tending to my mother wound transformed my stress dreams
It’s been awhile, but I’m back! I plan to share more often here on Your Healing Story is a Love Story. And I’m excited to share that I’m making this into a podcast as well. That way, if you prefer to listen to these posts on your favorite podcast player, you can!
I’m going to share a HUGE shift I’ve had lately…
It is dark out, and I walk out of Target with what feels like 75 bags hanging off both my arms. My right arm is raised and bent above my head and my left arm hangs, yanked down by my thighs. I am asymmetrical and uncomfortable, but I can’t do anything about it, almost like this is how my shape is supposed to be. I look and look and look for my car in the parking lot, but I can’t find it anywhere. No matter where I look or how I balance my bags, it isn’t enough and it won’t ever be.
This was a dream I had a few years ago, one of many stress dreams where nothing I do is ever enough. I am trapped, and the only thing that saves me is waking up. (I realize later that waking up is not only literal.)
Whether it’s not being able to reach my car brakes as I’m driving out of control like I’m in a cartoon or trying to find my house or car or anything that can get me to safety, not enoughness is a theme of my dreams. It isn’t surprising that it’s at the core of my mother wound as well…and yet! I’ve had these dreams for years, and it wasn’t until a few months ago that I put these two themes together 🤦🏾♀️ I assumed my anxiety was about the anxieties of daily life and not being able to get what I wanted done, like so many of us in the throes of capitalistic and patriarchal productivity demands.
One of the overarching themes of my memoir is not enoughness and lack of worthiness. While this is likely a global theme for many of us due to systems of oppression, it is also something I directly experienced with having an eldest daughter, Capricorn mom who never feels like anyone, including herself, is enough. She would frequently criticize me, not allow me to see friends because I didn’t do enough around the house, and a slogan she repeated was, “Why make mistakes if you don’t have to?”
No wonder I couldn’t find my car outside of Target in the dark with a million bags hanging off my arms. It was my lingering mother wound, hanging off my chest, searching for a balm that can gently set it back into my heart space so I could live my life with ease instead constantly thinking about what else I need to do because I did it all wrong.
But, lately my dreams have changed…
Image ID: An abstract photo of thin tree trunks a person wading through it.
In the past couple of months, my stress dreams no longer have a foregone conclusion of unsolvable tension. Either someone helps me to my goal or there is significantly less resistance. The first time this happened, I woke up with surprise and satisfaction. But I was also confused, this discomfort was normal for me. Then it happened a couple of more times, and I remembered what had recently changed in my life:
I expressed how I felt about my relationship with my mom, and she listened.
This, of course, is an oversimplification. With the help of relationship coach Kavita Jhaveri, I’ve been having deeper conversations with my mom about how I feel, specifically about how I haven’t felt like she sees me as a good daughter, and, not only did she listen, but at the end of one conversation, she earnestly shared that maybe she needs to make some changes. While my intent wasn’t to make her change but to fully express myself without fear of repurcussions, it was a brand new outcome borne of a brand new way of sharing what’s within. It felt amazing to say what I genuinely feel and not be as phased by her defenses (and figuring out how to do this took a lot of introspection with Kavita’s help!)
My dreams no longer required me to stay lost. My subconscious is changing after more than 30 years. THIS IS BIG.
One of the biggest shifts Kavita helped me feel is that it is not my job to be the parent in my relationship with my mom. As a parentified child, I knew this, but I wasn’t sure how to feel it. What this has done is allow me to be vulnerable with my mom in a way that I used to be to scared to do, and this has allowed her to be the mom I need. And what’s even more wild is that I have found myself being more vulnerable with my brother as well, pulling down a wall I’ve had up with him for years.
I believe that the healing work I’ve done in the past 10 years surely contributed to all of this. Perhaps this most recent work was a tipping point. While I may not have scientific proof that this is what changed my dreams, I believe it profoundly in my soul. In the past, I have avoided interactions with my family. At times, they felt like healthy boundaries, but, lately, it felt like I was avoiding connection and putting up walls. I didn’t want to do this anymore, which is why I hired Kavita.
If you told me these relationships would feel this different for me, even a year ago, I wouldn’t have believed you! What’s even more interesting is that I never expected to realize the significance of this change through a literal subconscious message. I no longer feel like I need to put a shield up when I enter conversations with my immediate family. This doesn’t mean they’ll never trigger me or there won’t be difficult conversations, but something about being vulnerable with them makes it all just seem so much more real and so much more relational.
Boundaries can be incredibly useful. They were a tremendous tool for me at the start of my healing journey, but I don’t necessarily think they are an end game. Boundaries evolve, and, for me, I got to a point where I had enough space to heal and enough capacity to relate to the very same people I didn’t want to relate to before.
I’m not sharing this to say that you have to resolve all of your challenging relationships right now. However, I do believe whoever we grew up with is our first association to belonging in this world. And, as Staci K. Haines shares in The Politics of Trauma (affiliate link), safety, dignity, and belonging are our inherent needs and “we are at our best when we have, and can offer, all three.” Trauma and oppression disrupt these, and trauma happens in relationship. I think when we can move toward healing in relationship, so much is possible.
The important thing is to meet yourself where you’re at always, and notice where your edges of discomfort are. This is your stretch zone. You don’t always have to be there, but it is an important place to visit when you can.
All of this is to say:
Coaches need help from other coaches and practitioners too!
If I can shift my relationship with my immediate family, I believe we are all capable of way more than we think.
You can shift your subconscious by healing in relationship.
Healing is a constant process that is full of surprises.
Have you noticed this with your dreams? Let me know in the comments!
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