Dreams and Guilt

[thejourney]

Does anyone have weird dreams? 

I am 3 years out and I have gone through a series of dream types - very clear meaning most of the time.  I rarely dreamt before loss, but I go through periods now where I dream night after night.

at first, my dreams were abandonment - DW was leaving me in a variety of ways - having an affair, moving out, generally leaving.  Those morphed over time and as I started seeing Ch2, they became dreams of guilt.  DW was not really dead and came back and just showed up in the kitchen with a lame excuse for being away for a month - now what do I do??  I have ch2 and DW.  DW would put me on the spot and force me to choose. I wanted to choose Ch2, but chose DW in my dreams when they first happened back a year ago - maybe out of a sense of 'doing the right thing' or maybe plain old guilt.  So now my relationship with Ch2 is better than it has ever been and the dreams are back.  In the dream, I want to move on with Ch2 but I feel terribly guilty about it.  And I no longer choose DW, but I wake before facing the consequences with DW .

Does anyone else have this kind of dream?  or this kind of guilt??? 

 

These are things I can only share here - I prefer Ch2.  I was happy with Ch1, but now that I have experienced something different, I see a new world. But I could never say that to anyone - friends nor family. I feel I can say it here in a safe zone.  But boy oh boy, even just typing this comes with a heaping load of guilt !

[BrokenHeart2]

Hi TJ

Yes we do get it here.  I have always said this widow journey sure is a mind f_ck for sure. I haven't found or seeked  a ch2 but I wouldn't be a bit surprised if I did the same thing would happen to me. May you find peace and happiness in your journey with you ch2

Hugs

[IfIonlycould]

Oh yeah I get the guilt when it comes to the feelings for Chapter 2.  Early on in my new relationship I reminded myself often I was doing nothing wrong.  I never broke my marriage vows, I was in it "til death do us part"....

It was  strange thought when at some point I realized that my boyfriend and I are actually a better fit than husband and I were,  and yes I have admitted that to VERY few in real life.

Sometime in my journey and I can't remember when (the YWBB would know  )  I had a dream where husband came back, showed up and wanted back in my life, and I told him "No this is not fair, I love _____ now."  Wow....

I no longer feel guilt, I have nothing to feel guilty about but I understand the struggle you are going through because I was there at one point. Hugs

[Mizpah]

I don't have guilt - at least not consciously/straightforwardly (a word?).  But I've had strange dreams.  My boyfriend is a widower - and the father of my only child.  My relationship with DH was extraordinary - superhappy, superhealthy, glowing, we were obsessed with each other and madly in love, inseparable, inspired by each other, we changed each other's lives vastly for the better and brought out our best selves.  My relationship with my boyfriend is not as easy, not even close, but that's not to say I love him less.  When I was pregnant and when our daughter was a newborn, I'd often have dreams of coming home and expecting BabyDaddy, but DH would be there holding the baby or sitting in a chair watching her sleep.  And I'd be trying to think of how to tell him that he's dead and it's not his daughter.  There was the strangest emotional aspect.  At the same moment in the dream, I'd be 100% overjoyed that DH was back but also 100% wondering where BabyDaddy was and wanting him there.  (Yes, that's more like 50/50, huh?  Hahahahaha.)  In one dream, BabyDaddy got home just after me and he was excited and relieved to find DH and was like, "See?  He's back.  I'm gonna go now!," and he started packing his things. 

 

It's so hard to put it on yourself as a "choice."  There is no choice.  It's a self-torturing hypothetical.  We didn't want them to die.  We didn't want to have to rebuild and repopulate a life.  But we did have to, and we did.  Because they're gone and only because they're gone.  What would we choose?  That choice would be another loss.  Widowhood = the gift that keeps on giving!  The eternal mindf**k. 

 

I know some people hate the word "victim," but I don't attach any point of shame or indignation to it.  I don't feel guilty, because DH and I were both a victim of the accident that killed him.  Maybe it sounds self-absorbed to say that, when he lost his life and I still have mine.  But I lost him, and he was my life.  I don't feel guilty - I feel we were victimized by life, and I don't feel guilty for doing what I can to make the rest of my life bearable, and maybe even happy.

[MissinGrizz]

Yes. I had very similar dreams when I moved on. First, I had a great dream, more like a visitation, in which DH said, "It's about time" when I started to date (2.5 years out). But, after I got deep into the relationship and got married, I had what you describe. He would come back, and I would pick my new husband, which at first I thought was guilt but then thought maybe it's a good thing, like saying be happy with your chapter two, it's okay. Maybe try to interpret it a different way to let go of the guilt. And, not that there's ever a choice, but I would choose neither, as I could never make that choice. I'd just be alone.

[Bunny]

Yeah, the dreams...I remember in the first one I was a wreck, wondering what to do with them, trying to juggle both without hurting them- not wanting to let go of either, and wondering what my responsibility was- am I really still married? And what does that mean to me now?

 

My second dream, when he came back acting like it was no big deal that he took off, expecting that things could go back to the way they were, I was seriously pissed off- like, don't you know what your death did to me?! How it completely fucking destroyed me?!! And now you come back like it's nothing?!! I have a BOYFRIEND now, and I am NOT going to give him up for you...My DH and I were more like 'opposites attract', my boyfriend is more compatible with me in many ways. My DH was a very charismatic larger than life character whereas my boyfriend is much more mellow.

 

This is what I've come to accept- DH was perfect for me at 31 and my boyfriend is perfect for me at 51. Being married to and widowed by my DH has made me who I am today. Who knows if things would have worked out so well had I gotten together with my boyfriend at 30? Perhaps it fundamentally changed me in ways that make what I have now so incredibly good. letting go of the guilt of this has been a process, but I've done it. I think. I'm happy now. He is perfect for who I am today in ways that my DH could not be anymore.

 

What a strange road widowhood has been...

[SieOma]

TheJourney,

 

I was very happily married to my late husband, and we also brought out the best in each other. I knew he was the man I would grow old with, easily. Then one day, just like that, he was gone. It's been a little more than 5 years. I now have a small family at home, a little boy and a man I can't get enough of. New Guy has had a very different life experience and approach to living life, so I am also in a new world. I'm happy, and I have thought about it as well, given the choice, I wouldn't give any of this back. As far as I'm concerned it was because of my former marriage and loss that I was able to not only have this life, but accept it. Part of me just shut down after my husband died, but when I finally saw love again, I recognized it and I wanted it more than I feared it (because of my traumatic loss). I consider it an honor of the love we had, the strength of it, that I was able to carry on.

 

I still struggle sometimes to get my head around it all. I want what I have, love what I have, wouldn't give it back for anything, still sometimes miss my former husband so much, and how does that make sense? It is a mindfuck that keeps on giving, I agree. But maybe that's because we get it pounded into our heads that there is a one and an only one forever the end. It's just not that simple, though, is it?

 

When I took psychology, we studied dreams. All we know about them are just theories. Because mine are so straightforward, I tend to believe the theory that our brains, during sleep, are busy sorting through memories, thoughts, emotions. Sometimes, they are caused by a sort of overload-- thoughts and emotions that are just too heavy to sit and think through. If that is true, then it is good that you are dreaming because it means you are working through it. Not that the dreams don't still... suck.