Hi, I had a response to Ari over in the loss forum, and I wanted to post it here too. Dear Ari, I am going to post a passage from my book because I think it pertains to what you are going through. Not that I have any expertise in dream analysis, but your dream sounds like a serious message to you. My question is: who was in control in the dream? What visualization can you do to take your power back? In this scene from the book I am telling my counselor (Karen) that I was thinking about a friend who had just died.***“I was obsessed with thoughts about him. Why did it take me such a long time to get over his death?”

“You were grieving. Mourning doesn’t come with a stopwatch; it takes time. Grief is a powerful emotion with many layers, like denial, anger, and acceptance. His death represented the other losses inherent in trauma. Focusing on his death allowed you to grieve the loss of your childhood, the loss of protection by parents, the loss of your sense of self.”

“I was grieving accumulated losses that I hadn’t acknowledged before.”

“That sounds about right,” Karen agreed.

Excited by insight, my arms flew up as if participating in a wave at a baseball game. “I just hit on something,” I interrupted.

“What?”

“I couldn’t control Christopher’s death, just like I couldn’t control Heather’s life. I couldn’t even control the loss of my own virginity. So I was also grieving the loss of control.”

“So much in your life was beyond your control. What do you think you could have controlled?”

“My friends,” I realized. “I befriended everyone who seemed to like me, or I did anything to get him or her to like me. It did not matter if I liked them, as long as they showed me some sign of the affection and acceptance I craved.”

“What does that remind you of?”

“My own family. I was used to a family out of control, a family that took control of my body. My so-called friends used me in ways that I was accustomed to, physically and emotionally. It’s like I automatically put myself in harm’s way.”***