“It’s just a bad dream.”
I learned when I was little that the only way to traverse the shock of a bad dream was to remind myself that the dream wasn’t real. When every waking moment feltas if the nightmare would bleed into my reality, I 
repeated over and over the childish mantra, the only solution I’d ever known to protect me without fail from my innermost terrors.
It’s just a bad dream, Kevin. It’s not real.
These high anxiety awakenings are nothing new. At times it’s as simple as my subconscious trying to work through some mental or emotional angst. Other nightmares are full of demons past, horrible beyond any endless hell. Upon waking from the latter I find myself writhing in pain beyond endurance, physical, mental, emotional and spiritual.
In the late 1980’s during my early days of sobriety and recovery from addiction, these torturous nightmares were what is known as drunk and drug dreams. I’d wake up at the very moment of realization that I had relapsed, again, as the full weight and bitterness of abject failure engulfed every aspect of not only what I am – an alcoholic and addict – but who I am: I am shame.
As time passed the 12-step programs worked their magic and the tragic relapse dreams subsided. The joys of living in sobriety bore fruit, a stability which allowed me to peel the onion layers of sadness and loss to find, sadly, a broken inner child marred by the hands of pedophiles. As I uncovered the abuse and the memories emerged my days became a ritual of therapy and tears, screaming in rage and grief. When the full weight of the child sexual abuse began to slowly lift from my heart, my nights came alive with remembrances so vivid I felt afraid to close my eyes. The nightmares of relapsing into addiction seemed pale compared to these vivid ‘Nightmare On Elm Street’ horror scopes that found me waking in my bed, sheets soaked with sweat, peeing myself in fear, my mouth open in breathless screams, as my abusers once again had their way with me.
Over time the therapy had a positive effect. As with the earlier drunk and drug dreams the abusive nightmares subsided. My life again began to flourish in ways unimaginable. A former highschool dropout, I became a college graduate. Divorced and estranged from my family, I reclaimed my place and rejoined the world as a father to my children, a son to my parents, a human amongst a wonderful community of healthy, healing people. I lived fully, remarrying to a beautiful woman, bringing two new babies into a loving family, walking along a spiritual path of faith, as well as a profound hope for a future without bad dreams.
Even while the world struggled around me, I felt grounded in my healing. I watched wars begin and end, and yet my dreams left me rested. I lived through the moments of 9-11, watching from Brooklyn as the towers fell in Manhattan. The ash of burned souls coated my windowsill and the smoke choked my children’s lungs. Still, with deep appreciation for my family and our community, we all prayed together, and my dreams brought me long and restful relief.
In 2005 my boss at the Fashion Institute of Technology, Roz Pier, asked me out for lunch. “We have something in common”, she told me. I assumed perhaps she was in recovery. I was never so unprepared for a conversation as I remember being on that day. Looking across our water glasses, waiting for the waiter to bring our food, Roz told me, “Kevin, I’m a birth mother. I had twins. I gave them up at birth.” Roz knew that I was adopted, and encouraged me to search for my biological family. As the search commenced, so too did my journey into the deeply embedded trauma of my most resilient fear: abandonment.
This journey to find my mother led me through an unimaginable labyrinth of loss. I had set out to heal the physical and emotional wounds of being separated from the one human being I longed for. The path I took, which began as a quest for reunion, became a challenge for me to become the protector of my child within, of little Kevin, who never deserved to be left, abandoned or discarded.
As I grew into the man I never thought I could be, I took on the role of my own warrior, an advocate for my soul, and my new strength crystalized a sense of courage. I lifted my head from my pillow each morning with purpose and resolve. I believed that I would not only complete the search for my mother, I would endeavor to create a new sense of how I belonged in this world, and a reason for being alive, for having been born. My sense of hope transcended my fears as I came closer to the completion of my search. I knew that my efforts had already given me more than I’d ever expected. I would have me, and I would never, ever abandon myself. No matter what I found.
I found a grave. My mother had passed away ten years before on the Fourth of July. The car her husband was driving crashed, and she died instantly. Her husband lived, only to commit suicide three years later, leaving behind their children, my siblings. Our mother’s headstone had their names engraved: Mother of John, Julie and James.
I had little reason to fear sleep because no bad dreams could match the nightmare of my waking hours. I was forever alone now. My mother would never hold me and tell me she loved me. I’d never know why she left me, or how she felt without me all these years. I’d never get to tell her I forgave her. Never get to say goodbye. Never hear her voice, or look into her eyes.
My dearest friends told me that time would heal these wounds. Others assured me that everything happens for a reason. Some, with their own tears of personal regrets in their eyes, said God has a plan. All of these assurances were meant to help, and each came from a place of compassion and empathy. None, however well meaning, could prevent the nightmares that I knew were coming. My journey into my deepest fears had only begun.
But the healing did happen. As the trauma of abandonment and loss brought horror shows to my sleeping moments, so too did I find hope and solace in a new community of people who feared the same nightmares, and yet hoped for a new life beyond our wildest dreams. In the same way that I had walked through the recovery from addiction and child sexual abuse with my fellow survivors, I now found a path towards an absolute freedom with my brother and sister adoptees. This powerful community welcomed me with joy and pure acceptance, and a profound willingness to trudge together toward a new tomorrow.
As the years have passed I’ve found great solace in the mending of my life. Now as I wake each day, even the bad dreams don’t haunt me as they did before. Today I realize that I’m not an oddity or freak for being afraid. Even as my mind struggles in fear, my subconscious trying to make meaning from a life of grief, when I awake I remember I am not alone anymore. I know the bad dreams are not real. I know the community I belong to is real. I believe I will never, ever be alone again, and I am confident that there are still more miracles to come.
I woke up yesterday, petrified, as a nightmare hit me in my gut and wouldn’t let me heal. Panicked and frightened, sleep eluded me as my mind scrambled and my body trembled. This panic was an inner struggle with the present, an uncertain fear or worry haunting me, and my brain was trying to problem solve and prepare me in the best way it knew how. This time, however, I had some new lessons to learn as I awoke.
As I moved past the pure horror of a full blown panic attack, three deep breaths allowed my body to remember that this was me experiencing panic. Three more deep breaths brought me closer to my center, the knowledge that I am not an anxious person, simply a person experiencing a time of anxiety. My breathing slowed and the greater truths of what’s real and what is just a dream expanded, easing my sense of belonging in my own body, and in the world. The dream passed without becoming a reality. I could still see the dream in my mind’s eye, so present and active and strong. I could fully taste the remnants of fear, and my sinuses remained clear from all the adrenaline still resident in my blood.
As the chemical reaction of panic dwindled, my prefrontal cortex flickered, sputtering to life with the slightest growing confidence, like a cool breeze blowing through the now open window of my mind.
It’s just a dream.
It’s not real.
It’s just a thought.
It’s not real.
It’s just a feeling.
It’s not real.
My thoughts, fears, feelings and nightmares all suddenly looked like vaguely familiar family members, distant cousins and long absent aunts and uncles, and some old friends of friends of acquaintances. They spoke words I knew deeply, but now they had a place of reference at once both fresh and new, and as old as my childhood rock collection of quartz and fools gold.
My mind screamed in despair,
“Nobody’s going to care what I write.”
It’s just a thought.
My body shook with grief,
“My heart feels broken and alone.”
It’s just a feeling.
My imagination roared to life,
“I’m threatened and I’ll need to fight.”
It’s just a bad dream.
They are not real.
They are not real.
They are not real.
A song is real, full of sound and meaning. A painting has presence and substance. Written words bring ideas to life. Spoken words enter the world and touch the essence of every ear they meet.
Not so with nightmares, feelings, thoughts and deepest fears. Their substance is directly proportional to the weight I provide them, and the clarity I choose when I focus my attention on them. They are not real. The very heart of a bad dream is shattered as the dreamer awakens. Thoughts of loss and sadness are noticed and allowed to dissipate. Floating away on the warm breeze of mindfulness and serenity, the loss and sadness are lost and forgotten. The feelings of fear so strong in the moments of conception are abandoned and left to fade to dust.
As has always been true for me, there are still more paths to travel, more lessons to learn. Perhaps tonight I’ll have dreadful dreams. Tomorrow sad thoughts may at times plague me. As my feelings run like a horse without care for its rider, and as these unreal happenings approach, I’ll remember my mantras, these words that are strong, and true.
It’s just a dream.
It’s just a thought.
It’s just a feeling.
And I’ll sleep again.
In truth, I’ll rest.