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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 12 of 12. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by vwoolf on December 19, 2004, at 8:01:22
I had this strange dream last night. Does anyone feel up to interpreting any of it? I am at a bit of a loss. Btw, I live in Africa, so some of the imagery is perhaps not too unusual.
I am in an institutional type of building reminiscent of my Catholic boarding school or a state mental hospital where I spent some time as a teenager, with large dormitories, iron framed single beds in rows across the room and large door less bathrooms. I am one of a group of female slaves, kept and humiliated in this place. I am the favorite, the most promising slave. We are being prepared for something, and because of my status, I am always given the most humiliating treatment. We are made to stay naked and lick the toilet bowls. Mine is always the dirtiest. Our keepers are rather bizarrely dressed in bits of 18th century costume ….breeches and lace and wigs.
One, a woman, forces us to go through a secret tunnel which starts in a puddle of mud in a cave. It goes through an obstacle course to end up in a modern-day city sort of like Cairo. I come out into a room full of women who are studying with me. Someone is dictating a song to us, but I can’t understand the words. I keep putting up my hand and objecting. The lecturer is trying to be helpful, but I can’t find a clean page in my exercise book to write on, and keep losing track of what is happening.
I quickly go to my childhood home to fetch some flowers, but I find that the housekeeper has not put any water into them and they are dead. I shout at her. She gets furious and splashes water all over the floor, threatening to call her trade union and go on strike.
I drive back to finish my dictation then back through the tunnel, covering myself in mud, to the bathroom where a freshly dirtied toilet bowl is waiting to be licked clean. I do so with enjoyment, noticing that there are three identical books on top of each toilet. I start to read the top one, a black leather-bound book like a Bible. I discover that it contains "The School of Whoredom" by Pietro Aretino.
Suddenly there is great confusion and quarrelling and someone is trying to free us. Then I am walking in the bush. I see a man ahead of me carefully shaking weaver-birds’ nest. He is looking for eggs but is afraid of snakes. From time to time he puts some into his bag.
I see something rolling in the dust. I go closer and see two bat-eared fox cubs fighting. Suddenly the head of an adult fox with a broken ear appears behind a hillock, then twenty others, then a whole lot more. A gnu gallops past behind me, then a rhino, then a cheetah on the hill. I try to walk down to the waterhole, but I am charged by a gnu. I stroke its horns
Posted by Toph on December 19, 2004, at 11:01:27
In reply to Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone?, posted by vwoolf on December 19, 2004, at 8:01:22
v, I wrote something but it disappeared somehow so I'll try again. I am no scholar on these things but I have a few impressions. I was first curious about what someone living in Africa would find to be exotic. Africa is exotic to me.
Anyway, I sense that institutions with their rigidity, harsh control, and cold detatchment is the central theme of your dream. It is of course normal conduct for someone to be forsed to "whore" themself in order to gain a favored status in such places. Even licking toilets might spare someone one less rap on the knuckles. Additionally, children (and institutional siblings) often need to fight like puppies for the teat. If in your past you had to compromise yourself to survive you might be ashamed and conflicted about it as an adult.
You then said something about tunnels of mud and the obstacle course of becomming a woman. And then something about the Bible and an autobiographical book which asounds like the moral struggle you have with your conscious.
The colorful animals give me the sense of freedom and wildness that any institutionalized person in a boarding school/asylum/prison must idealize when fantasizing or peering out from greyness within. Leaving the predictablity and structure of these controlling institutions is difficult, speaking as one who spent months on a ward back when there was such a thing as health insurance. Finally, I'm not sure who the man is but for many institutionalized girls, I suspect fantasies of being normal and free involve love and romance with the noble rescuer. All I know is, if this guy wants the eggs for which he is searching he better be wary of one certain newly liberated beast of the savanna.
-Toph
Posted by Miss Honeychurch on December 19, 2004, at 21:09:35
In reply to Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone?, posted by vwoolf on December 19, 2004, at 8:01:22
Holy Cow! What an incredible dream! My limited abilities are no match for all that symbolism. Whatever it means, your unconscious really wants you to pay attention to it.
Posted by vwoolf on December 20, 2004, at 8:05:47
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone? » vwoolf, posted by Toph on December 19, 2004, at 11:01:27
Wow, Toph, you’re spot on. You should make a profession out of dream interpretation!
Just to tell you how well you read it:
1. Rigid, harshly controlling, and coldly detatched express the idea of the institutions, but even more so, they describe my mother, and the voice I have internalised. It’s quite scary - these are also the words I used to descibe my T after our first meeting - quite a projection.
2. I compromised myself sexually with my father in order to be his favorite, to be the best, to gain a favored place in the family. I naturally find this humiliating, shameful and conflicting.
3. Becoming a woman was a great obstacle course in a strict Catholic boarding school, I can tell you. I won’t go into details.
4. The animals I think symbolize my desire to free myself of the control and rigidity of my mother’s judgements, possibly through therapy.
5. The person collecting eggs (positive, life-giving) and avoiding snakes and pitfalls is probably my T.I am most impressed with your ability to read the symbolism. I couldn’t see all this, but now you have pointed it out it is very clear. Do you want to try another?
What do I find exotic? Well, when I visited the US a few years ago I couldn’t get over the water and forests. I spent some time in New York State and the vastness of the rivers and the size of the trees really struck me as exotic. We have water restrictions here again (it’s summertime) and it is so depressing. Everything is turning brown and burnt, and the first bush fires have already started. And this is just the beginning of summer.
Posted by vwoolf on December 20, 2004, at 8:08:17
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone?, posted by Miss Honeychurch on December 19, 2004, at 21:09:35
You can say that again. I always have these really complicated dreams with bizarre symbolism, gleaned from a lifetime of reading and travelling.
Posted by Toph on December 20, 2004, at 9:59:02
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone? » Toph, posted by vwoolf on December 20, 2004, at 8:05:47
Hi v,
I only spoke about what I could feel, things that I could identify with. I wasn't smart enough to unveil a deeper level of childhood vitimization. Not everyone believes in the significance of dreams or even that there is an unconcious. I think that when asleep the mind is free to put all kinds of important memories into the blender. It takes some work to later sort out the flavors.I worked for a while in child protection and witnessed the confusion and harm children suffer when someone they love uses a child as an object. Despite my experience I think only survivors can truely understand this kind of betrayal. You speak so openly about your victimization that it appears to me that you have done alot of work on this. It is very important that your therapist have clear boundaries but also allow you to heal and develop a healthy desire for sexuality and love. I hope you have found someone nurturing but safe to help heal this very deep wound.
There's nothing like traveling to another continent to reveal to us how wonderfully diverse the terrain and cultures are on this planet. And there's nothing like the internet to show us just how similar we humans can be.
-Toph
Posted by vwoolf on December 20, 2004, at 11:39:12
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreamers » vwoolf, posted by Toph on December 20, 2004, at 9:59:02
You know, I haven’t actually done that much work on these issues. I just sort of feel that the csa and neglect are facts and I don’t have any problem talking about them on an anonymous board. Intellectually I can cope. It’s all the emotional stuff, and the damage to my self esteem that I battle with.
I chose to go into therapy with a female T because I knew there was such a high risk of being revictimised - in fact I was sexually molested by my psychiatrist when I was about twenty. My T has very strong boundaries, which suits me fine. I suspect that she also comes from an abusive background. She says she has problems with boundaries too, which is why she insists on sticking to them so much. She is known as a specialist psychologist, and handles mostly csa cases. I actually like and respect her highly even though I battled with her so much at first.
The internet is a great instrument for crossing boundaries. I have close friends living in some of the more remote places in the world. When we meet it is as if we have always known each other. I know Dr Bob is arranging a meeting in Chicago later next year - it would be wonderful to be able to join the company. Perhaps he can move it around the world the following year, and everyone can come to Cape Town for PB 2006. Perhaps we should suggest it.
I also used to work for Childline, before I realized that I had been abused as a child. After that it just became too close. There is so much abuse happening all the time that it can become very soul destroying work in the long run.
Thanks again for the dream analysis. I will take it to therapy with me on Wednesday.
A warm hug.
VWoolf
Posted by Dr. Bob on December 21, 2004, at 0:36:05
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreamers » Toph, posted by vwoolf on December 20, 2004, at 11:39:12
> I know Dr Bob is arranging a meeting in Chicago later next year - it would be wonderful to be able to join the company.
Well, it's not just me, there's a committee... If anyone's interested, please see the thread at Psycho-Babble Administration:
http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20040902/msgs/391925.html
Thanks,
Bob
Posted by dawnfawn on December 22, 2004, at 20:04:55
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone? » Toph, posted by vwoolf on December 20, 2004, at 8:05:47
You must have an incredibly precise memory to recall this with such complete details.
Posted by vwoolf on December 23, 2004, at 0:05:25
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone?, posted by dawnfawn on December 22, 2004, at 20:04:55
Hi DF, I actually have a really bad memory. It's just that when I have very vivid dreams like this one, it is almost as if I am still living inside them when I wake up. If I write them down immediately, I can then take them with me to therapy. If I wait, even an hour, before writing them down, I lose most of the dream, and am left grasping for it. I now keep a pen and paper next to my bed.
Posted by dawnfawn on December 23, 2004, at 6:39:33
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone? » dawnfawn, posted by vwoolf on December 23, 2004, at 0:05:25
vw, This is a wonderful gift to have. You could actually turn it into something profitable by publishing or turning these into movie scripts. It may even help you in working out the conflicts. Does this happen often?
Posted by vwoolf on December 23, 2004, at 11:01:10
In reply to Re: Exotic Dreams - analysis anyone?, posted by dawnfawn on December 23, 2004, at 6:39:33
Oh gosh, thanks df, but you make me feel all bashful. No, I don't think they can be made into movies, but I am struggling to write a novel at the moment and they might come into that in some way. I do dream quite a lot, as I think we all do, and I try to take note whenever I can. The dreams are often very rich in imagery like the one I wrote about - often to do with tumbling, collapsing, conflagrated medieval cities and fantastical creatures. I lived in central Italy for many years, and I think a lot of my dream symbolism is influenced by my experiences there.
However I have discovered that it is only by actually becoming aware of my dreams and deliberately remembering them that I can see what wealth of material I was missing every day. I have only been doing this for about a year. Before that I thought I didn't really even dream much, and certainly didn't think my dreams were interesting. Try and write out your dreams on waking - you'll be surprised at what comes out.
Warm regards.
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