I don't dream much about Janey. I don't dream much about my kids at all, or my current life, although I dream all night every night. In my dreams, I've gone to high school and college about a thousand times over, sometimes vaguely aware that I am redoing an experience. But the last 20 years of my life are barely there in my dream world---I have no idea why. Last night, though, I had a dream about Janey, and it struck me in how mildly it changed reality. I am dreaming small lately.
In the dream, I took Janey to a very upscale kids clothing store. I wanted to get her some fancy clothes for a party. I held her hand constantly, as I would do in real life, and we looked at the rather meager selections the store had. I noticed there was an upstairs, and so we went up there. It was in the form of a loft, completely open to the downstairs with no railing or anything, but that didn't seem to bother me. I found some promising looking clothes, and Janey found a dollhouse and some play teacups. There was a slightly older girl there who started playing with Janey, and so I let my guard down. So much so that when somehow my parents showed up and needed me to walk about a block away to help them with something, I just left Janey there. When I got back, she was fine, but all dirty and without her shoes. She said to me "We went out to play in a meadow" Even in the dream, I realized that was a pretty great sentence from her, and praised her for it. And that was it, except for a long drawn out part of looking for her shoes and the nasty shopkeeper being annoyed I had lost them.
And I wonder---why don't I go all out in dreams? Why isn't Janey talking fluently, not autistic at all? The Janey in this dream was mostly the real Janey, just a better talker, and even then, the dream world knew that was an unusually good utterance. Of course, there's no answer to those questions. Nobody understands dreams. But if there was a meaning, I'd say it was one of acceptance. Janey isn't going to change drastically. The little changes are what I hope for now, the little triumphs. They make me happy. Her autism is a basic part of her, even in my dreams.
Rarer in Girls...Life with my daughter Janey, who is twenty and severely autistic
2 comments:
Yes I would say dreams are just manifestations of our subconscious thoughts and desires or a way or our brain to process events. Since in your subconscious you have accepted Janey as she is, it means you don't have any hidden desires that she will be someone who she is not.
My father in law who is a very religious man told me recently he had a dream in which Sophie was talking perfectly. He took the dream as a divine sign of what is to be. I didn't crush him by saying that it was just his mind's hidden desires coming out... I think acceptance is better personally. If I had a talking Sophie dream I would probably be quite shaken up that day.
I think I'd be the same way with a dream like that about Janey. I can't even quite picture it. Dreams fascinate me. I would do the same as you did with the dream about Sophie talking---it's kind of a nice thing your father-in-law is thinking about her enough to dream about her. Although I don't think my subconscious mind plans it that way, if it did, I'd say I dream so much about pre-kids as it is giving me a little break at night, back to the days when whether some boy talked to me or not was the biggest most dramatic issue I needed to deal with!
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