Lost!

I recently woke up in the middle of the night and sat straight up in bed. If someone had been watching it would have been really spooky, I imagine. I guess that would be doubly spooky because I sleep alone and no one should be watching me sleep! Anyway, I had been dreaming of little M and thinking I had lost her. Thankfully I went back to sleep almost immediately but I woke in the morning knowing the dream had happened and feeling really unsettled.

If you've babysat children and have lost them, you might have an inkling of understanding what it's like to lose a child. I remember when the girls were little and K used to LOVE hiding in the clothes racks when we went shopping. I would have panic moments, wondering if she had been stolen. I'd call her name, and she'd giggle, hiding the whole time in the middle of the circular display of brightly colored shirts. This happened often at "Limited, Too" which is now very similar to a weirdly-named young girl's clothing store, "Justice." I used to yell at her because didn't she know how worried I was? Don't do that!

The panic of losing your child and imagining some irreparable harm coming to them is one of the most horrifying, nightmarish feelings of a mother's whole life. Usually the first minute is spent thinking, "don't panic don't panic don't panic" and then after that minute it is "panic panic panic." Then, the utter relief you feel when you find them after that second minute is ridiculously jubilant and angry at the same time. Doesn't she know?

If you have children, I am guessing you know this feeling.

I wonder if I now feel this because my children are both getting ready to be adults. I wonder if the sense of loss over their childhoods is now manifesting itself in dream-lost-panic. I know, this is a bit too psycho-analytical. It was probably just a bad dream.