TreeHouseView

In the early 80s when 911 when first introduced in my region, and I was still a very impressionable child, I remember having a dream at some point that has recurred a handuful of times over my life, and I think about on an almost daily basis. I work in the healthcare field, so I’m no stranger to calling 911, and I’m sure this is why I’ve never forgotten this dream or why I’ve had it resurface more than once.

I don’t remember the actual dream, but the overall theme is that I have to call 911 for an emergency of some kind, and I get put. on. hold.

My literal nightmare is to ask for help. I don’t ask for help. I do things myself. This is a top tier toxic trait, and I know this. So does my therapist. Another topic for another time but you can see where this is going and why this might be the closest thing to a nightmare for me. I also don’t really ever have nightmares. I have very vivid dreams–the kind where I don’t feel like I’ve slept, I feel like I’ve experienced another life while I was supposed to be asleep.

As someone who started taking THC edibles once I discovered that they help me sleep, and sleep without dreaming, I don’t recall many of my nightime ventures these days but that pesky 911 dream still sneaks in every once in a while, usually in the early morning hours when the sleep aid has slipped out of my system and The DreamWeaver has been loosened from his medicinal bindings.

It’s always the same. I dial the three numbers that are supposed to be my salvation and get a message of some kind stating they are busy and will be right with me. Or something rather llke that, to quote Mrs. Garcia, my middle school Home Ec teacher.

The anxiety that is induced from not getting through to a human who can help is something that I don’t know what to do with. My brain starts to devolve with what I imagine can only be the emerging collapse of society as we know it. I am not a catastrophizer by any stretch, yet this one thing sends me off the edge of every available cliff every time.

Even writing about it makes me jumpy, itchy, and wanting out of my own skin–looking for an escape from the absence of a system that is supposed to be there to assist those in need. What do I do? Who do I call?

The dream never has any answers. I’m just on hold.

Nightmare.