Last night, I had an incredibly vivid dream. I actually had three incredibly vivid dreams, all very telling, but I feel the need to write this one out in particular. I was dreaming that I had woken up, here in Ben’s room, just as I would normally wake up had it been for real. I was by myself. I sat up and felt something in my mouth, and as my tongue fiddled around with it, it fell out and revealed itself to be a tiny piece of my fake tooth that had come undone. Then all of a sudden there were more tiny pieces in my mouth. I spat them out, and upon spitting, I felt a number of my teeth disconnect from my gums. I ran over to the mirror, and as I opened my mouth, I watched the entire part of my front mandible simply come undone from my jaw, just as if they were dentures, and float around in my mouth. Then the top half caved in, and I was spitting out entire chunks of my gums with the teeth still on them. I frantically ran to my phone, halfway realizing that I was unable to speak, and I clicked on Ben’s number.
Then I woke up, and my heart was going crazy, it had felt so real.
This is actually not the first time I’ve had a dream about teeth, but by far the worst. I’ve had maybe three other dreams where my one fake tooth (that I had to repair a few months ago in Italy) breaks again, but nothing like this, nothing so vivid and horrific.
Teeth dreams are apparently very common, along with flying, being chased, etc. Teeth in psychological studies are often considered to be where we subconsciously derive our sense of power- teeth can tear, bite, chew, gnaw… animals show their teeth to assert their power, and so on. I believe that my dream is a result of what I have been feeling recently, to a degree that I don’t think I’ve ever experienced before, which is my notable drop in self-confidence. I have been unsuccessful in finding a real job here, and in all honesty, I am losing the motivation and optimism I held before. I have almost depleted my entire savings and I am dependent on my boyfriend for almost everything. So what I’m dealing with- low confidence and loss of independence- are two things I have never experienced before in such high, real, day-to-day degrees, and as a result, on top of all this, I am not feeling like myself. I am detached from not only my familiar physical surroundings but from what I thought I knew the best, what I thought I could always rely on: my own self.
And thus, the dream. Powerless, panicked, literally disconnected. I had those themes replay in all three of my dreams last night, so today has not been a very good day.
