A terrible nightmare

I had a terrible nightmare a couple of nights ago. It was so realistic that I couldn't really shake it off, even once I was awake.

I dreamed that I was lying in bed, with David's arm around me. I was wearing the same blue pajamas that I was actually wearing that night. I dreamed I woke up with a start and heard William crying from his room across the hall, and I started to get up. Then I heard a strange man's voice, talking loudly and harshly. I heard William's cries escalate, and heard some banging around, and I realized that someone was taking him from his crib. Someone was kidnapping my son! As I tried to struggle up from the bed, David held me back, whispering that maybe it was someone taking someone else's baby, not ours. I struggled against him, and my heart was beating so fast that it felt like it might burst up out of my throat. No, no, no!

Then I woke up for real. Only when I awoke, it was almost exactly like waking up in that dream, with the pajamas and David's arm. And I wasn't sure it was real. I rolled over on my side, breathing like a sprinter who had just finished a major race. I got up to go to the bathroom, and then, just because the nightmare was so real, I went in to check on the baby. William was just fine, of course. He was in his crib, and he had his arms thrown out to the sides in his regular deep-sleep pose. I stood there and watched his chest rise and fall for a few minutes and tried to reassure myself that he was right there, right in front of me, safe and sound and asleep.

I was sort of afraid to go back to bed and fall asleep again, afraid that I would sink back into the abyss of that nightmare again. I guess I'm just terrified of something happening to my little boy, and the fear has permeated my subconscious.

Luckily, the nightmare didn't come back. But it was yet another reminder of how protective I am of that precious little guy, the chubby little one in light blue choo choo train pajamas who wriggles in delight when his mom or dad picks him up from his crib in the morning. I wonder if the nightmare is partially a result of how affected I was by that photograph that I wrote about a few days ago--and the prospect of being forcibly separated from my child. Or maybe it's a common new parent fear. I don't know. But I do know that it's like having part of my heart outside my body, having William out there without me.