Running Scared

Found here

I am sleeping in a small bedroom, on a soft bed with a quilt over me. It seems to be a cabin out in the country somewhere. I'm not sure where, and I think I'm alone in the house. I wake up suddenly aware of some noise, someone prowling around outside under my bedroom window. I slowly slip out of the bed, trying not to make a sound. As I get closer to the window I can see a shadowy form tinkering with the screen, removing it. It won't take much to break in. It's such an old place with old fashioned, brittle wooden window sashes and locks. I've got to get out of here, quick! Maybe through the livingroom door at the front of the house. If I can sneak out the door and run to my car, I can get away without the guy at my window seeing me.

Trying to conceal my heavy breathing by holding my hand over my mouth, I run quickly to the livingroom. I only have on my bathrobe. It's a good thing I have on something half way presentable so when I dash down the street or into the car, I will be decent.
What's this? Someone is shining a flashlight in through the livingroom window's sheer curtains, trying to see inside. I'm afraid to move. It looks like only one person is there but I'm not sure. He begins to rattle the doorknob. I turn to run back to the bedroom but I hear the window in there slowly sliding open. Should I go back to the livingroom? There aren't any other rooms in the house except the bathroom and the door doesn't have a lock. I back up to the wall. The rattling of the front doorknob intensifies. The man outside is pushing his weight against the door. I hear it creak and groan as he fidgets with the door hardware and leans against it.

There is the sound of footsteps coming from my bedroom into the hall. The wooden floors do not mute the sounds of his shoes--clip, clip, clip. He is walking slowly and deliberately toward the livingroom. Should I try to hide behind the couch? No. It is under the window and he will see me. There are no long curtains to hide in, no table for me to crouch under. The man in the hall is almost to the livingroom now. I press my back against the wall as if it will pull me into the siding. There is the sound of splintering wood as the front door yields under the force wielded against it by the man on the porch. A blinding light shines into my eyes as the flashlight is slowly raised and pointed at my face. I can hear loud breathing behind me.

There is no place to hide, nowhere to go. I can't escape this and I think I'm about to die. I am panic stricken.

Scary, isn't it? This is the dream I had one year ago on the first night I attended Camp Good Grief as a counselor. I woke up out of breath with my heart racing. My jaws were tense and I was gripping the blankets up around my neck for all I was worth.

A simple nightmare, right?

Why do you think I had that dream while I was getting ready to lead a group of young boys through a weekend to resolve their losses? Most likely because I had not yet resolved my own. It had been six months since my father had died and for many reasons I had not been able to concentrate on grieving. My job, my responsibility for my mother who was languishing across the country, my own shock. Plus the fact that I never got to say goodbye. Daddy had donated his body to science and I never saw my him after he died. I had just been carrying on, relatively unmoved and amazingly composed.

Now I was going to have to face grief coming and going. There was no place to go, nowhere to escape to. I would be hearing about the boys' sadness, numbness, grief, emptiness. And mine was going to be tapped and drained.

It was an oddly predictive dream that immediately resonated with me. Over the next three days I entered into the experience of the boys: hearing their stories of loss, questioning why, memorializing the dead. My own healing began. My dreams had known.

Tomorrow I am going back to Camp Good Grief as the therapist for the weekend. I hope to see "my" little boys again this year. Six of the nine from last year are slated to be in my group. We formed a bond. They asked about my pain and I witnessed theirs. This year however, I am not trapped. I go freely, feeling ready and much more settled in my heart. No more looking over my shoulder and no more running scared.