DREAMCATCHER : I'm attacked by a gang of zombies

Barry’s Dream:

My wife and I were travelling by car to see a friend. We stopped at a service station but when we were about to set off again the car wouldn’t start.

I called another friend for help and he appeared with a moped aNd told me to drive to Stoke for a part. There was only one crash helmet and I was going to drive on my own. However, my wife insisted on coming with me and wearing the crash helmet.

We got on the bike. The wife, two young sons and the mother-in-law appeared, all with crash helmets! At the time of travelling I was worried about being stopped by the police for not wearing a helmet, but didn’t see any.

We arrived in Stoke and I was trying to find the place to get the part and also to meet up with the friend we were travelling to see. I followed the traffic and ended up driving straight into a police station. I tried to leave without being noticed but an older Bobby came over and told me to wait outside.

We sat at a pavement cafe and had a pleasant coffee with the officer who told me that he understood why I was driving without a crash helmet but that he would have to report me for the offence. He then sent me on my way to the garage, informing me that it was in a bad area of town and to be careful.

As we drove around the corner I immediately got a sense of foreboding. There were several gangs of people, I did my best to avoid them but we ended up in some tunnels with a fork ahead.

A gang was in the left hand fork and so I tried to drive up the right one. Another gang appeared from the shadows and I realised they were moving like zombies.

I stopped the bike and told the family to run back the way we had entered. I then swerved around and tried to go up the left fork but became overwhelmed by the gang of zombies.

At this point I woke up.

Dream Analysis:

This dream starts and finishes with the same theme, which suggests that the problem still remains. The dreamer is trying to confront or resolve something in his life but is struggling and is flagging, tired of the effort required.

Driving a vehicle in a dream represents the drive to confront a problem. However, he breaks down while attempting to do so, which is a symbolic way of representing tiredness the journey is creating.

Part of the problem is the responsibility he feels to protect others from the potential harm that could occur and the vulnerability he himself is left feeling, represented by the image of himself as the only person without headgear. The dreamer has sought help to resolve this problem and has received some basic support, but this is insufficient to manage his fears as they return. This is represented by images of being overwhelming by attacking zombies at the end of the dream.

Although the dreamer is anxious over the sense of accountability that remains, at the same time he is drawn toward needing to be accountabl,e hoping to have the opportunity to reveal his fears but in a non-threatening way.

He feels self protective as he tries to find a way forward and continues to avoid real or perceived threats to his emotional stability. However, he can’t escape his fears and it has started to affect his ‘sense of self’.

Currently, he has ‘stopped and gone backwards’, which is an attempt to face his fears represented in the dream by his behaviour towards the zombies, but by this time he is feeling overwhelmed.

If the dreamer would like to provide feedback about the interpretation, please send it to ACDreamcatchers@mail.com.

Interestingly, we have found it is not always possible to interpret your own dream, probably because it often represents the sublimation of feelings or thoughts that we are trying to avoid in our waking lives. However, with a little assistance from the dream interpreter, the symbols and themes can start to make sense and help us to move forward.

If you are interested in having a particular dream analysed, please send us an account of your dream to the following email address: ACDreamcatchers@mail.com

We only have space to interpret one dream a week which will be selected from those received. Please refer to the guidance provided to describe your dream as this will enable us to provide a full interpretation.

Guidance for the Dreamer:

• Record your dream in writing as soon as you wake up with as much detail as possible.

• First of all ask yourself who is in the dream.

• Where are you, what is happening to you and what is happening around you?

• Record how you are feeling about what you and/or others are doing.

• Are there particular symbols or objects in the dream that are unusual?

• Are there any sounds and is the dream in colour or black and white?

• Are you watching yourself in the dream or are you experiencing it first-hand ie: through your own eyes.

Alex Hossack and Catherine Aubrey are Public Service professionals with years of experience as practitioners and managers in the Criminal Justice System.