This Is Why People Don't Remember Their Dreams

I have another story posted that mentions my maternal grandmother, who I never knew. This story involves my paternal grandmother who I knew very well.

In retrospect, the following story is actually funny. But while these things were occurring they were terrifying to me.

Around the age of nine, I started having vivid dreams that were more like nightmares. From my earliest memories I had difficulty falling asleep and staying there. So I tried not to pay attention to my dreams because I was never really sure if I was actually asleep. Even as a young child I suppose I believed that my imagination was taking over.

The dreams became more like premonitions with the exception of details that didn't fit in. For instance, I would dream that someone was going to die, but in the dream everyone was wearing their pajamas and had blue hair. However, someone in the person's family would die within days of my dreams.

These bad dreams continued through my early twenties and many of them were only dreams - nothing more. I am a hypnotherapist now, and I'm pretty familiar with the dream states that we experience. So while some of these were spooky they were also fairly normal, in that we all have goofy dreams now and then.

Through the years some of these instances have been chilling and others have been foreboding. But none were quite as weird as the dreams I had before my paternal grandmother's death. She was in a nursing home in another city and had Alzheimer's for several years. Unbeknownst to me, she had suffered a stroke several days before her death and was in a coma. During that time, I had two dreams two days in a row that left me empty and cold.

The first one was goofy and disconnected like all the other dreams I'd had in the past, but it was alarming enough to get my attention. Since I couldn't determine what it was about, it really set me on edge. The second dream was a little more comprehensible.

I was in my own house and an old woman was dressed in white, standing in front of the oven. I didn't recognize her. She turned to me and said in a desperate tone, "Look at me. It's killing me. Look at me." She looked like she was already dead. There was also a young man with me, who I seemed to know and connect with as if he were a brother. But I'd never seen him before. Right about now I should add that I've never used drugs, and it is okay to laugh at this story.

The next morning my grandmother passed away, and then it made sense. I didn't think anything about those dreams until a few months later. I figured that was the reason for them even though they were weird and disjointed. It made sense to me when I learned about Grandma's coma, that she could call on us at will to prepare us for her death. If I'd known about it before the dreams, I think I wouldn't have been afraid.

Three months after my grandmother's death, one of her closest, dearest friends passed. She was one of the kindest souls I'd ever known. However, I didn't really know her that well, and didn't maintain contact with her. I was actually closer to two of my grandmother's other friends.

One Sunday morning I woke up but never really stopped sleeping. I started to have yet another dream that, not surprisingly, made no sense at all. I was in college when this happened, but in the dream I was on a high school campus decorating for a school dance. I'd walked into the principal's office to get something from a closet. When I turned around I saw my grandmother coming through the doorway. I was happy to see her but really surprised, too. She put her hands on my shoulders and with a big smile proceeded to tell me excitedly that I would be joining her in the fall - not sure if it's an action or a season - and that it was beautiful where she was and that I would love it. But it wasn't my grandmother who was talking to me. It was her friend.

That time, my dad got chills from my dream, and they got worse when his brother called that evening to tell him that this dear friend had passed away the night before.

Since I was actually closer to some of her other friends, I assume Grandma hopped on the closest vessel possible to deliver her message. And I don't know if it matters, but she died during the Fall season. I, however, am still happily alive twenty years later.