Do you remember your dreams? I tend to go in spurts when it comes to remembering my dreams. I'll remember vivid details about dreams for days or even weeks on end, and then I won't recall a single dream for weeks at a time. Lately, I've been remembering every detail of my dreams. Last night, I had a recurring dream. Maybe some of you have had this same one?I dreamt that I needed to pee, but I couldn't find a bathroom anywhere. Everywhere I went, the bathrooms were full and people were waiting to use them. At one point, my friend Julie and I met another mutual friend's mom. For some reason, she was a little old lady (in real life, she is not a little old lady). This sweet, little old lady looked like she should be baking or knitting or sitting in a rocking chair with a shawl about her shoulders regaling the younguns with tales from days of yore. Instead, she sat at a table talking to us and dropping f-bombs that shocked the heck out of me and Julie. She told me it was good I was getting divorced so I could marry Doug. (I have no idea who Doug is in real life.) Just an aside here - no, I didn't have pizza, pickles, and ice cream before bed. I have no idea where this stuff comes from.
We decided we'd better get up and use the bathroom before beginning our long drive. I have no idea where we were going, but I know it was going to take a long time to get there. I couldn't find an open bathroom though. I walked in a stall, but the toilet was missing. There were people standing in lines and blocking the other stalls.
Then I saw Jonathan Merkh, the vice president of Howard Books and for some reason, I wanted to avoid him, so I ducked behind a potted plant. (Sorry Jonathan, I would never avoid you in real life. I can't control Dream Dawn.) Then I found a bathroom but the door wouldn't lock and there were tons of people standing around outside the door because there was a party going on. A girl told me that it cost $2001 to use that bathroom. I didn't believe her so I checked the price list and discovered that you could also tan in the bathroom for as little as $5.
The same girl told me that people behind a two-way mirror would make a videotape of me while I was in the bathroom. I turned around to check and see if there was indeed a two-way mirror in the bathroom. Not that I really cared, mind you. I mean, I really had to go! But when I turned around to see the mirror, I noticed there was a bed in the bathroom and a coat and three Greek fisherman caps had been left on it. I found it strange that people had left their coat and hats behind. (Yeah, it didn't phase me that it cost thousands of dollars to use the bathroom, or that people hung out behind a two-way mirror in the bathroom, or that there was a bed in the bathroom. The only strange thing was that there was a coat and a couple hats there.)
Next thing I know, I'm in the hallway of a school and it's filled with all these school desks. I saw a sign for a bathroom, but the desks were blocking the door. I pushed my way between the desks and saw Jonathan again. I quickly turned the other way so he wouldn't see me. My friend Doreen called to me. She was sitting at one of the desks. I told her I was trying to get to the bathroom, but she informed me it wasn't a bathroom. (I'll show her! It's MY dream and if I want it to be a bathroom, then it'll be a bathroom!) I didn't believe her and continued to move toward it. There were tons of drawings taped to the wall and covering the door of the bathroom, so I started pulling them off. After moving the drawings, I saw that the sign didn't say "bathroom" after all. It said, "damaged water slide" and there was just a hole in the wall and not a door to a bathroom.
This is the point when my alarm clock went off. I woke up and immediately thought, "OH MY GOSH I HAVE TO PEE!" I don't know how I made it to the bathroom in time! This is not the first time I've had a dream like this. In fact, every time I have a dream in which I have to pee, I can't find a bathroom, or all the bathrooms are out of toilet paper, or have broken doors. Then I wake up and really, really have to go! I feel so frustrated in my dreams that I can't find a darn bathroom, but I guess I should be thankful. What would ever happen if I found a perfectly acceptable, functioning bathroom in my dream? I'd probably relieve myself in bed! Oh ew! I guess it's a good thing that I go on an all-night quest for a working commode after all.
Too funny! No wonder you're such a talented writer, with dreams like that! And yes, I have been on the same "dream-quest" for a bathroom, just not quite as exciting as yours.
ReplyDeleteOnce, (as a child mind you) I woke up after one of these dreams when I did find a toilet, only to discover I was really sitting on a chair in the bathroom, thinking it was the toilet. Oops! Wrong seat! "Mommmmmmmm!" I remember wailing..... lucky for me, she cleaned up the mess. What a great mom I have.
Damn. Now you've made me want to pee!
ReplyDeleteHahaha, thanks Dawn! I thought I was the only one who had the 'needing to pee but can't find a bathroom' dreams! Or you find one and go but then 5 mins later you really need to go again and because you can't find the previous one, the the search starts all over again!
ReplyDeleteHahaha, very funny. :D
ReplyDeleteI have totally had dreams like this! Sometimes I'll be wandering around somewhere and I'll find a bathroom and use it, but then as soon as I'm out, I'll have to pee again and have to look for another bathroom, but often it's like the one you described where every time I find a bathroom there's something bizarrely wrong with it, so I can't use it.
ReplyDeleteOhmygosh! I have dreams like that, too. And, I HAVE found a toilet in my dream and yes, if I don't wake up I've been known to relieve myself (just a little) in the bed. Talk about humiliating! *facepalm*
ReplyDeleteI have always had very vivid dreams. I used to entertain my mom over breakfast about whatever it was I had dreamed about. Sometimes they are so real I don't know if it is a dream or not until something weird happens.
ReplyDeleteI long ago trained myself to wake up if I have a looking for the bathroom dream, because that is the signal that I have to go. Still, I have had many of these looking for the bathroom dreams and encounter similar obstacles.
Oh boy, I share your pain, I have had those dreams, looking and looking for a loo and not being able to find one, only to wake up and have to go to the toilet RIGHT NOW.
ReplyDeleteMine is always asthma. My asthma really isn't bad except for a couple times a year. But if I start wheezing in my sleep, it goes into my dreams. And I spend hours, it feels like, trying to find an inhaler in the strangest places and never finding it. Sometimes I recongnize I'm in a dream but all I keep telling myself, as I'm still searching for an inhaler, is eventually I'll get it. Drives me insnane when it happens...cuz then you've gotten no sleep because you just spent 30 minutes of dream life running around like a maniac.
ReplyDeleteLOL - great dream. Did you happen to see the comic Close to Home (www.closetohome.com) for Friday, February 26th? I think you can relate.
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad to know I'm not the only one that has stupid pee dreams when I need to wake up and go. In my dreams, though, I eventually find a weird bathroom to use and go and go and go forever. Luckily I've never woken up wet!
ReplyDeletetoo funny! i thought your dream was going to end with you finding a bathroom and the horrible real-life details, so i'm relieved that you didn't. haha! ;)
ReplyDeleteYou crack me up!! I never remember my dreams. BTW I saw your tweets and wanted to say that there IS a Barbie dog that poops. In fact the same poop is also the food. Quite disturbing. My daughter has it, but thankfully we "lost" the poop/food. Where do these people come up with these things? :)
ReplyDeleteIsn't it funny how your brain works in dreams? You accept the craziest things, yet when something normal in comparison pops up, you are shocked!
ReplyDeleteThis was so funny! :)
I have the searching for a bathroom/have to pee but can't dreams fairly often. Once in college, I had the have to pee but can't dream, but in the end of the dream I could pee! It was so wonderful! Until I woke up and realized I wet the bed. Explain that to your roommate. I blamed it on a bladder infection.
ReplyDeleteI have a SSO question. Dear son has lost his last tooth. What do people do with their kids' teeth? Throwing them away seems callous. I worked hard to build those teeth. Saving them is also gross. When I come across that baggie with the dead teeth, I get a little chill. What have you done with them Dawn?
ReplyDeleteI remember as a kid I used to dream I had got up and gone to the toilet and it was so vivid I really thought I was doing it, I wet the bed so many times (I did mention I was a kid yes??) So eventually my mum and dad clocked that if they took me to the toilet before they went to bed it wouldn't happen, problem solved!
ReplyDeleteI've started having the same dreams now though, not sure Boyfriend would be too pleased if I wet the bed now!!
LOL, I"ve had that dream too, although I don't think I ever found Greek fisherman caps, lol.
ReplyDeleteWhen I awake I have to pee really bad too. I think it happens to all of us at one time or another.
Once upon a time I thought you were nuts. Now I know for sure!
ReplyDeleteI'll save you a seat for lunch at the cafeteria. They usually let me out of my room around 11:45.
My dreams are ALWAYS very vivid and in full color. Usually with a soundtrack. And I almost always remember them.
ReplyDeleteMy Youngest Boy recently told me that he had a dream..."But, Mommy, everyone was wearing black and white!" I find it strange that a child who has never even heard of black and white TV dreams in black and white...
I have peeing dreams a lot. I cannot find a real toilet... they don't have bowls or something weird. And it will be the same kind of place where there are showers and dysfunctional toilets. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one who has those kinds of dreams. It helps if I don't drink much before bed so I don't deep sleep with a full bladder! :)
ReplyDeleteI think it's hilarious how disjointed dreams are and your (editorial) rationale of how perfectly weird things become acceptable. And just a final thought here, what if you weren't dreaming all night but had this complicated, long dream only a minute before you woke up. The brain is amazing...
ReplyDeletemy mom has always had similar recurring dreams, except in hers, there are people watching her go to the bathroom in some way. either the bathroom is located in a crowded room or there's no door, or some variation of this.
ReplyDeleteGee, I thought I'd leave an original comment, like "Wow--I thought I was the only one with dreams like that!" or "I'm staying anonymous with this comment because I'm confessing that once, in a dream, I DID find a toilet and wet the bed, and I was 18 years old," but it turns out, like with everything else, I'm not alone. LOL THANK YOU!!! (And like one of the others commented, I've "trained" myself to wake up if I start looking for toilets in my dreams. Sometimes it takes longer than other times, but eventually, a voice will say something along the lines of "This is a dream--wake up and use the toilet." And sometimes in the night, when I do really go, it takes awhile to convince myself that I AM awake and I really AM sitting on the toilet...)
ReplyDeleteHi Dawn!
ReplyDeleteI always have long, complicated dreams, and usually 2 or 3 a night. And I remember them. Sigh. Sometimes I wake up exhausted from all the dreaming.
My "having to find a bathroom dreams" are a lot like yours (with no Greek fisherman caps. Yet.)except invariably one dream sequence involving a house that has the only toilet right out in the middle of the living room and there's a party going on.
I read somewhere once that dreaming is so important to brain function that we'll stay asleep even when other stimuli should wake us up, such as a full bladder or light shining in our faces. That's why we incorporate the stimuli into our dreams somehow.
By the way, when I divorced my first husband, I had recurring dreams (nightmares) for years about having remarried him and needing to find a way to divorce him again. Eventually, I worked through all of that because the dreams changed over time until we were just engaged again and I had to find a way to end that. The last dream of this type involved me not even considering going out with him and telling him to get lost. Whew! I was sure glad when those dreams were over!
Sandy in Tucson
HAHAHA! I have had that dream many times! When I was younger, like 8, I used to have that dream ALL the time. The problem is... I ALWAYS found the toilet... if ya know what I mean.
ReplyDeleteNow I have that dream, and though it's frustrating, I thankfully DO NO find the toilet!
That's just crazy! Entertaining for the rest of us...but crazy all the same!
ReplyDeleteI have those dreams all the time, too. Mine usually involve finding a bathroom, but it has no door and there are alot of people around.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad I'm not alone with these dreams!!
Donna in PA :)
Ah, dreams....everybody can relate. And yes, if you do find a bathroom in your dream (what a relief after all that searching!), you will pee in the bed. Not that that has ever happened to me!!..LOL
ReplyDeleteLOL...isn't it funny what happens in our dreams? Thanks for sharing & for the laugh!
ReplyDeleteI always thought I was the only one with "pee" dreams - glad to find I'm in such good company. I remember when I was a child dreaming that I was a fireman and somebody said, "Turn on the water!" So I did!
ReplyDeleteI have a blog that links to dreams that are well-described and translate into words what dreams are really like. I hope you don't mind that I linked to you.
ReplyDeleteI have weird bathroom dreams whenever I have to pee, too. In the last one I had I did find a bathroom but the toilets were hooked together like love seats and they were sitting out in the middle of a big room where two little ladies were sitting under hair dryers gossiping and people were shooting pool at a big pool table. Good thing I can't pee in a crowded room or I'd have probably wet the bed, too.
ReplyDeleteYep, I dream about having to pee when I really do need to. But more disturbing (I think) is that last night I dreamed that I was close to my daughter's guinea pig and it sat up (more like a ferret) and said "I'm going to spank your bottom" in a cute little voice. WHAT!?! Then I proceeded to find out what all it could say. Not sure if it bothers me more that the gp could talk or the choice of opening sentence. ;)
ReplyDeleteSSO Question:
ReplyDeleteDid I miss something? Are you getting a divorce? :/
OK so I've had the same dream for years, needing to go can't find one working, unoccupied, etc. Waking up barely making it to the one in my bedroom but beware, at 48 years old and evidently in a very deep sleep once, just once this past summer I WET THE BED! Believe me now I am extra sensitive and get up and go every time I wake up during the night. Glad I'm not alone.
ReplyDeleteThat happens to me too! Though most of the time my dreams consist of me trying to figure out exactly what the name of something is. Or else I make up some crazy name for something in my dream and then I spend the rest of the dream trying to remember what it was. It's very frustrating.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, what differentiates a Greek fisherman cap from a regular one?
Yep, that's EXACTLY what would happen! You can pretty much take it as given that whenever you start dreaming about pee (even if you can't find a toilet!), it's your body trying to desperately wake you!
ReplyDeleteGood thing that alarm went off when it did.... :D
I wonder if my Sweetie was dreaming about the allusive bathroom when he decided to wet the bed right after we got married? He's still embarrassed to this day.
ReplyDeletelol, I have had that dream 2 times before. except I found the bathroom. very nice bathrooms, in fact. one had a fur toilet seat. (??? don't ask me, it was a dream)
ReplyDeleteanyways, what happens when you have this need to pee dream and you find a dream toilet? you pee the bed. now i have my brain trained that if I am looking for a bathroom while asleep, I also need to hit myself in the head so that I wake up and make it to my normal, non fur lined toilet seat in time.
So did you spend the extra $5 to get the tan?
ReplyDeleteOMG! I have those needing to pee dreams too and am so happy to see other people have them too! I usually wake up and go pee after I've had enough of the dreams. Man I thought it was just me, this is a releif. LOL
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh you'll love dreammoods.com I used to go on there when I was having awkward dreams of cleaning, yet waking up to the same mess!
ReplyDeleteThis is what it says:
To see urine in your dream, represents the feelings you have rejected.
To dream that you are urinating, symbolizes a cleansing and release of negative or repressed emotions. Depending on your dream context, urination is symbolic of having or lacking basic control of your life.
To dream that you are urinating in public, symbolizes a lack of privacy in your affairs or your need to make a public apology or confession.
Dawn--I always have dreams like that! Usually, I find a bathroom, but they're filthy as all get out, open to the public (i.e. they'll be in the corner of the restaurant where everyone can see you), there's no toilet paper, or the roll of paper is completely soaking wet. And yes, whenever I wake up, I need to make a beeline for the bathroom (and thank the heavens I didn't wet the bed!!)
ReplyDeleteGah!! You're lucky you didn't pee in your bed! :)
ReplyDeleteI once had a dream where I was trying to find a toilet and eventually found one and it was sweet relief to actually go.... until I woke up and it was real!! I was about 21 at the time, and it was the only time I'd ever peeed in bed since I was a little kid .. and I was *mortified*!!
Nowadays I'm slightly paranoid about dreaming about peeing..!
I have dreams like that all the time and wake up having to really pee! The bathrooms are always co-ed and the stalls don't have doors, but no one else cares. Or the toilets are like the chairs at the hair salon, but with a hole in it.
ReplyDeleteI am SO glad to know I am not the only one!
Jen in CA
Yeah I have those dreams too...though I always find a bathroom, and I have never wet the bed. Sometimes in the dreams, I end up wetting myself, but still not ending up wetting the bed when I wake up! But, then again, I haven't had much life yet...just 14 and a half years, plenty of time to end up wetting the bed.
ReplyDelete