Drawing from Dreams

“Draw from a dream…..” I pulled out my deck of Fame cards this morning. I needed inspiration or at least a jump start that would take me away from listing activities from yesterday and lists for today.

What dream have I had recently that I remember? How can I trust my dreams to tell me anything? Dreams are just….well….dreams aren’t they? Some neurochemical, neuro firing between synapse things as we sleep. Painting scenes strange and bizarre. Some are down right hysterical. Like the dream that I was crawling across an abandoned railway track in the rain. Or was it abandoned?! I distinctly heard a train coming and couldn’t move any faster than cold molasses!

And then there are the frightening dreams like the one when I was sitting in my car, again at night, at a stop light. No traffic ~ definitely no traffic. I felt, from behind, a pair of arms grab me and hold me tight against my car seat. That dream dissolved in shattered pieces as the sun streamed in slices through the louvered curtains of my bedroom windows. Thank heavens!! 

And of course there are the just plain confusing dreams. Entering a house without knocking and going upstairs without asking. Stairs that went nowhere except for a bathroom with a dripping tap! Oh my goodness, the dreams about work. Sometimes chattering away with colleagues at the nurses station. Sometimes walking long, long halls filled with patients in various stages of wellness and illness. Sometimes doing a bed bath. All the while in my dreams different people with faces and personalities known to me being replaced by people unknown to me but familiar.

For a very long time, between 1966 and 1996 ~ dates are not 100% certain ~ I had few dreams of any sort. It was in those years that I was prescribed Dilantin (phenytoin) and Phenobarb, both designed to control the seizure activity of epilepsy. Epilepsy had come along for the ride in my life’s journey and without my permission. Dilantin has not been a problem in the way of dreams. Gums, teeth, headaches have been problems, but phenobarb brought a different story. I didn’t know that then and it really wasn’t until many years later that I learned about the effects of certain drugs on the normal circadian rhythm. The sleep cycle we all go through: rising up into REM sleep and a dreaming phase. As phenobarbitol is not only an anticonvulsant but a sedative, hypnotic I seldom was in REM sleep. I have now been off of phenobarb since 1996 and am supremely grateful to the marvelous physician in Lubbock, Texas that walked me through that long process. My moods, my behaviour and my dreams have been, at first erratic, and then slowly steadied. As I said earlier, I did not know the effects of my prescribed medication. Phenobarb to me was merely for epilepsy management. However I learned that it did so much more to me, while it did one thing for me. I have learned to live much healthier, calmer and differently since 1996. I now have dreams to draw from and appreciate, whether they make any sense or not.

“Hold fast to dreams, 

For if dreams die, 

Life is a broken-winged bird,

 That cannot fly.”

~ Langston Hughes

FAME Cards

Prompts for both sides of your writer's brain

Created by 

Connie Frey, Phd.

www.creativitycoaching.ca