Mothers Worst Dreams

Time ticks on and the dream fades. My heart still aches with remembering the tears in that dream, the anguish that struck me. It is just a dream I tell myself. My body shivers and the world feels wrong.

The dream was one I have in variations before, we live some place I am not familiar with in this one. A military post though like so many others we have lived on. I sit with my laptop while my children play and suddenly see an alert about a tsunami heading right towards our area. At first is disbelief as wouldn’t the the sirens be going on post? But then I remember that in the past the military have been some of the last to let us know what is going on with a situation.

I tell the kids I will be right back as I toss my laptop aside and dash for the door, I run into a neighbor who looks happy and not paniced at all. She asked if everything is ok and I shout that I don’t think it is and to go in and put the news on. I run past the public pool behind the house, a reminder that 3 of my children can not at all swim, and I run to the fence of the cliff that drops down to the beach. I stand there seeing nothing but sailing ships. I look around at the children playing and people being normal and no one but me freaking out. My heart pounding, I turn in circles looking at the normality of the day. It all just seemed wrong. My husband wasn’t home, he isn’t often with his job though. I like so many other times wished he was.

I thought about what would happen if the internet was right. My children can’t swim, we have no boat, no life vests for them even. The cliff is high but is it high enough I wonder. Should I go call my husband and should I say anything to anyone and risk looking like a crazy person? What about supplies, how can I keep 4 children from drowning and then how can I keep them from being swept away. I remember the images of what happened in other countries when such forces of nature have hit them with near no notice. It wasn’t just the initial waves that killed but the lack of food and clean water after the event. I couldn’t do it all I knew to clearly. I kept turning in circles, and then my eyes caught something on the hurizon out to see, a wall of darkness against the while clouds off in the distance. It stool my breath and I could not shout. I pointed, frozen, not sure what to do. Others looked on where I pointing, some did scream then, and then finally the sirens went off on post alerting everyone to an emergency. The big voice came on over the speakers telling everyone to find high ground. I watched mothers grab children, pack up toys and bags and found it so strange that they took the time to gather belongings rather useless in the situation. I waited hoping I would see someone doing something that I might do to save my children. Upon seeing nothing I broke myself free from the fear and raced to my home past the pool and on the door step I found my 13 year old daughter, 7 year old son, and 5 year old daughter all asking me what is wrong and what they should do. They know what to do in a tornado, and an earthquake, but we never planned for this kind of disaster, how can you? I tell them not to worry and told my son to call Daddy on my cell phone and tell him we are ok but to get home. I tell my oldest to get the baby up and I ran to my room to pull the sheet off the bed. I tied my 2.5 year old to my back, as high as I could manage. I questioned it as I am not a powerful swimmer but I can float on my back for hours without exertion. Putting baby on my back would mean I couldn’t float but putting her on my belly so high up as to keep her head out of the water would mean my arms would fairly useless in front of me.

I told my oldest daughter that there was a wall of water coming that I needed her to make sure she took care of herself, that her responsibility was to herself and I needed to count of her to take care of just her. I told her to run and find the 5-5o cord Daddy had, it is a green cord that is not very thick but is very strong. As I stood on the back patio not facing the ocean I hopes I was wrong, that the waves would not reach our home. I can tell you that in real life I often wish I was wrong because being wrong would be easier in so many cases. I am rather a realist though and it comes at a cost.

I used the cord to tie each of my children to the metal frame. Pulling on it as hard as I could in hopes it would hold. I told the kids that they needed to hold on and kick and fight to stay about the water and that it was ok to be scared but that they had to do a good job and that before we knew it, that it would be over. I knew that after the first wave, others might come, but if we could survive the first, maybe we could survive any others. I had so many doubts but I simply had no other plan. I ran into the house and grabbed the seat cushions off the sofa, they should float I thought. I don’t know if in reality they would though. I hoped they would. I tied cord around these too in hopes they would float and give the kids something to hold on too. I would try to hold my two middle children up but I doubted I would be able to actually do it. It was a horrible feeling and it was a choice no mother would ever want to make and I am not sure how I was going to be able to do it.

I went to the side of the house and looked back at the ocean, I thought that by now the wave much surely have hit us already, but there it was, still out there in the ocean, closer though and clearly taller than our house.

My husband got home then and told me we had to get out of there, he had our van though so getting out of there before had no been an option. I cut the cords and piled the kids in, I took the cushions too. For the first time, we didn’t bother with seat belts, there was no time, it felt wrong and I really hated the feeling. We raced up and out of the housing area we lived in, and then off post. We could see high buildings far away, nothing seemed high enough though, nothing seemed solid and secure. The streets where a mess of chaos.

We finally found a very old tall brick building, I didn’t know what was in it but it looked so solid and high. We got out of the van, oddly parking in a parking spot as it is just in my husbands nature to follow the rules even maybe when they are not logical, that is my nature too though and maybe it is something I dislike a bit. We dragged and pulled and carried the kids up flights of stairs. Up and up and there where people behind us now and above us, others with the same idea. I handed baby to my oldest daughter as I was so slow and told them I would catch up. They where all out of site and then there where police officers gathering people, forcing us down the stairs and telling us we couldn’t be there they forced us to the street and would not let us back in. They had guns. I wanted to fight them, wanted to sneak around and get into the building another way but I was carried away with the crowd, we ended up at appartment, we couldn’t get in though and we could see the wave falling over the city and so we climbed the fire escape, people pushing others and showing a sad side of human nature, our need to survive even if it is over others.

The wave hit but I was not worried about myself. I ended up letting go though much to my anger and the water pushed me down and under and around and when I finally broke the service I was moving in fast water, hiting things with my body, there where screams in the air. I managed to get on a car, it was some how floating and I was able to get on top of it. The water was slowing now, and it went by what had to be a mall, people on top where doing all they could to get people out of the water. Another side of our human nature, that we will so willingly risk ourselves for others. They saved me from the water.

At the top of the building I looked and looked trying to find the Q1 building, that was the letter and number on the top of the building I had left my family in. I couldn’t find it and I didn’t recognize anything. Time must have gone on as the water was receding  it could have been pulling out for another wave coming in, what ever the cause I risked going into the building, the top level of which was still dry. I found what so many others had been looking for, a connection to the outside world, searching for an explanation for the unthinkable.

Gathered around TVs, all on different channels we watched in horror as news reports came in of our area, of the devastation  I saw what I wanted to see, the building with the Q1 on it. My family was in there, and I saw the water hit it, it was a recording of what had happened. The wall of water hit it and at first I thought we had made the right choice but then the side hit by the water buckled and parts of the building were quickly swept away, the building sank into the water and nothing of it could be seen. My heart sank. I couldn’t keep still, I had to get out there and I had to get to them. I went outside and jumped back into the water and it bounced me around and in my insanity I couldn’t feel the bleeding and most likely broken bones. I was frantic to get to them but the whole time believing there was no way any of them could survive. My husband can’t really swim, and I knew the plan had been to get to a top room, not the roof, meaning they went down in the rubble. I pictured a room filling with water and them unable to get out. Maybe my husband or oldest daughter would survive, maybe, but then I knew they would not leave the little ones to die alone and it was a horrible feeling. I screamed and cried and kept fighting to get to them because even though I didn’t believe they where alive, and I didn’t believe I could do anything, there was hope… there had to have been right, or why else would I have fought to get to them.

Of course then I woke up, tears stinging my eyes, my through tight, and my day a mess from a horrible dream. Some dreams stay with you, the ghost of them lingering in you through your day. Today is like that. I hug them closer and think about how I could not stand to live with losing even one of them. Some people who lose a child have to deal with others saying things like “At least you can have more children.” But no other children would be my 13 year old, or 7 year old, or 5 year old, or 2.5 year old. Another baby would be someone different and I want the ones I have. No one, nothing, could replace them.

In the light of day I can’t help but think about the school shooting, and the children gone too soon from the world and families trying to survive the loss. They are in a living nightmare I can’t comprehend and my heart breaks for them. What would we give to keep our children safe?

As for me, the facts are that my husband and I are out numbered having 4 children. While we are all thriving, would we if things got hard? I only have so many hands. I think maybe the dream last night was sparked by a situation we have been dealing with. Our 2.5 year old has been having fits like I have not seen before at night. She flips out and screams and gets violent and nothing seems to calm her. What normally works, just doesn’t. We are visiting family and so things are different for her and she is not used to things and this is contributing to it but in the end, the fact is I have not been able to calm her down 4 nights this past week, 4 nights of screaming tantrums that left me feeling helpless. My husband handled last nights, a song she loves finally calmed her down in the kitchen so she didn’t feel like anyone was making her go to sleep. It wasn’t like we made her sleep alone, we whee happy to co-sleep but she wouldn’t have it. She had some toast with Daddy and he played the song with her for hours and eventually she went back to sleep. She is still a little grumpy butt today though. We don’t tend to let her cry it out, ever. She would fuss and we would meet the need but this trip, we can’t figure out what she wants and I am not sure she herself even knows. She is out of sorts. I feel over my head and there is no good reason for it, we are on vacation and all the other kids are happy and doing well and behaving very well. I can’t figure her out. She is not sick, not hurting, just not happy. I think feeling helpless to make her happy these last few nights might have caused a dream that left me feeling so helpless as a mother. No matter the cause, I know I am not the only Mother to get dreams like this that make them cry when they wake up.

I wish there was a positive point to them. I wish I could forget them.