The Story of Cindy’s Dream

Many years ago, one night my sisters and my mother were sitting at the dining room table telling stories and relating memories. Somehow we got on recurrent dreams. Each of us had a recurrent dream that we could still remember from our childhood. Each dream had an impact of that sister’s life and we concluded that these dreams would remain for us for the rest of our lives. Some were good dreams, but most were nightmares. These nightmares would cast fear into our hearts. Mine was about snakes, while Cindy’s nightmare was about screaming. I can’t remember now what she said her dream was about, but what had continued into her adult life was the scream. As she related her story, Mom and I suddenly knew where her nightmare had originated.


One night Mom and I was home alone. Cindy was asleep in the next room. We watch television or talked about the events of the day. The hour was late and I had decided to go to bed. Suddenly we heard a squeaking noise. It sounded like a baby’s squeak toy, but there were no babies in the house and therefore no baby toys. We listened intently, and then we heard it again. We both got up and started to search for the cause of the noise. We realized that the noise was coming from the basement.

We descended the stairs and looked around. There were always cats around, so to see one of the cats in the basement was not unusual. We listened patiently for the squeak again. The sound was coming from the corner of the basement where coal had been stored for the winter months. As we got to the corner, we saw a bunny, no more than a few weeks old. The bunny was making the squeak. Looking closer, we saw that the hind leg was severely injured and bleeding. As we bent down to pick up the bunny, the cat attacked.

The cat, while hunting for mice, had found the bunny. Since the young rabbit was about the size of a large mouse, it had become the cat’s prey. The cat was not about to give up his prey, especially to my mother or me. The cat became ferocious, like a tiger or lion, both in manner and in sound. This unnerved me and I am sure it did mother. Finally we rescued the bunny and tended to its wounds. The wounds were too severe and the bunny died a few hours later.

The sound of the bunny’s terror was the source of Cindy’s dream screams. As soon as Mom and I related the story and therefore the cause of her nightmare, Cindy would no longer have this recurrent dream.
The lesson is that children will have nightmares, and some of those nightmares will remain with them for the rest of their lives. As adults, we must realize that a child’s nightmare probably has its origins in the real world. If the situation is not one that the child can understand, the child will change the facts of the situation in terms that the child can understand. If the situation is too difficult or painful from the child’s point of view, a nightmare could result. As the child grows, the ability to understand the “real” situation surrounding the nightmare will result in destroying that same nightmare and therefore will cease to exist.