Girl Sinking - Girl Rising

When I was a child, which sounds even strange to write, because quite frankly I never really felt like a child. I always felt like an adult. Not in a jaded kind of way, but in an introspective, melancholy way.  I had many imaginary friends, not a lot of real ones. I liked music that was slow and sad, and longing. I liked sitting alone and listening to it from age 4 on up. I have almost a full recollection of my life since age 2. I felt the need for melancholy, I liked sad dark things. Perhaps a carry over for something I wasn’t quite ready to let go of from a past life.
   
I had dreams of some of those lives, one was a re occurring nightmare of my drowning… I was dressed in garb perhaps from the 1600-1700’s. They started when I was a toddler and did not stop until I was an adult. Every night the same dream awakened the same way.

I was apparently on a row boat on a boat in a body of water, perhaps a small lake or something bigger. I cannot see faces; it starts with me being lowered into the water, on my back, with a weight of something on my chest to assure that I sank.

I was on my back; I could see sun light through the water, only my legs free. I was sinking sinking sinking, until I was almost at the bottom. I brought my legs up straight high up in the air, and brought them down in an attempt to right my upper body,  I woke up doing this in my bed, I would bring my legs up, and down, and propel my body up, and wake in terror. Every single night…. Oddly even though I could not see who was doing this to me, I did not feel like I was being murdered, I felt like they had to do it, and did not want to???? I always thought perhaps they thought I was a witch.

The last time I had the dream would be when I married (too young) and moved to my new home with my new husband, and had my daughter Setara. I love my daughters and would not trade them for anything in the world, they are my heart, but I always had an aversion to having children prior to having one.

Many many years later perhaps 20 years later, someone told me that I could probably have the front part of that dream if I wanted to…. That very night after not having the dream for so long. I received a gift, the front part of the dream.

The dream we are getting in the boat, I can see their faces, but I do not recollect them after waking. Perhaps two men a woman and myself. They are crying and I am comforting them, telling them it will be okay, that they have to do this….They do not want to, but know they must….

I am young, I am unwed, and I am pregnant. My pregnancy and circumstances would have led to destruction for myself and my family. I asked them to do this. I wake as I am being lowered into the water. I felt no terror; I felt sadness for them that they had to do this thing, to let me go, to sacrifice me as it were at my behest….

I told another friend of mine that the original dreamed stopped when I married. He said no Lisa the dreamed stopped when you had your baby…. I think he was right.

I would love to hear your thoughts and experiences with such…