I never really have terror-type nightmares, like being chased by monsters or that type of thing, but I do often have dreams that are so depressing or sad, they become nightmares to my sensibilities. These are the types that invlolve psychological torment rather than dealing with the threat of physical harm, which most people associate with the word nightmare.

When I do have dreams like this, I often will wake up in the morning with a cloud hanging over my whole existence. Everything feels gray and hazy, and the whole world seems dull and out of focus. And I feel sad. It is unbelievably hard for me to shake this feeling, and sometimes it can stay with me for several days if it’s disturbing enough.

Well, once again, I had one of these dreams the other night. It’s been a long time since I’ve been truly depressed…I haven’t been since high school…but this brought those feelings back to the surface. There wasn’t much action in the dream, it was more about the feelings than anything else.

Basically, I was with my close friends (a group of four males), and they flat-out told me that they didn’t want to hang out with me anymore because they thought I was too depressing.

This was incredibly hurtful to me for several reasons. First of all, this really did happen to me in high school, with a different group of friends. (It was a group of conformist girls who turned out to back-stabbing bitches with serious problems of their own, but that didn’t make it any less devastating.) Secondly, I tend to be the person in our group with the sunny demeanor most of the time. When I’m with them, I’m very happy because they are fun to be around. If anything, I should not have been the person they turned on, if that was indeed the real reason they were dumping me.

Lastly, in my experience, being friends primarily with guys is very different than with girls. Guys are much less emotional and open, but they seem to be more loyal and stable, with less tendency to form little conspirational groups to gang up on their so-called friends. They mainly seem to get along with most people and if there is some kind of trouble, it’s taken care of more quickly and directly than it is with females, who like to put on a front and play mind games rather than deal with the problem. I HATE that kind of stuff…in fact, I find it a highly loathsome and dispicable act.

But enough about that…there’s no point in wasting my time grumbling about something that happened so far in the past, even if it has affected my life so profoundly. The point of even bringing that subject up is to demonstrate just how much it bothers me. If this happened to me again, with the friends I have now, I’m afraid I would seriously have to re-evaluate my value system and my ability to judge character in other people, especially those I feel I know well.

The only thing that really made my day bearable after waking from this dream was being able to talk about it. When I brought it up in the art channel I’ve been visiting, people were very compassionate and quick to offer me kind words. Jules, in particular, was very helpful. I talked to him for quite awhile about it, and soon I was feeling much better about my life in general. It was so comforting to have someone there who understands me and can offer me real words of encouragement. There are a lot of things that have been on my mind in the last month that have caused me a lot of uncertainty, and it just feels good to lay them all out on the table and get another person’s perspective.

So thank you so much Jules, it meant a lot to me. You’re a great person.