, nah it can't be, so after a few moments he just shrugged it off and left. I didn't come out of hiding the rest of the day, not until the first hint of the sun beginning to set. The two boys came along shortly after, the one who would eventually become my older brother ran away while my foster brother led me back to the house where we lived with Pa. I tried to tell him what Pa had done but he couldn't believe that Pa could do such a thing. Pa wasn't there - he didn't return until late that night. I pretended to be asleep but I was awake. I remember running away at night and I have been assuming that was the night I ran away, but now I'm not so sure.

It sounds like I'm more convinced that these are not dreams but memories. However, thinking of it as memories makes it easier to speculate and, at least for the time being, I'm not ready to draw that conclusion. I need some proof - something substantial to coincide with the memories. I have others that are not as well developed - like of a day when the community was gathered outdoors around a center stage with a man in a hat speaking to the crowd. It could have been any number of things - an election campaign, an auction, or heck a chili-fest or something for that matter. The only significance of it is that it marks a particular point in the timeline because I recall that I was standing with some kids from the orphanage.

Another is of digging in the dirt with a kid's pail and shovel while feeling very strange and out of place, surrounded by other children who I eventually came to know as my family but on that day I kept trying to tell the woman (my "mother") something but she just kept insisting that I "go play". My "brother" was looking for his dog. He came up to me and asked me if I'd seen it - I nodded. "You did see it?" I nodded again. "Where?" He asked. I pointed towards the woods. He went to where I pointed, looking for the dog and calling for it. Eventually he came back and asked me again, and again I pointed towards the woods. He kept looking for his dog - he looked for it all day but never found it. In fact I had seen the man there (my "dad") bury the dog in the woods the previous evening. When I ran away from the foster home I got lost in the woods for several days. Eventually I came upon their house in a clearing but I was afraid to come out of the woods because of the dog that kept barking and barking. It sensed me being there and was undoubtedly trying to alert the family but no one came out of the house all day until the man came out, he walked around the side of the house and came back with a shovel, he hit the dog with the shovel and then buried it in the woods. Afterwards I came out of hiding and he carried me into the house. The only people I saw that night were him and the woman. I tried to tell them what had happened but the woman smacked me around calling me a liar. She said something strange that I still don't understand: How could you let your brother take all those whippings for you? Eventually the man told her "enough!" and she stormed off up the stairs or into another room. I was so hungry but I didn't know what to say or who to ask so I just started chewing on my hands and arms - the man noticed this and he gave me some food. I must have fell asleep while eating and I woke up on the couch the next morning surrounded by strangers, mostly kids, and the two adults. The woman didn't seem angry any more and the kids kept looking at me, the girl closest to my age, in particular, sat and stared at me for a long time. I'm sure I looked frightfully dirty - I was wearing nothing but dirty underpants I'd had on for days after having been wandering in the woods and sleeping on the ground. It was scary in the woods at night and I would fall asleep with my back against a tree and wake up sprawled all over the ground, damp on one side from the dew, and wet leaves stuck all over me and in my hair.

Eventually, when I was about five years old, my brother was upset one day and asked me again about his dog. I told him what I'd seen but he didn't believe me at first - he didn't believe his dad would kill his dog and bury it and not even tell him. He went straight to our parents with this new information - our mom had a fit (she probably never knew about the dog). I don't think dad said anything at all but after that he believed me. At that time I brought up the murdered girl and he acknowledged having seen her. I told him who had killed her and he knew who I meant because he knew the situation with my foster brother since they had been close friends. However it was still impossible to get anything through to our mother and we now lived in Florida.

I didn't want to bring up the incident about the dog at first because it makes my parents seem like horrible people. Truth is, my mom could probably best be described as a red-headed Irish woman, although her hair was more brownish auburn in color but she definitely had a lot of Irish in her blood and she had that red-headed Irish temperament. My dad was quiet and soft-spoken and didn't tangle with her much but he wouldn't let her go too far. I doubt if my dad ever hurt a flea before that day and I imagine perhaps she had been on the "warpath" all day, keeping everyone inside (a killer or child-snatcher on the loose?) while he sat in his chair listening to that dog bark and bark all day until he just couldn't take it any more. He went on to kill others of our family dogs - we would hear about it from neighbors who had seen him leave early in the morning with the dog and carrying a gun - and it was always the barkers that tend to yap at the moon all night. I don't know what my family experienced but the remark about my brother and "all those whippings" comes to mind. Knowing my mother she probably terrorized the entire family if she was worried my brother was somehow involved in something so horrific as the death or disappearance of a small child. My "return" might have eased that pressure allowing things to return to normal, but perhaps the sound of a dog barking and barking reminded my dad of a long and terrible day(?).

ARC

 

[Oxajil]

ARC, I'm glad our input helped you out a bit.

Oxajil - I wanted to ask you about the dream you spoke of where you were hiding under a table. Is that also symbolic of secrecy? Hiding? Something hidden?

It could be, I'm not sure. It could also be because I had done some reading on shootings (false-flag operations), and that might've been why I dreamt about it happening. It was truly horrible, as it felt quite real!

--
If the experiences you shared are memories, I can imagine why they're on your mind to this day. If you haven't already, writing them down in a journal can be helpful. See: Redirect: The surprising new science of psychological change

Reading some of the dreams you wrote about earlier, made me wonder whether reading the book 'The Narcissistic Family' could possibly give you more insights into your dreams from childhood, and perhaps it will give you an understanding of what exactly was going on (with regard to family dynamics), how you reacted to it, and how it currently is affecting you.

 

[ARC]

Oxajil,

Ha - I've never heard of that book but I will find it and read it right away. It's definitely my kind of reading and I've been needing to order some new books anyways. I'm not sure if you're referring to Pa or my other family but I suspect both of many narcissistic tendencies, possibly even sociopathic. I've read everything by John Douglas and also some Martha Stout and Robert Hare's book, plus "The Gift of Fear" by Gavin De Becker (an awesome book I recommend to everybody who hasn't read it yet) and a few others. In particular, John Douglas's books (and Gavin de Becker) have been extremely helpful in enabling me to understand how the criminal mind works, which has done wonders for helping me to place the many perplexing incidents from my past into perspective. I have also read John Walsh's books - they weren't particularly helpful but interesting. I really like his shows (America's Most Wanted and The Hunt) that profile wanted criminals.

I first began researching unsolved crimes in 1998 when I got my first computer - I actually got it for my kids who were in high school at the time. I worked a lot back then but then everything started changing suddenly as my kids were graduating and I remarried and moved out to the country with my husband. I started spending my free time researching old crimes from that area of Ohio around Columbus but I quickly began following links to other unsolved crimes as well. I developed a deep sympathy/empathy for families who had lost loved ones to violent crime, and I was even able to aid in solving a couple of the crimes - most of the cases are in need of someone with information to come forward, but occasionally it happens that a case just needs a fresh pair of eyes or a different perspective and one case I came across was of a young girl who was murdered in her bed one night while her parents slept. They had sent her to her room after her friend's dad had caught her and his own daughter smoking - he'd seen them through her bedroom window. After he left with his daughter, the girl's parents grounded her and the next day she was deceased in her bed. Her parents were questioned but aside from that they had no suspects (???). I sent them an e-mail and I was like, what about the man looking through her bedroom window? Has he been questioned? Too often sadistic psychopaths are able to hide behind disciplinary tactics - I knew that from experience and so that was an automatic red flag for me. And would you believe that man left the girl in such a state that her parents didn't even suspect she was dead until they tried to rouse her after she didn't wake up by noon? The autopsy revealed she'd been asphyxiated, and it wasn't until several months into the investigation that the mother of the girl came across a big ball of duct tape in one of the girl's dresser drawers. I feel so bad for those parents and I think what bothers me the most is that the girl may not have even been smoking and it was just a tactic to get the girl right where he wanted her and all to himself. It makes me so angry every time I think about it.

I also write things down - I wouldn't exactly call them "journals", they're more like tomes (ha). Each time I do the "memories" evolve to include more and more detail. I recently graduated college with an associates degree in Computer Information Technology for network infrastructure and administration, and so for the past two years that has kept me too busy to do much reading or writing beyond what was required for my classes. (Now I'm looking for a job.) I'm enjoying being back on a forum (I still live in the country so it's nice to be able to interact with people of similar interests and most of my friends that I see frequently would think I'm crazy if I talked about my dreams and memories in this way).

ARC

 

[duyunne]

I definitely relate, in regards to being seen as crazy. I still talk about *some* of my dreams anyway to begin a challenging dialogue that I feel forces the person I'm talking to think or calculate suspicion of their own of specific topics that they should be thinking about.

I was on a PM dawn kick for a bit after I had a startlingly suspicious dream that involved mutilated, tortured people and a friend asked why I was suddenly obsessed with this pop music act out of the blue and I blanketed the experience with "I had a dream about a psychopath". It started our dialogue about psychopathy... and eventually we ended up talking about people of power that permeate through politics, etc. Sometimes a dream can be used to push into what can be seen as being too controversial to bring up out of the blue. As dreams are often fantastical and just plain crazy!

As for much of what you said here, it's hard to bare. I have serious anxieties with child abductions and violence against children as I'm a father. I hope none of this is from your memory!

Either way, I hope your grounded enough to take comfort away from these awful occurrences, be they dreams, memories or your own imagination. Sometimes it's hard for me to discern the difference between the three when so many years pass between myself and the night of the dream or the time when the memory surfaced.

 

[ARC]

Well zin,

I've been doing this for a long time so I'm pretty well conditioned to the "awful"-ness of such occurrences. That said, I apologize as I realize some of the content I converse about is upsetting to most people and so I make every effort to avoid verbal graphics. I recall hearing about a missing child on the news when my son was a baby and how upsetting that was. Still, I believe that knowledge is power and if we want to continue to enjoy an illusion of safety we need to be aware of the surrounding dangers.

My daughter has dreams about zombies - she loves watching those goofy zombie flicks and she is terrified by the dreams. I always laugh at her for being so silly-headed (she's not a child, she's 29). I don't usually dream about tortured or mutilated people but I once dreamed that I woke up on fire. I actually thought I was awake and that our house was on fire. My daughter still lived at home at the time and her room was on the opposite end of the house - I woke myself up trying to yell out her name in hopes she could still save herself. I was so surprised to find that I was not on fire and had in fact been dreaming.

Some of the dreams I have when I'm reading the bible a lot are truly amazing - a staircase with a thousand steps (I almost get to the top and then I have to go back for something and then most of the way down I realize I already have it), a 7-headed serpent coming out of the Intercoastal right in front of me as I stand on my brother-in-law's mother's deck, and the sound of flapping wings flying over my house.

But the most perplexing dream is the house with all the rooms. I'm not sure how many times I've had that dream but it's always different. The only two of them that I remember in detail are the one where I was with a man I'd only seen in a photograph and had no romantic interest in, going from room to room looking for one with no other people in it so we could make love. We never did find one but what was interesting was all the people I saw in each of the rooms - my dad who had passed away, my children and siblings at various ages, and my grandchildren. The other was even crazier - I rented a house and hadn't lived there very long, and then one day I was in the bathroom and noticed another door across from the door I used to enter the room. I had never noticed it before and was curious where it would lead. When I opened the door I saw that it lead to another room I'd never seen before. I didn't want to get lost so I told myself I would only go a little further and then turn back, but then I just kept moving forward, opening door after door and going through room after room, until I came upon a bed where a lady was sleeping. I quickly turned back and attempted to retrace my steps back to my bathroom but I was lost. I was forced to awaken the lady and explain red-faced that I had "accidentally" gone through the wrong door by mistake. Without a word she led me to a door, opened it, and then said curtly while pointing to the open doorway, "That is your house, this is mine". I went through the doorway and I was back in my bathroom. She closed her door and then I went out the other door and I was outside. That wasn't supposed to happen. I decided I would walk around and enter my house from the front door in hopes it would all go back to normal, but once I'd walked a bit I could no longer recognize my house. There were other houses and I didn't know which one was mine. I'm not sure at which point I finally woke up but it was such a relief to be out of that house. In another one of those dreams I became lost while going through doors and from room to room and at one point I ran across Sylvia Brown (the lady who claims she talks to dead people). I know there is a symbolism for this type of dream but I don't know what it is and I've never been good with symbolism.

ARC