Over the past several nights, I have had a recurring dream. Anyone out there into dream analysis?
Actually, I don’t need to have it analyzed, it is pretty straight-forward. I am a simple person. My dreams are simple.
In my dream, I am back in time, probably a year or two. It is hard to tell, exactly how long ago, but everyone is about the same age as they are now.
In this dream, my sister is still alive, and I am trying to tell her the future. Her future. In this dream, I know that she dies in 2010. I am struggling to tell her this. She either doesn’t hear me or is ignoring me. I repeatedly try to tell her. I try to explain that I have been to the future, and that she will die in 2010. Perhaps she doesn’t believe me.
In any event, I have a very clear feeling of frustration, anger, and helplessness. I cannot save her. I cannot keep her from this fate. I am also struggling with how much I should continue to try to convince her. In some part of my mind as I am dreaming this, I wonder if I really should be telling her this information.
When I awake, I am exhausted. I feel worn out. I am emotional, in or near tears. The dream has been the same, and usually comes just before I am waking up for the day. So, I start my day with these feelings.
This morning was the clearest of all of the dreams. As I thought about the dream while I was getting ready for the day, I realized that I am not sure if I would want to know that I was going to be dying in the near future. Would I do anything differently? Would my sister have done anything differently?
I have also tried to figure out what is triggering these dreams. I am not sure. This weekend was my nephew’s 15th birthday, and I have concluded that is what is behind all of it. My sister made his birthdays very special. I know that had she been alive, we would have had lots of conversations about him, and how it will be just a year until he can drive, and how he has gotten so tall and grown up. I missed those conversations. I texted my nephew for his birthday (there is really no other way to communicate with him these days). Nothing else. No reminiscing, no laughter, no sharing of the wonders of parenthood.
I still haven’t been able to decide whether I would want to know the future. What would I do differently?
If I did know that I was going to die in the near future, I would visit my blog friend sweffling in Paris right now, then travel as long and as far as I could go around the world. And I’d bring as many of my family and friends as possible.
If I’m dreaming, I might as well do it right.
Just My Life 
I wonder if your nephew’s leukemia and your brother-in-law’s ignorance has anything to do with it? I don’t know; it seems you’ve had to deal with many deaths recently, so it could be anything, really.
If you knew your days were numbered, then I think you should travel and dream big 🙂
By: jannatwrites on November 22, 2010
at 10:08 pm
That situation is also probably behind the dreams as well. My mind is definitely working overtime.
By: chlost on November 22, 2010
at 11:47 pm
This post about a dream just woke me up a little bit: I actually realized and considered, for the first time in my life, how I would feel if my sister died, particularly if she died young. I’m so sorry.
I’ve read in many places that people diagnosed with terminal illness often find a new richness in their lives; once they know that the end is coming soon, the rest of the “game” feels different–some say they wouldn’t trade those last months of knowing and breathing each minute deliberately.
By: Jocelyn on November 23, 2010
at 3:46 am
Have you seen “The Bucket List”? Sort of a good movie on this subject.
By: chlost on November 23, 2010
at 9:13 pm
I just watched that movie this past weekend. Recently I’ve been thinking about how when my sister was my age she was living the last months of her life, even though she didn’t know it. Hard for me to realize that my next birthday will make me older than she was.
By: Yael on November 24, 2010
at 5:52 pm
That must be hard. My sister was younger than me.
By: chlost on November 24, 2010
at 7:17 pm
A bit personal I’m afraid: When I was 21 I was given two weeks to live and told that I had to have an operation with odds that were not good. My family and friends were called to come and say goodbye to me, coming from all over the UK and abroad. Clearly I survived: but as I convalesced I found that I was impelled to go to every ballet, opera and concert that was touring the North of England that Summer. And for each outing, I made a new dress! I could not face the thought of dying without having experienced the greatest musical performances I could get to. Beforehand I had no idea that I would feel like that as music had not seemed very important to me and there was always tomorrow!
The next year, when I was 22, everything went very wrong, again I was admitted to hospital as an emergency, all that could go wrong did, they had to repeat the operations of the year before, peritonitis set in, the works. My body could not cope. Again, people were called to come to my bedside. I was not expected to live. It took three months in hospital, then the doctors said they could do no more and I would never recover there. I went to my mother’s looking like someone straight from Belsen: after another three months I still could gain no weight or strength or walk. My mother had inherited a little money and decided that she new what to do. She took me and my husband to an Island in the Indian Ocean. After two weeks of swimming gently, eating fish and fruit, lying on the sand and exploring the new wildlife and plants, I was a new woman. That was when my need to explore new places began: ever since, I have taken every possible opportunity to travel. And I also try to convince the NHS that it would be cheaper to pay for people to have holidays as a preventative than to pay for some kinds of treatment!
Many years later I got thyroid cancer. Each time I felt that my life was threatened it became clear to me what I needed to do. And since then, even a trip to the supermarket is fun, because there were three times when I thought it would never happen again.
Now, everything is precious: the arts, the sciences, family, friends, travel, new experiences, just squeezing every last bit out of every thing I do, whenever possible. Wherever physically possible I never put off what I need to do, for a later date. I think my general enthusiasm and Pollyanna outlook probably irritate some people: but when you have the chance to do things that you thought you were losing forever, and when that has happened on several occasions, what can you do but be cheerful and grateful. I just love life even though I get dark thoughts about all that is wrong in the world too 🙂 On my death bed it is the things I did not do that I will regret the most. At each stage I knew others in hospital my age who did not make it through. That remains with me. Their lost chances.
I am so sorry you are having these dreams: you are still processing a lot of grief. From what you have said of your sister, music was so important to her that as long she was singing and taking pleasure from music, there were probably no great things she would have done if she had known. My friend to whom I owe this holiday, said before she died that there was nothing special she wanted to do, just more of the same.
I hope you feel more rested soon and cheered by the family Thanksgiving. Have a good time.
By: sweffling on November 23, 2010
at 3:14 pm
I hate that you have had to go through so much pain in your life. However, it explains so much the things I see about you in your posts. You have a true love of life, of music, of people. It comes through in your blog. I am looking forward to the holiday. Thank you so much for your good wishes.
By: chlost on November 23, 2010
at 9:15 pm
No, I don’t. One old guy at the pool grabbed my hand and told me I was going to die in seven years. That took me aback for weeks until I was able to let it go.
By: Mage Bailey on November 23, 2010
at 9:35 pm
This post hits home for me right now, my sister will die in 2011 we just don’t know when, she has been on chemo for Lymphoma and that is under control,
But now she has been diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer.
The holidays always seem to bring death in our family..
As Thanksgiving approaches we always wonder who it will be this year.
Yesterday it was my cousins husband.
Not un-expected because he was in Hospice..but just making the Holidays more difficult for every one.
I am sorry about your sister, I am dreading the day I get the call about my sister.
Get some chocolate or maybe some wine, light some candles and crawl in a hot
tub.
By: GiGi on November 26, 2010
at 6:00 pm