And I woke up, eyes bulging out of my head with sheer terror, shortly after 7am, before it was even light outside.
I had a bad dream.
Now, I know dreams really don't have a bearing on reality... maybe they don't even belong on my blog, because truly... what difference does it actually make in my life? But it was one of those dreams where the images are just so vivid, that it really seemed real. Terrifyingly, horribly real. I feel like I have to write it out. Maybe it will finally stop haunting me if I do.
My children and I were out together. Jesse was not with us. It seems like we were in a place similar to the Science Center down in Baltimore... there was a very tall entry way, with the front of the building largely covered in glass, so it felt very open. There were even exhibit-like structures. And it was very, very crowded. I had Alex on one hip, and was struggling to switch back and forth between holding Jacob's and Melinda's hands, chasing them, keeping them in eyesight while the crowd pressed and shifted all around us. They're so little, and the crowd had so many adults... I lost sight of them often, and was already starting to feel frustrated/exhausted/panicky with the effort it took to keep track of them. It seemed like we were there to play with friends, like a playgroup or something, but the effort drained me, and we left.
We exited the building, moving slowly past the crowd, down the narrow concrete stairs. There weren't many stairs... maybe 5 or 6. There was an old, simple bar support on either side of the stairway, though the stairway was so crowded that we didn't get a chance to use it. We just slowly made our way down, weaving between the people going up, on their way to enter the building. I still had Alex on my hip. Carrying my diaper bag, I didn't have a free hand for Melinda and Jacob, who were being stubborn enough not to hold onto me, anyway. They started falling behind me, and by the time I was about 5 paces away from the bottom of the stairs, they were still on the bottom step. I turned my head back in their direction frequently, to check their progress and make sure they continued to follow me.
But it was so crowded! I lost sight of them. Finally, I could see them again. They had made it off the stairs, but were starting to angle in the wrong direction, heading about 45 degrees away from my path. I was now walking on a grassy field, which butted up against a road leading to a parking lot. The kids were now just on the very edge of the road, not on the grass... just a hop down from the curb. It wasn't a busy road, but there were cars occasionally driving past, very slowly, as people were crossing almost constantly in any given spot along the road.
I called loudly to Melinda and Jacob, beckoning them to come to me quickly so they could stay safe. They both heard me, and started making their way towards me. Melinda didn't waste any time, and was soon following safely on my heels. But Jacob did something he often does in real life - he sort of walked at an angle while he was heading towards me, not really paying attention to where he was going. I could tell he was sort of humming to himself, and he was slowly drifting further away, even as he was trying to catch up. I called him a couple more times, growing more and more frustrated, and he kept on his wayward path. The crowd was still all around us, though it was beginning to thin here and there. I struggled with balancing Alex on my hip, keeping Melinda behind me, and my bag out of the way as we passed shoulder-to-shoulder by so many people. I was bumped and jostled every few seconds, and having a hard time. Jacob was getting further and further away.
Soon enough, he had managed to weave his way across the road, on the opposite side that I was on. He looked up, trying to find me, eyes searching in a very real, lost way. Every mannerism he displayed in my dream was completely true to life. No element thus far seemed the least bit out of place or odd, as things often are in dreams. A well-meaning but thoughtless woman next to Jacob saw me calling to him, and suddenly encouraged him to cross the road to get to me. My heart nearly stopped as he quickly hopped down from the curb and shuffled into the street, now having spotted me and been encouraged to get to me. He had a subtle little grin on his face, his chin slightly down, eyes peering out from under his eyelashes, and even his tongue sticking out every-so-slightly from the corner of his lips. He must have felt a little silly and happy to have spotted me. His shuffling through the street took him directly in front of the path of an oncoming car. But this wasn't the terrifying part yet - the car came to a stop easily, since it had already been going so slow and watching out for other pedestrians. Still, I glared sternly at the woman across the street, for her careless idea of sending my young child to cross the road on his own.
And as I looked back, the terrifying thing happened. Seemingly out of nowhere, there was a river of water on the road, heading towards a drain. Jacob slipped in it, and there was enough swiftly-moving water that it carried him, laying down, to the drain. My heart really did feel like it was stopping, then. But when he reached the drain, he stopped. My eyes assessed the situation instantly: The drainage grate was not built safely. It was merely about 5 or 6 thick, parallel bars - each having about 8 or 9 inches of space in between them.
Jacob would be able to slip through.
And nobody was near enough to help him.
I quickly dropped Alex to the ground, sitting him on his bottom. In the same motion, I was running towards Jacob, slipping my bag from over my shoulder and dropping it carelessly on the ground as I moved as quickly as I could. Water continued to rush against Jacob, and it was sliding him back and forth, almost like he was on a small water slide. As I ran, his hips slipped through the grate. His eyes stared straight up into the sky. He was scared, but staying as still as possible. The look in his eyes looked entirely too familiar to me, and it was frightening. I still ran, calling his name loudly.... "JACOB!!!" His torso slipped through. Suddenly only his arms, shoulders and head were still above the grate, everything else was dangling below. His arms were bent at 90 degree angles, so that if he had been standing, it would have looked like he was exclaiming "touchdown!". The position of his hands was good - they were palm up, and I would be able to grab them quickly as soon as I got there.
But I was a fraction of a second too late. The rest of him slipped through, just as I reached the grate. I lunged and grabbed for him, absolutely screaming in terror, my voice as alien to me as I have ever heard it: "JAAAAAAAAKE!!!!" My fingers brushed his fingers just as they went out of reach. I couldn't grab him. I watched his eyes as he fell silently into the water below. They were wide and still, locked onto mine.
It was like a rushing river down there in that strange underground tunnel, a good 8 feet underground, but oddly lit as if by daylight. It wasn't dark. I could see every little whitecap of the water as it rushed by. I could see Jacob splash into it as if it weren't so far underground at all. My Jacob, who doesn't know how to swim. Who is terrified of water getting into his eyes. He sank into the water, was carried away, still laying down as if on a bed, and finally bobbed up a bit to the surface several feet away. But not his face. It remained under water. He was carried further away. His face never resurfaced. I knew he would be dead shortly, and there was nothing I could do about it. The grate was impossible for me to pass through, and I could not remove it. All I could do was watch as his small body was carried away, knowing I would never see him again. I could already feel the giant knot in my heart.
And I woke up with a jolt.
I could not forget my scream, I could not forget those eyes. I was drowned in guilt, myself, knowing it was my own fault he got separated from me in the first place. I got up to use the bathroom, got a drink, and tried to lay down to go back to sleep. But every time I shut my eyes, I could see everything with perfect clarity again, replaying in an unforgiving loop. It was too real. Much, much too real. There would be no returning to sleep any time soon, so I picked up a book and started reading.
Before long, people around me started waking up, and soon got out of bed. What a comfort it was that Jacob chose that morning to be extra snuggly. He stayed in bed with me long after everyone else was out eating breakfast and enjoying their morning. He sank deep into the covers, pressed up against me, saying sweet little things like "I like you, mommy", and giving me his tight, thin-lipped kisses right on my mouth. It was such a comfort to hold him, it helped the images fade from my mind. And when Alex needed to nurse a while later, it was thankfully easy to fall asleep again, myself, and make up for the fact that I had only had about 5 hours of sleep by the time the nightmare woke me up.
Still, the rest of the day, I was haunted by those images. It felt so real. So terrifying. I'm so glad it wasn't real. But why on earth did I have to have a dream where my son died?!??
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It reminded me of another dream I had, when Jacob was close to Alex's age, now. And it occurred to me: I've only had two dreams of one of my children dying. And BOTH of them have been of Jacob. This is what I wrote back then, about that dream:
...I was sitting in some grassy area with stone benches. It was surrounded by a chain-link fence in poor condition. For some unknown reason, I had been given some drug to put me in a barely-there kind of state, like laughing gas would do. Not sure if this has any relevancy in the dream, but it wasn't something out of place within the dream, it felt normal and accepted. So I'm sitting there, barely in tune with what's going on around me, along with my husband and some other random people.
All of the sudden I realize that there is an impending explosion, to be of devestating force and destruction. I get up, now fully aware of everything, and sprint like the wind to take cover behind a hill. And then I start screaming at the top of my lungs, louder than I've ever heard a sound come from myself, to the people left behind, including my husband: "RUUUUUUUUNNNNNN!!!" "RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!" The urgency in my dream was unbelievably real, as well as the terror I felt.
They all get up and run towards me as quick as they can. We quickly take cover in some random, dark walk-in closet, and huddle down. Someone says something to the effect of "Well, we have about 10 minutes until we're safe."
And then Jesse looks at me, as he's holding me, and says: "Did you get the baby?"
I then immediately wake up, but the feeling of course did not go away, and I'm laying there, half-asleep, feeling frantic, and I kind of continue the dream while I'm awake: I feel desperate to get out but Jesse holds me back, saying there's nothing I can do, it's too dangerous. And I can't do anything but bawl my head off and pray, "God, PLEASE don't let him hurt when he dies!" and I bawl even more.
At that point I am feeling completely overwhelmed (in real life) and have to get up and walk around. Of course Jacob is right there laying next to me, and that helps me feel better. But I had a hard time going back to sleep after that, and now I just remembered it after going all day without thinking about it.
And I told Jesse exactly how it went, because when he woke up and saw me up, I told him I had a bad dream, and anyway, when I told him about it I just cried so hard when I got to the last part. Good ol' Jesse came over and gave me a hug.
Of course an eerie part to me is that my son wasn't even IN my dream until that very last bit where Jesse suddenly asks me if I got him. Which made me feel all the more terrified, shocked, and upset - how could I not KNOW to get my baby boy out of danger?
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So what's the deal? Two terrifying, realistic, urgent dreams.... both killing my little Jacob.... two and a half years apart. I scream, I want to save him, but I'm powerless to do so. The emotion crushes me.
I enjoy dream symbolism. But I have a truly difficult time seeing past the very real emotions locked within these sorts of dreams and trying to analyze them, to figure out what my subconscious might possibly be thinking when it kills my child in a dream.
The only good part is how I'm so relieved to hold Jacob afterwards, and run my fingers through his hair, smother him in kisses, and feel how real he is in my arms. If only it could make the negative emotions slip away... Thankfully, a few days later, and the reality of the dream has dulled quite a bit. But it's still incredibly vivid, the details so rich and true to life. Typing my dream still made me cry.
