Nightmare

It's currently 7 AM, and an hour ago I woke up for the most horrible nightmare of my life. I woke up sobbing and overwhelmed with a sense of fear. The dream, like all of my dreams, is patchy, but I wanted to write down what I could remember.

I was sitting in a wheelchair looking at my tiny daughter in the NICU. She was obviously very premature. She was in one of the clear plastic incubators and hooked up to every monitor and tube possible. The nurses had told us to talk to her and touch her because she was fighting for her life. So we did. Hubby was freaked out and speechless, so he just sort of stood there. He seemed scared to touch something so fragile and tiny. I had my hand stuck in the incubator with my daughter's hand wrapped around my finger. When I spoke to her, the monitors would indicate her heart rate going up. So she knew my voice. I just talked and talked to her. I told her the meaning of her name. It's a family name, and I wanted her to know she comes from a long line of strong women. I told her to fight and how much we loved her, etc. Anyway, her heart rate slowly started to go down until it flat-lined. She was gone. In the dream I just sobbed and sobbed. Refusing to let go of her hand. Then I woke up.

What made this dream even more upsetting to me is how it parallels the real life experience I had watching my Granny die last April. The major difference being that my Granny had lived a long, full life and was dying an old lady; my daughter was dying before she had even started her adventure. But the deaths were the same. When Granny was in the ICU, they encouraged us to talk to her because it increased her heart rate. I would sit for hours at her bedside, holding her hand, talking to her about everything under the sun with one eye on the heart monitor. When the decision was made by the family to remove her from life support, I was in the room. I held her hand and talked to her. Painfully watching her heart rate drop down to nothing, and then the horrible beep of the monitor as she flat-lined and was gone. It was the most traumatic event of my life.

It doesn't take an expert to interpret last night's dream. I fear losing one of my twins above all else. We are so close to the finish line, that it would just devastate me if something happened at this point. I don't understand why my son wasn't in the dream though. I assume he was doing great. Anyway, the dream was especially painful because it was like revisiting Granny's death all over again.

I don't fully know what my thoughts on the afterlife are...they seem to sway. But I've always thought that my Granny had something to do with my twins. After years and years of trying, we got pregnant with the twins less two and half months after she died. She was very much a part of the long, painful infertility journey. I would call her after every failed treatment, after every time my period would arrive. She knew how badly we wanted children. And then suddenly -- with no treatment, no Clomid, no medical/scientific assistance -- we got pregnant with two babies. I can't help but think she had something to do with it.

Anyway, my OB appointment is in about two hours, and never before have I needed to see my twins on ultrasound like I do today. Especially my daughter. I need reassurance that it was just my unconscious playing out my fears in the form of a dream. That it wasn't an omen or anything like that.