girl in pain...

Dream - I am in a hospital room.  There is a young girl, about 14, lying on her back.  She is in pain lying that way.  She turns over and I see why.  Two large syringes are implanted on either side of her lower back.  They are held in with large clips and this is what is causing her pain.  There are instruction labels on the tubes themselves, as well as on the point of entry for the needle.  They caution against removing them.  I do it anyway.  After I pull out the syringes I read that they are on a slow drip and that it is critical, life or death, that all the medicine be injected.  I panic and go look for a nurse to re-implant the syringes.  I find one who comes in a side door; she is brusque and tough but seems to know what she’s doing.  She says it won’t be easy but she will re-implant the syringes.  In an adjacent room, a man I know and respect is sitting at a table with a group of teenagers.  I go over and shut the door so this girl will have some privacy.  A few moments later they all come bursting in and dance a conga line through the room.  

My first dream session was of an elk with a terrible wound.  The unconscious was kindly using that image to open me up to an awareness of my own wound.  About two months later I had this dream and it is no longer an elk, it is a young girl. I can take a step closer to relating and feeling a wound that is mine. I come into the hospital room and disregard all the signs that I shouldn’t remove the syringes.  What arrogance!  It is so painful to see that there is a part of me that thinks I know best, for myself and others. Yuck! I then panic and ask for help.  I am trying to prevent the girl from feeling her pain...twice, once in removing the syringes and then by shutting the door to the teen energy.  

Early in my life I became a caretaker; I wanted to avoid feeling my own pain so I took care of others, made everything about their needs; dismissive of any need I may have, not allowing that there may be caring and support available for me.  This is not caring. True caring, true compassion is feeling another’s pain because I can feel my own.  

The nurse is the Anima and I am relieved that she is there but yet I judge her; I don’t care for her style but ‘allow’ (arrogance) that she does know what she’s doing.   The man is the Animus; he and the teens want to be with the girl as well, even come dancing through the room, but I, in my control, want to close the door on them.

Caretaking...now begins a long painful journey into seeing how what I valued as being a woman of service, of being a thoughtful, mindful friend, ‘adult in charge,’ the teacher, as Rodger calls it ‘wise old Mary Jo,’ were all ways I stayed out of my own feelings, my own heart.  All this control, all this caretaking was so developed (unbeknownst to me so as to not feel) and resulted in a great deal of pride.  I came to believe that I had to be in control because I knew what was best...for everyone.  I had become intellectually and spiritually arrogant.  I believed that I was the one who looked at things from all angles and therefore knew what was best, always in my mind, always analyzing, judging, deeming what was the right course of action.  Yet all this behavior, ugly as it is, was a reaction, to the unfelt pain and fear.   And underneath all this was a young 14 year old girl in tremendous pain, the girl self in all of us who feels her pain, as well as her love, something as of yet I wasn’t quite willing to feel.

Homework: Be the girl in the hospital.  Let myself be surrounded by the Anima, the teens, and the Animus. Feel that they care about me.  Let myself be taken care of by them.  

Mary Jo Heyen
Archetypal Dreamwork Practitioner
mjheyen@gmail.com 
Dream sessions in person, via Skype or on the phone
website: http://maryjoheyen.com/