Nagging Doubt is Dealt a Blow

Over the past several months a voice in my head has been asking: do you really want to get married? I think I may have found the answer in a dream that I had over Thanksgiving weekend. Actually, it turned out to be a nightmare.

The dream starts out with me and my fiance lying in bed in the morning. I begin to describe to him a sexual fantasy. (This is significant, because while we have a satisfying sex life, I still have trouble letting go of my insecurities and being honest with him about how much of a slut I really am. I figure my omission leaves us room to grow in the future.) So anyways, as I'm describing to him this fantasy, he suddenly sits back in disgust. He looks at me like he doesn't know who I am, as if he never thought I would be into what I described.

At that same moment he gets up and starts dressing and packing his things. He starts acting very distant, and basically tells me that he doesn't want to get married. He explains that his Dad has been sent to prison, and so he is going to move into his Dad's house. He doesn't say much; doesn't really explain himself. He simply walks out and makes it clear in so many words that he's leaving me.

What's important about this dream isn't that he has rejected me, it's my reaction. At first all I can think about is how my Dad just put a non-refundable $5000 dollar deposit on the wedding location. I tell myself, "I'll pay you back Dad, every penny." Then it starts to sink in, he's leaving me and doesn't want to marry me. I can remember my thoughts very clearly. I think, "Shouldn't I be relieved? I get to be single now! I get to have first dates, first kisses, and sex with other boys!" But I don't feel any sense of relief. I am crying. I can feel a crushing pain in my chest, and I feel like my life is over. And then I keep repeating to myself, "Of course you aren't relieved. Who cares about fucking other guys when I love HIM. I don't want anyone else. I love HIM. He's the one I want to be with." And so the dream ends with this feeling of despair and hopelessness about my future, because I know that I can't get him back.

It was the kind of dream that still seemed real once I woke up, even though he was lying there next to me sound asleep. My despair turned to anger at his cruel behavior, and I imagined myself pulling a Lucy Ricardo and hitting him with the pillow in an irrational fury. After comtemplating the dream for a few hours (due to the fact that it was so closely tied to my current fears about my sex life and our relationship) I was grateful for having it. How else would I have been able to deal with my fear of getting married without actually breaking up? I was able to experience how I would feel if he left me; it seemed that real.

I know that in the end it was still just a dream, but it was so vivid and so correlated to my current insecurities that I can't help but consider it a sign. (Although, duh, that's where dreams come from.) Maybe I'm reading the sign wrong; maybe I should be focusing on the fact that he rejected my true sexual self in the dream. Maybe this means I was better off single in the end. And maybe my reaction was more about the fact that he dumped me, which always hurts, even if the relationship is doomed. I'm going to stop over-analyzing and go kiss my gorgeous fiance.