Pregnant Dreams

In all 3 of my pregnancies, I have had strange dreams . . . actually, it was one of the ways I knew I was truly pregnant with baby 2 and with Kate. The dreams are vivid, long, real . . . and strange.

With Meg, I dreamt (dreamed?) that I was standing outside the Skippy Peanut Butter Factory, watching it burn to the ground. I also dreamt that I ran into an old high school flame and finally told him that I was over him and that I was with someone else. In that very dramatic dream, Jim happened to walk into the room just as I was saying these things to the old beau, and I got to whisk off into the sunset (or leave our high school cafeteria, as the case was in that dream) arm and arm with my love.

With Kate, I had a strange dream early in the pregnancy about being in bed with Heath Ledger. I wasn’t doing anything – I swear – but I did leave him and return to my apartment (yes, for some reason Heath and I lived in the same apartment complex in this dream) to find that I’d left Meg alone and the cops were knocking down my door to take her from me. Yikes.

But now, at 34 weeks, the dreams are getting stranger. On Saturday night/Sunday morning, I had a series of three such dreams . . . all of them about Kate’s birth or the care thereafter. Each time I woke up and fell back to sleep, a new dream would begin . . . equally as disturbing as the one that preceded it. It was a long night.

In Dream #1, I was in labor with Kate and Jim was far away in San Francisco. I was at the doctor, and he was telling me, “Yep, we aren’t going to have this baby today, but tomorrow for sure . . .” and I freaked out because Jim was not home. Jim does, in fact, travel to San Fran next week . . . but I’ll only be 35 weeks, so it’s really a bit too early even for an early arrival of Kate. Still, my subconscious must be unnerved by this travel of Jim’s.

In Dream #2, Kate had been born, but I didn’t know where she was. I was roaming the hospital in a pink polka-dotted nightgown, looking all over for her. At one point, Jim and I left my hospital room to search again, only to find Kate in the lobby in the arms of my mother, drinking a bottle. In the dream, I FREAKED out. I was so furious at my mom for giving Kate a bottle of formula. I yelled, snatched her away, and tried to give her my breast . . . which she totally refused. Those who know me know how much I enjoyed breastfeeding Meg . . . and the idea of having another to nurse is simply delightful to me. So, the freaking out was understandable . . . maybe that was my subconscious revealing some fear that there could be nursing issues with Baby Kate.

In Dream #3, I kept waking up in the morning and getting kicked out of my hospital room. “You can’t stay in this room, Miss. We have to move you . . .” the nurses kept telling me. I’d wander around, but Kate was not with me. I didn’t know where she was, but each time I was put in a new hospital room, she’d turn up. I don’t know WHAT my subconscious was telling me with that one.

I told Dr Graham about these crazy dreams at my appointment on Monday. His only response was, “Exactly when does Jim stop traveling?” I guess he was validating my subconscious worries that Jim might be missing in action when this baby is born. (Highly unlikely, I promise.)

(Oh – and Dr Graham also told me that I can expect a labor of only 4 or 5 hours, since Meg was pretty quick. He again confirmed that he thinks I’m going early . . . so only a couple more weeks until Kate is here, I guess.)

Anway, the dreams are always crazy, but I can’t always remember them. I’m glad I have the Skippy memory to share with Meg and the crazy hospital memory to share with Kate. Who knows what kind of dreams I might have with another baby.