don't dream it's over
So, anyone else have mikvah nightmares?
Last night I had the most insane one, in which the mikvah was the bathtub in my house growing up, and the mikvah-, er, bath-room had an inordinate number of women passing in and out. I thought it was my turn, but the mikvah attendant said no, I had to wait. So I put my jeans back on (?? I don't wear jeans, and ouch, not wearing anything underneath!) and tried not to get anything dirty or messed up. Except I somehow got the impression I wasn't going to make my turn at all, so I gave up and put gel in my wet hair, and then when the mikvah lady called me I said oh no!! How am I going to wash this out on Shabbos?
I know, what?? Exactly.
When I have these the night before I go to mikvah, they're pretty easy to figure out. And usually they're made even more transparent by plot devices such as Blood Found Right Before Immersion. But this one is a week after. I should have at least another two weeks before mikvah anxiety hits.
Armchair psychologists, feel free to have at it. But know that if your translation involves Freudian symbolism I will laugh long and heartily.
Comments
Would you believe I've never had a mikvah anxiety dream? Never dreamed about drowning, either, that I can remember. My anxiety dreams are more like realizing it's most of the way through the semester and I forgot to go to class ever and now I have to go to every teacher and ask if I can make up all the work, except I can't remember which class I'm supposed to be in next...
Sorry Ruchama, skipped the ham and cheese sandwich one too, although growing up Kosher, I've never actually had one in real life.
Oh, I have actually had T"H anxiety dreams, just not the actual mikvah part. Like having to shove my husband away because he's not supposed to be touching me, or the finding stains one you mentioned... and they don't seem to have any relation to where I am in my cycle when I have the dream.
So it sounds pretty normal to me.
My therapist says one way of analyzing dreams is to look at every character in the dream as a part of the dreamer. Hmmm...?
Most of my mikvah anxiety dreams are pretty gross. Combination mikvah-toilets are a recurring theme. (Psychoanalyze that.) I also had a Mayim Rabim anxiety dream recently, in which I sent a mass e-mail from my Mayim Rabim account to just about everyone I know and signed it with my real name. But that is neither here nor there.
I would imagine that mikvah anxiety dreams are fairly common. They fall into the same category as that dream about eating a ham and cheese sandwhich on a day that is, by some quirk in the calander, both Passover and Yom Kippur. (All Jews have that one, right?)