3/25/2003 03:53:44 PM|||Amy|||As my sister did, I had a horrible dream about my mother last night. I dreamt that I was about two weeks from my due date, and all of a sudden blood and tissue started rushing down my legs. I didn't know what to do, so I kept going along as if everything was normal. My mother began talking very loudly to me saying I needed to call the doctor and find out if I was losing the baby. I had already considered doing this, but wasn't yet prepared to deal with the situation. I was hoping that the bleeding would stop, and everything would be okay. Still, my mother nagged and then, I broke. I screamed at her to "shut up." I kept screaming and she kept talking, except more and more loudly. Finally, I was slapping her, trying to get her to stop. Then, I woke up.

I can diagnose the mother issues in the dream, but the part about losing the baby worries me. What if there really is something wrong? What if the baby dies, or is severely disabled? I was much less careful during my second pregnancy, then the first and I haven't changed anything really this time, except that I'm not smoking or drinking alcohol or indulging in sedatives. I've taken one prenatal vitamin since I became pregnant, and my nutrition intake is abysmal.

One of the interesting aspects of the dream is what it dredged up from memory. When I slapped my mother, I slapped her in exactly the same way she slapped me once when I was a little kid. Part of the dream took place in the home of a childhood friend who found out a couple of years after the fact that her mother had aborted a baby. I don't think about either of those two events very often, if ever, but somehow they both played a part.

I think the dream may have something to do with the blood screens I had done yesterday. It's also occurred to me that time is passing too quickly, and I need more than I have. I'm 16 weeks along, and somehow in the next few months I have to move all of our things out of my third floor apartment and get my parent's health hazard of a home ready for the new baby. There are other things that have to be done and adjustments made. I think Monkey is going to have a hard time when Baby comes. She is the little princess, and this is a fact of which she is very well aware and has gotten damn good at using to her advantage. Bear already has some sibling rivalry issues. I may go ahead and find out what gender Baby has so that I can pull out all the stops on getting Bear prepared. He can help us pick a name and get Baby's things ready. Still, not knowing might go a long way in helping him build happy anticipation.|||91369915|||