Dreams of an Abusive Relationship. Why Can’t I Walk Away From This?

Reader’s Question

I grew up in a very abusive, dysfunctional family. My mother is schizophrenic. My father never really lived with us for longer than a few months at a time. At 13, I met a young man 5 years my senior. We were together until I was 21. At that time he was a good man, protecting me when I could not do so myself. He was everything to me. Then one day, I realized that, in spite of how I much I loved him, I did not want to wake up when I was 50 and regret being with someone I could not trust. In spite of how sweet he could be, he was also very manipulative and somewhat psychologically abusive. He was a liar, a cheat, he smoked marijuana (I never have), was completely amoral, put me second to others, and always thought the grass was greener on the other side. Leaving him cost me dearly. I felt I was ripping my own heart out, but eventually managed to extricate myself (hurting others in the process, unfortunately).

I am now 37, have been happily married for 7 years and, yet, have on several occasions dreamt of my childhood love. I do not consciously think of him, yet I have dreamt of him on three occasions; once his mother was with me. Why can I not just walk away from this?

Thanks in advance.
–Very disturbed

Our Consulting Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

You have successfully walked away from this childhood love…but your memories remain. The issue involved is called “Emotional Memory (EM)”. When we are involved in emotional events, the brain remembers not only the details of the event but the emotions as well. From that point on, anytime a memory of that experience (or groups of experiences) is triggered by a song, similar event, name, smell, etc. — the details and the emotions we felt at the time return. You can read more on Emotional Memory in an article I’ve written on this website by that name.

While you may not consciously think of him, memories are triggered by events in our daily life that are out of our control. For example: Where did you attend high school? If you instantly remembered, then I’ve triggered a high school memory in your brain and you couldn’t prevent it. In this same way, it’s not uncommon for events during the day to trigger childhood memories, and guess who is there? Your childhood love! The brain then uses daily events — and memories we’ve used during the day — as topics for dreaming that night. It doesn’t mean anything important, only that we always have the capacity to dream about anything in our past.

There is another issue. If you’ve been stressed lately, or moderately depressed, the brain does tend to torment us with old, bad memories during that time. If you ask an egotistical person why they are so great, they’ll list a group of positive things they’ve done. Depressed folks do the same, only listing memories of mistakes and bad relationships. Under times of stress, we often think about our worst experiences.

In real life, you have survived your childhood and your first love. You have a new life…but that doesn’t mean that our past memories are suddenly erased. They will still creep in from time to time, usually triggered by something in our daily life. Allow them to pass through, laugh and remind yourself that those are memories from your “years of hell”, and continue about your business.