01

Loss or Losing Something or Someone

A lost opportunity; forgetting something which is important. Depending on the dream content might also suggest actual, or feelings about, loss of virginity; loss of health; losing a lover-partner, or whatever the lost thing depicts. If one dreams often about losing things, like handbag, car, children, it could show that the dreamer is deeply uncertain about themselves. In other words they are feeling a loss of identity, wondering where they are going in life, who they are in the present situation, or what value they have. Often such feelings often come about from losing contact with your deep feelings and passions. Without them we may feel we have no rudder, no place to head for.  See: lost; lost husband 

Dreaming about the loss of a child or partner can cause a lot of emotional pain. It helps if you can open to the emotions and feel their depth; for sometimes it feels as if a part of you has been torn out. Withholding the emotion doesn’t get rid of it; a woman in a therapy sessions burst into tears about a child she had lost 17 years previously. A neighbour hearing her cry at the time told her she should not cry and so it took 17 years to release it.

A dream of loss might also indicate being frightened of losing the control they thought they had over their life and the world. Such dreams are often about meeting some massive apparent threat, such a huge wave or creature. The dreams sometimes have great fear in them. Some dreams about losing control are about sexual relationships and how much control you have. See Meeting the Huge – Being in Control

Fear or experience of being left or losing someone? Fear of abandonment can lead to great feelings of jealousy, rage, withdrawal from everyday life and depression. The pain of losing a loved one is frequently a sign that our infant or child self is still wounded or hurt, and needs the healing of being allowed into consciousness and thereby integrated into the adult personality. See Beware of Love; Inner Baby and Child

Dreams about loss can arise through anxiety about losing friendship, or of illness creating a loss. It can also suggest that you feel unloved and unwanted. These hells and heavens we each carry within us in the form of fears such as losing the person we love are sometimes habitual attitudes such as that of feeling our partner is out to trick us; chips on our shoulder such as conflict with the society we live in or the authority figures we confront, and genuine childhood or birth traumas.

Many people have a real fear of losing their identity. People relate to this threat in two major ways. They either fight to keep control, and employ all manner of techniques such as keeping their attention focused outwardly by such things as talking, walking about, drawing, holding their breath or dancing – or they surrender to what is being experienced. To meet the parts of one’s nature that has previously been pushed into unconsciousness, one needs to surrender in some degree. If the person fights the loss of control as the new material from within is emerging, it sometimes feels as if they are disintegrating. Their body may feel as if it is changing or dying, and they are losing themselves. Such struggles arise out of the fear of losing oneself, or at least losing the sense of oneself connected with appearance, work, success, or financial standing – the loss of identity. See  Identity and dreams; Identity and Sex; Stuck in life – unable to move or grow – How do we change?

Death is often felt as a losing. The change that takes place in this experience of an inwardly felt death, may at times feel like losing everything, shedding the past, becoming completely insecure. There is not in the end a loss of anything, only a gaining that requires one to let go of the dominance of what was previously important. From this arises a feeling of wholeness and connection with the world and self in a new way. See Dreaming of Death

 Example: The other night I had a dream that my ex-boyfriend was killed in a car accident. I was mortified and became hysterical. I can only remember little bits of it now, but I do remember seeing him in his car, dead. I think I started crying in my sleep. I have been thinking a lot about him lately, before I had the dream. I’ve missed him so much and this worries me.

The woman in the example had actually parted with her boyfriend. The dream is therefore most likely an expression of her deep feelings about losing him.

 Example: My husband died over a year ago, and I live alone, no pets. Yet I dreamt I opened my front door and there was a cat waiting to be let in. It was my cat, and I knew I hadn’t fed it for ages or looked after it. I felt awful that I had neglected it for so long. The strange thing was that the next day as I walked around the supermarket, I kept wanting to go to the cat-food section to buy food. – Winnie P. – Exeter

In losing her husband Winnie has lost her source of giving and receiving affection and is feeling her need for this.

 Example: Suzanne told me my voice changed as I cried out again and again as I released the pain of losing all my children, my husband, even my parents.  My hands were clawing my legs in an effort to express the misery, and I was screaming that I could not bear to live any longer with such pain.  I cried out to God to take me, for there was nothing left for me to live for.  “Why?  Why did this happen to me?  Why has everything I loved been taken from me?”

Such an awful feeling of loss can be caused by the person having no or little connection with their core self in which there is a feeling of connection even after death. See Touching Your Core Self 

Being lost: This links with feelings of confusion, lack of direction or conflict, of not understanding what is involved in the present situation you are in. The dream environment you are lost in will define what the confusion or conflict connects with. Sometimes this lost feeling arises because there are issues or changes in your life you have not acknowledged or do not want to acknowledge.

Losing something or someone: This probably relates to feelings about a lost opportunity, something that you have forgotten that you need to remember, or the loss of an important personal quality like confidence or virginity.

Losing ones husband-wife: Often dreamt by people in middle age. It shows them fearing-exploring the possible death of their partner. It is not a prediction, only an awareness of a likely situation.

 

Useful Questions and Hints:

What did you feel was lost and what feelings were involved?

Have you recently experienced a loss in any way?

How do you deal with loss?

See Opening to Life – Self help – Martial Art of the Mind – Karma – Avoid Being Victims – Being the Person or Thing

 

Comments

-carmella 2018-04-16 18:46:26

I also dream of toilet bowls, overflowing, I have to go to the bathroom but the toilets are dirty, overflowing, disgusting.

    -Tony Crisp 2018-04-19 8:53:51

    Carmella – If the toilet is unusable because of its state, it can sometimes be a way that while asleep you desperately need to go to the toilet and yet do not want to wake up and actually go. This is a way we can manage to hold on, and is more likely a female dream – because while awake they will hold on rather than use a dirty toilet seat. The idea of going to the toilet is only unpleasant because in reality it is far nicer to stay in a comfortable warm bed. The dream maker creates the image of the dirty toilet as a reason to get up and actually go to the toilet rather than wet the bed.

    Full toilet bowl suggests a pressing need to deal with old attitudes or emotions that you cannot easily allow release in your everyday relationships, or even alone. The reason being that you might feel others will be repulsed by or judgemental about that side of you. It is certainly about inner stuff that you are trying to pass out of your life but is hanging about.

-carmella 2018-04-16 18:45:14

My sister passed away 4 years ago, we were only 10 months apart. I dream that she losses my purse, and I am very upset with her. I am yelling at her and we are trying to find it. I have this recurring dream in the last few months

    -Tony Crisp 2018-04-18 10:28:37

    Hi – It is important that you read https://dreamhawk.com/forums/index.php?topic=529.msg1472#msg1472
    Nothing can replace your own ability to understand your dream. With a little effort you can do this by practicing what is described in – http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson or http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/getting-at-your-dreams-meaning/

    Tony

    Carmella – The death of your sister has had quite an effect upon you. I gather from the dream that she was quite a support for you. At least it was good to know she was sharing life with you. The loss of your purse suggests losing your identity to some extent, what you needed to deal with daily life to get what you want.

    Maybe you do not realise that you have your sister inside you. When you think about a sister, a friend or a person you know, you are only taking in your thoughts, impressions and feelings about them. So many people do not realise that they have an inner person equally as powerful as the external person you know. You have taken in millions of bits of memory, lessons learnt, life experiences along with all the feelings or problems met by meeting or living with them, and they change you and make you the person you are. The memories and experience we gather unconsciously change us and are not lost. It is part of you and is symbolised in dreams as a person or event. Such an inner person can appear in dreams because you still carry the memories or impressions of them, and so they influenced what you hold within you.

    So sometime, instead of yelling at her for going, sit and feel her inside you and you can talk with and get replies from her because she is alive and intelligent, and can even link with the dead sister.

    All of us are much more than we suspect.

-Renee 2018-01-26 12:06:26

Just awakened from a dream. In this dream I was at the local fair, with a baby named lisa. I sat the baby down to take a picture, looked over to her and she was asleep in the baby chair. My daughter who is 30 in real life, takes my picture. I look to get the baby and she’s gone.
Strangely the missing baby is named lisa, she’s about 6-8 months. But in real life my daughter is 30.
In the beginning of the dream I had the sense I w babysitting, but as soon as I realize she was missing I yelled “lisa”. I looked around the location then woke up.

I did dream of a baby missing, but was spooked because at first it was not my child, but by the end I was calling my child’s name. However my child is grown. Never had a dream about a child/ baby.

-Ty Massey 2017-05-21 14:08:32

This was really interesting. I’ve been having this recurring dreams/nightmares every night about losing my girlfriend. In the dream she disappears, leaves me to go with someone else, or I lose her and can’t find her. It makes me so sad, especially when I wake up and she’s at work. I want it to stop. Haha

-deep 2017-03-16 7:33:09

Hello,

Yesterday I had a dream about me and my son were riding a roller coaster. I was in panic when I saw him that he wasn’t holding the seat properly, he didn’t use a seat belt.. he was in fact turned upside down and was holding himself with feets on a rope.. like in a circus. I saw my self my hands holding tight to the seat, but I couldn’t hold him.. to protect him.. I was trying to help him..than the ride begun, and after first ride I couldn’t saw him on his seat anymore.. than I woke up trying to find him..

Today I was dreaming about my deceased grandmother.. I was searching her in a dream, i even went to the police that she is missing, I kept asking where she is.. but in the back of mind I knew she already died… than I woke. up.. and light her a candle

I would really appreciate your help with analysis.

Thank you

-Anna 2017-03-09 10:44:30

I am having a recurring dream about losing my daughter’s. I have been a single mom for a year now. The dreams have different settings. At a park, in an unfamiliar neighborhood for example. I will be talking to someone else in the dream and I turn to check on girls and they are gone. I wake up and my daughter’s are asleep and where they should be. I drift back off and the dream continues.

-Cheese 2017-01-28 13:28:40

So I had a dream where I was best friends with a book character, but the only difference is that I couldn’t find him. My parents got me a cat to help deal with it, but it didn’t work out. Don’t know how it happened, but days later we found each other and we hugged and it was great but whAt just happened???

-Amber 2017-01-22 22:56:28

I dreamed of losing someone I love (a fiancee). In my dreams he died but the weird things is I don’t know the person. I can’t even remember his face. The love feels real though. I was crying in my sleep until I woke up. I can still feel the pain. My heart is hurt.

Thank you so much.

-Danny 2016-07-31 11:34:26

I always have this same dream my wife who I’m still with and is alive but In my nightmares dreams she is always missing in the end…. this helps me understand better thank you

-Airene 2016-07-21 1:45:18

Thank you for the amazing description of dreams. These few days I have been having horrible dreams. I was walking on the side walk, and this girl, was spitting harsh remarks on the others because they were gay. Calling them disgusting and stuff. I couldn’t walk out, I was hiding behind a bush, scared that I would get mocked at if I went out. All of a sudden, I saw this Korean singer, my favorite Korean singer, she picked up a trash can lid, it was made of metal, and smacked the girl who was mocking the gays walking on the streets, it wasn’t just one gay person, it was a hole line of them. Then I woke up.

Another time I had a dream that I was in a school trip, we stopped at bus stop kind of place and ate. After eating I went out go back in the bus, but all of a sudden my mom appeared, she was running away into an elderly shelter. I rushed to her to grab her out. I asked her “Why are you doing this?” She replied, “You don’t care about me, why should I continue living with you.” As she struggle trying to break my hold on her. During the period of having this dream, I had an argument with her we haven’t talked for over 2 weeks now.

This other dream the next day, I came back from some place, which I don’t remember and this American guy was in front of our house, we squished in trying to get to our front door (we live in an apartment) as we were trying to squish in he said “Damn these asians.” And I was the only one who spoke English in my family so I understood exactly what he meant. Turns out he lives in an apartment just 2 houses from ours. After I got in, my parents decided to visit their friend’s house which was 4 houses away. As they were out, I got up to lock the doors, but this American guy called over his friends, some very young, some his age, around 18 year old, and the came to me. I was slow in locking the doors and they tried to come in, so i held onto the door not letting any of them in. The main American guy asked, “Score?” So i immediately asked “What score?” He said, “My score so I can get in and f$$$ you.” I immediately scream for my dad since i knew he was just a few houses away, but he didn’t hear. All of a sudden 2 of my friends (who I was not close with, just some classmates) I called onto them to call my dad who was in her house. I kept screaming but to no avail no one heard. Until this other friend appear, I screamed for the friend who was closer to me to tell the other friend to call my dad. Immediately she ran to tell the other friend and she called my dad. He came runnning outside and pulled all of the guys out of the front door (around 8 of them) and I woke up.

And just a few moments ago, I had another nightmare again. Because of this dream I decided to check this website out. So I know a friend from Twitter. We’re from the same country but I have never met her in real life, only saw how she looks like in pictures. This friend and a couple of others appeared in my dream. I don’t know how it all started but we were trying to go into this hole for i dont know what reason. We went into that hole a couple of times and we were out safely, but this time an explosion occur, we all tried to quickly crawl out as fast as possible but it didn’t work. Me, the person at the farthest back, I was closer to the opening of the hole so I got out safely. Some others did too, some died at the scene, some go their heads cut off. It was horrible. I immediately went to my twitter friend, she was unconscious, but still breathing. I kneeled beside her and started crying. It wasn’t any sort of just crying, I was hitting the floor, praying, crying, and basically about to go crazy. But I was only crying for this twitter friend. She gain consciousness and I took her back home. The next day, I visited her house with my other friends who survived. We were all the ones who planned on going into that hole, but it was mostly me, I planned on going into that hole. I realized that, after the explosion, seeing her laying on her back, her neck seemed broken, but she was still breathing. I realized that I didn’t take her to the hospital instead. Fear crept into me as I sat in the living room of her house. An alarm went off, it was her phone’s alarm, no one turned it off. I started crying again, the alarm went off, again and aagain, no one turned it off. Her parents came, asking why she isnt turning her alarm off. We explained it to them. All of a sudden, time fastforward and I was in a forest with a bunch of friends. We were playing this game similar to a korean show called “Running Man” where u r given a mission and u had to accomplish it before anyone tried to take eliminate u in any way it stated in the mission card. I don’t remember what the mission was. But I found myself running, finding stuff, hiding them so no one would try to steal it from me. I was put with a partner who was doing the same thing. It went from forest to some old city. I can’t really describe what happened later on because it was so messy, I myself didn’t know what was happening.

I had all these dreams in a matter of one week. I am 16 and I am really scared and confused, please do reply. Thank you so much.

    -Anna - Tony's Assistant 2016-07-25 9:48:48

    Dear Airene – Being an adolescent can be quite challenging at times and I trust that reading and working with this book can help you too to move through this process with less fear and confusion; http://mindfulnessforteens.com/the-mindful-teen/reviews-of-the-mindful-teen/
    You can also order it by amazon.com and they ship to Cambodia too.
    I do not feel it is helpful at this point to address all aspects of your dreams, because growing up to living the best you can be is a “one step at a time process”.
    Nightmares are part of the process and may also be an attempt to heal you from attitudes that are standing in the way of feeling a whole human being.
    Feeling a whole human being means that you can accept and integrate every aspect of yourself and this will lead to accepting these in others too; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/whole-2/
    Those aspects that you cannot accept yet are also called your Shadow;
    //dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/the-archetype-of-the-shadow/
    So your dream about a girl “spitting harsh remarks on the others because they were gay”
    may reflect that you find it difficult to accept the thought of feeling sexually attracted to another woman.
    This attraction does not mean you have to act upon it, although you could explore it of course.
    Another aspect that you may not like about yourself is your being Asian and/or living and expressing parts of the Asian culture; “Damn these Asians.”
    Becoming aware of your Shadow in your waking life by looking at what you loathe in others without judging yourself in any way may bring a change of mind.
    You can explore the symbol of the girl in your first dream by using http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson
    Please recognise that you have an inner life that is probably more important than your outer waking life. So please read http://dreamhawk.com/inner-life/inner-world/#MakesInner
    Let me know if you have any questions so far Airene.
    Anna 🙂

-Charles Carson Grandmaison 2016-05-29 10:54:00

After having a loss dream of gals the past three nights due to a friend getting married. I found this web page and read it. It really hellped. Thank you for having this web site available. I book marked it for future reference, as I am sure this wont be the last of this kind of need.

Cheers

-Brianna Brading 2016-05-22 16:03:01

Hey, thanks for posting this up. I usually don’t really ever think about my dreams but when I woke up from this on I just had to search about it.

I was in the dream and I have this baby bear, it reminds me a lot about brother bear. But this bear and I were really close and I could speak to him. I ran from my step brother and sister to be able to take care of him in the dream.
But all was going good until this girl named Harley, I don’t know why I remember the actually name of this woman, but she was bad news because she wanted to take my bear away from me and kill him for his fur.
So I told him to hide, once I made sure he was hidden, I ran up to my grandmother’s house where my mother was, (again this was really weird to me) and I told my mother about the woman being bad.
The girl Harley to my mom was her bestfriend, and when I told her she had to make her go away, she got really mad at me and yelled.
So I ran back to my bear friend, and Im pretty sure his name was Koda like in the brother bear movie.

But when I got back to find him he was gone. I screamed and yelled for his name but I got no response. I searched for him and finally I went back to the house and was very, very mad.
I asked my mom where the woman was and she said she was out doing something and so I went to my mom and I took the woman’s phone and snapped it in half. Then I took her random scrabble pieces that she loved and threw them outside. When I tried to get her favorite cover, my mother took it from me and wouldn’t let me have it.
I can’t remember every detail but when I was finally,about to take it back from her, I torn it up and threw it outside.
My mother did nothing but said she was in jail. So I called her in the jail with this weird looking phone that only had three buttons, which were 1, 2 and 3. When I asked my mom for the number she said it was 666, and somehow typed it in. (again I’m confused about why and how that happened.)
But Harley wouldn’t answer me so when I finally told my mom and grandmother why I was so frantic and angry at her. They understood and we all went outside looking for Koda.
I screamed his name out but got no response. I live across from my grandmother’s house, and we live in the country so both of our driveways were pretty long.
But I kept screaming and looking for him, I was also crying in the dream. But when I reached the end of the drive way I woke up.

Now I’m not even sure if anyone will read this and help me out on the matter.

But when I woke up I felt so sad and confused. I wanted to find Koda and wanted to hurt the other female named Harley.

And here are some details to help you understand somethings.
I am 15 years old and I don’t have a boyfriend so I wouldn’t get jealous over another girl.
I live in the country and I live across from my grandma’s house.
It’s very strange that my mom was at my grandma’s house.
My mom is a laid back kind of person who choses her boyfriends over me, ( think this will help somewhat)
My step brother is now 18, me and him have always been very close. But he got into a car wreck this year and he is getting a huge check. But when he does I know he is moving out. And that makes me sad.
I haven’t watched the brother bear movie in a while so I don’t know why I would be dreaming about it.

When I woke up, I went straight to my phone and started searching what my dream meant and I am still kind of confused about all of it.

Please help me, I am so confused and lost.

    -Anna - Tony's Assistant 2016-05-26 18:41:36

    Dear Brianna – Your dream reflects a part of your inner growth process; you are moving from teen into adulthood.
    See also http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/teenage-girl%E2%80%99s-love-dreams/
    What you may have taken with you into your dream is your belief that when you grow up you have to kill the “baby bear” and this is the cause for all the conflict in your dream and for Koda hiding and not showing up anymore.
    Koda may reflect your helpful inner voice that shows you the way, as Koda did in the movie Brother Bear.
    A way to connect with your inner Koda could be to use http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson
    When you use your imagination to give your inner bear a safe place in your inner world, you do not have to put your inner Harley in jail and you do not have to fight with your inner mother.
    Each of your inner parts can have its own place and express their desires and inner qualities in their own way.
    I like to introduce a book to you that can help you deal with feeling confused and lost; it is called Mindfulness for Teens; http://mindfulnessforteens.com/the-mindful-teen/reviews-of-the-mindful-teen/
    Does this give you a start?
    Anna 🙂

-Gurman Singh Rathor 2015-10-22 1:49:28

I had a dream of losing my grand mother a month before I lost and then a few months I had a dream of losing my mom but when I woke up I walked down stairs she was there. I don’t know what’s going on but my dreams could represent the future. All I know is that I’m afraid of losing another family member.

-Little Tree 2015-08-24 15:35:51

Thank you for your wonderful site! I’ve just awoken from the worst of three recurring dreams, had over the past three months or so: I was running around a hotel where our room door was left wide open, and all our pets (4 cats and 3 dogs in real life) have disappeared. All the other rooms are wide open, an array of strangers in them, but also in the rooms – under beds, in closets, on counters – and lining the halls are hundreds/ thousands of cats. Many look like ours but aren’t. Of course I was frantic, calling out our cats’ names, crying; however, an added twist is that I have also found sweet, purring, beautiful (spiritually) kittens and/or cats (depending on which dream) that I’ve immediately loved and carry with me while I’m searching. Eventually, as my search gets more panicky and fears build that I won’t be able to find my babies (I only have animals, no children), I lose the added loving kitty I’d fallen in love with and can’t find that being either. When I awoke, I sobbed (really keene: doubled-over with grief) for the loss for 20 minutes. I’m in perimenopause and have many pain/inflammatory issues, and I’ve recently been thinking about childhood abuse. Do those factor into these horrible dreams? And in the past I’ve managed a bit of lucid dreaming. Can we break into these awful dreams to escape them? Should we try to escape them? Thank you so much…Antonia “Little Tree”

Copyright © 1999-2010 Tony Crisp | All rights reserved