Bad Dreams

The other night I had a dream about my nephew Madden. I don’t remember the details of my dream but what I do remember is that he didn’t recognize me; he didn’t know who I was when I went to him. He
was scared and shy and timid- not at all himself, not at all the Madden I remember.

Then tonight, around 2:30am, I woke up crying to what sounded like a knock at my door. I was dreaming that my sister Brittany was knocking on my door and when I opened it, she was standing there, alone, bleeding and crying. In my dream, her boyfriend had beat her up but she couldn’t tell me where the boys were. We drove to her apartment and
when we got there, there was so much blood. I seen the boys’ dad covered in blood but I didn’t see the boys. That’s when I woke up crying to the knocking at my front door.

I couldn’t go back to sleep because I feared that she would call or show up and I wouldn’t hear her. Since her and Madden moved in with me in 2011, she’s always pretty much ran to me any time she was having a difficult time. And as angry as I am with her for what she’s doing, I know that she’s being abused as well. And I still miss her and I love her so very much.

The hardest part of all of this is the real, palpable, physical pain that I feel in my chest. Sometimes it feels like I can’t breathe when I think about it, sometimes it just feels like pressure or tightness. But it’s real and it’s there. As messed up as it sounds, I know it’s the pain that drives me to keep fighting for them. Yes, I want them safe more than anything in this world. But my heart is vested into them boys and my sister and right now, it feels as though a piece of it is missing.

I hate bad dreams.