The Answer to Your Dreams 11
Mostly when writing these articles I extract short segments of dreams that I want to use. In Frank's dream below I have included more of the dream than normal because searching for animals it is a very common theme. I feel that the dream will resonate with more readers by including as much as I have. Be assured that I still only include a fraction of the full dream he submitted and a fraction of the twenty minute audio analysis he received!
ROB'S DREAM: I'm lying in bed and my wife is getting up for work. Her clothes all over the bedroom floor as usual. She's become annoyed about some of them being there and is throwing some of them into a laundry basket in the corner of the room. However, it is not a laundry basket it is a big black waste bin that we got rid of some time ago. The particular clothes she is throwing a darkish blue. I think she is doing it to wake me up.
INTERPRETATION: Clothes represent attitudes and because they are in the bedroom the dream is about your sexual relationship. You are annoyed with your wife for some time (clothes are there a while) and are being asked to eliminate (waste bin) this negative attitude (dark blue). In fact you should have done this some time ago (the bin was gotten rid of some time ago). It is time for you to wake up.
COMMENT: This is quite a simple dream and shows how dreams are merciless. Rob has been allowing these negative feelings persist for some time and that point is emphasized twice in the dream. Things underfoot in a dream are what we must overcome so even if the clothes were not being thrown out we would still know that his negative attitude is what needs eliminating. From Rob's perspective it is his wife who has the problem but the dream reminds him that attitude is nonsense. If your partner is giving you a headache you can't give them a tablet to make it go away. You have to change. In changing Rob will grow in awareness and wake up.
FRANK'S DREAM: I am in my mom’s house using the bathroom when I hear a horrible screeching of dogs crying out in pain. I can't jump up right away because of going to the toilet. But as soon as possible I jump up just holding up my pants with one hand. I run out to the garage and I am screaming, "Oh God no, my poor boy!" The garage door is open and my dog and my mom's little dogs are not in there. I know MJ has had someone steal them and I know they have been killed.
I am in total grief. I know they are dead but I head off in the neighborhood trying to call my dog's name. My mom is following me and she is being very comforting. Then it occurs to me she must know her dogs have been butchered too and why isn't she upset. I start to turn around towards my mom's house. I feel all this anger and betrayal. She is trying to get me to keep going away from her house. I can see the light on in the top story bedroom and I just get overcome with a combination of horror, anger, and betrayal. I know MJ is in the bedroom in my mom's house. I can 'see' her dogs dead on the floor and he is choking my dog, but I can tell he is already dead. He somehow wants to transfer the agony to me by 'overkill'. Then the back door of my mom's house gets huge in my mind's eye. I am running and I scream out. My mom tries to stop me and grabs my arm, but I pull away and she scratches me. My wife is suddenly there and she is screaming "No baby, no baby, don't do it!" I am running toward the back door of mom's house and I have murder on my mind.
INTERPRETATION: Your mother has affected your natural instinctive sexual identity (killing dog in the bedroom) in a very negative way. You need to eliminate (bathroom) the effects of this. You have to deal with the anger and betrayal around this. Ignore the fact that your mother is not upset over what she has done. Don't let the past become bigger than what it is (huge back door on mom's house).
COMMENT: This is just a snippet of quite a long dream and a snippet of the full analysis. Animals often appear in dreams to represent the dreamer's instinctive animal side. We often forget that we are animals in the animal world and that we have natural instincts that want expression. It is like our body rather than our brain knows how to deal with particular situations and we have the urge to express ourselves in specific ways. Frank's natural expression is inhibited by his mother. In Frank's words, "She tried to suppress my maleness and treated me very much like a girl. I think she was actually kind of hoping I would turn out gay." Frank is very aware of this but still finds himself affected by his upbringing from time to time.
Submit Your Dream
Send your dream to Michael Sheridan by email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Always submit a full dream with as much detail as possible. Give it a title. Write down briefly anything significant emotionally that happened to you the day before, any question that has concerned you recently, any therapy you are undergoing and any recent change in your diet or lifestyle. The dream may be in response to any of these.
Dreams selected for the newsletter are interpreted free of charge. Only a few dreams are selected for each issue so don’t be disappointed if your dream is not chosen. If you simply must know the meaning of your dream you can request a paid interpretation here.