Only in My Dreams

So...you avid readers of this blog know that I've been feeling a bit nostalgic about the ex lately. It's that weird period post relationship where you start forgeting the bad things. I had coffee w/ a work associate yesterday who said that that's how the brain copes. It forgets the bad stuff.

Well, someone up there doesn't want me to forget the bad stuff because I had a dream last night:

The ex and I had gotten back together. He was in the shower, looking exactly the same as he had before. It was the morning and I was about to get some coffee. Before I had the chance to ask him what he wanted, I started getting yelled at:

"You never asked me what I wanted? You never ask me what I want."

And that was it. But it was enough. It reminded me that I never was made to feel like I was doing enough for him. If I did one nice thing, it was always asked why I didn't do three nice things. If I had put up with some of his nonsense, it was brushed off because we lived in a nice home and had a nice life. But like Carrie and Petrofsky, I was living HIS life. And while I had plenty of proverbial horse-drawn carriages in Central Park during those five years, it wasn't enough to make up for the fact that I wasn't me in that relationship. And one shower scene in a dream was enough to remind me of that. Because in those two sentences, hold everything that my life was about for a large part of that time.

And this morning, I ran across a mutual friend's comment on his status on Facebook. Even though we're not friends anymore on FB, it showed me the status that this friend was commenting on. And then it showed me their entire exchange in status updates. And just seeing his name again, repeatedly and reading a status that was literary in a showy way and long winded, was a definite reminder of the past.

But thank God I could have a dream to remind me of that. I don't have to get soft and revisit the past in real time. That would be a huge mistake. It seems obvious, but when the process of healing also allows you to forget the pain, it's not that out of the question.