Calling Dr. Freud…
I’ve been having a recurring dream.
In the dream, it’s the middle of the night. I’m alone and asleep. Not in my house, though. I’m in a high-rise apartment building. I don’t question this change of residence. I just accept that this is where I live now.
The doorbell rings and wakes me. I’m apprehensive. Who would be at my door at this hour?
I get out of bed, and without turning on a light, I walk out of the bedroom and across the living room toward the front door.
There’s no furniture in the living room. A little bit of blue-ish fluorescent light shines through the windows from the street lamps outside. I can tell that the walls and the ceiling are painted white, and there’s white tile on the floor.
As I approach the front door, which is also white, I can see a bit of yellow incandescent light spilling through the peephole and under the bottom of the door.
I see that the chain lock is unhooked. The steel chain is dangling loose. I quickly grab the chain and slide the end through the chain plate, thinking, “I can’t believe I left that off. I always double-check.”
Then I look through the peephole. Nobody’s there. And I look at the floor. No shadow from someone standing in the hall.
I start to breathe a sigh of relief when I notice that the deadbolt is open. Something is really wrong. I wouldn’t go to bed and leave that unlocked. I turn it and the lock slides into place.
I try the door knob. It turns. That’s unlocked too. I lock it.
I realize that the door was completely unlocked. Anyone could have opened it and let themselves in.
I think, “Did they have enough time to ring the bell and slide inside before I walked into the living room?” The panic I’m feeling wakes me up for real. I sit up in my bed in my little house, my eyes open and my heart pounding.
I know the origin of the dream. My buddy Step came over when I got home from the hospital. He’s a carpenter. He installed peepholes and chain locks on the front and back doors of the house. I make sure that the dead bolts, the knob locks, and the chain locks are all secured at all times. My girlfriend has a key, but she has to wait for me to hobble over and undo the chain lock before she can enter the house.
If you had asked me a month ago, I would have told you that I felt younger than my 54 years. Both in my mind and in my body. I don’t know if I looked younger, but I felt younger. I didn’t think about it, but I was confident. I felt able to take care of myself, able to defend myself.
Today I feel older than my actual age. I’m aware that I’m a gimp. If I was an animal, I wouldn’t last a night in the wild. The injured and the lame are easy prey.
I’m realizing that the kid did more than cause me physical harm and disrupt my business. He changed the way I look at the world. He changed the way I look at myself.
Bob:
I’m no Dr. Freud, but I think that this dream and your reaction are likely to be expected after the violent events of this month. On the physical level, you have to heal and re-build strength. This is the same, in my opinion, on the psychological level. Things are not settled upstairs and this is only natural. You are in a different place mentally and worrying about different things than you did last month.
In actuality, almost nothing environmentally has changed in terms of your personal safety. Arguably, the same threats always existed. Fortunately, most of us never have to confront these fears as you have. We are not trained on how to deal with these fears and most of us are stumbling by through a mixture of good luck and serious denial that we are potentially subject to that level of random attack. My mother, on the other hand, spends most of her energies contemplating potential threats, yet has never actually been directly exposed to anything that she fears.
Bob, I bring this up because you are likely closer to the right balance of diligence and concern. You no longer can be as dismissive as the rest of us in our shared delusions and I think you are not frantically obsessed despite your high anxiety dreams. You have a heighten awareness and sensitivity that most of us elect not to have. You are safer for it and I think that these dreams will pass over time. I am hoping that you increased diligence will help foster psychological healing.
John DeLuca
26 Mar 09 at 4:58 pm
John,
Thanks. I think at first I was so focused on my physical health (and so tanked up on pain killers), I didn’t process the psychological. I guess this is the time for that, and I’ll work through it.
Bob
26 Mar 09 at 7:36 pm
Bob,
I’m afraid that these thoughts/dreams will be “with” for some time. Studies in post-trama folks (think about soldiers coming back from war) show that emotional well-being also needs time to heal…and just like your physical therapy needs some facilitation, your emotional therapy likely does as well.
A few years ago - back in Boston - a friend’s house was broken into. He and his family were held at gunpoint while the intruders stole valuables from the house. It was traumatic for them. I purchased a home alarm system and we’ve been using one every night since then. It may not stop someone intent on braking in, but, my family does sleep more soundly knowing that at the least an alarm will sound.
Dan
27 Mar 09 at 2:34 pm
Dan,
You’re the first civilian who has recommended I seek ‘emotional therapy’. The detectives mentioned that counseling was available free from the State when they took my statement the day after the shooting. The Assistant State’s Attorney also mentioned it the first time I spoke with him. And just this past week, the woman in Tallahassee who heads up the Victims of Violent Crimes unit, told me that it’s typical for people like me to get through the physical healing part and then to fall into a depression. I’m not convinced I need to seek help, but I’ll seriously consider it.
Thanks.
Bob
27 Mar 09 at 9:20 pm