A Dream About A Husband Stabbing the Dog-Baby

This is what I dreamt last night:

My husband, Matt, had a stack of knives (maybe 12?) and he wanted to show me that he could stick them in our little dog Valerie, without hurting her. He said he could stab her with each knife, leaving them all sticking out of her, and not hit a single organ. I don't know why he wanted to show me, but he was acting really impressed with himself, like he was going to show me this cool trick and I'd be really blown away by it.

I thought it was a terrible idea. I tried to tell him that Valerie is too small, there is no way he could stick all those knives in her and not hurt her. I didn't want him to do it. But he insisted. I watched the first few go in. She didn't even flinch. She seemed frightened, but I could tell that she trusted him so much, that she just pushed her little body against him and let him shove these knives into her. She didn't cry or anything. But her ears were flattened against her head and her tail was between her legs.

I thought it was just awful that she trusted him so much that she'd justsit there while knife after knife stabbed into her. It broke my heartand scared me. After the first couple of knives I couldn't watch anymore, I was too frightened. I left the room and started wandering in this house we were in, I think it was our house but it didn't feel familiar. I was trying to look for a yellow pages so that I could get the number of an all-night emergency vet so that when he hurt her, because I was sure he was going to hurt her, we could rush her to the hospital. But all I could find was a white pages. I was scared and hopeless and I felt powerless. I went to check on them and Matt was done. He was wrapping up his knives and grinning. I could not see any blood. Valerie was standing beside him, wagging her tail. "See? I did it! I told you I could do it!" He said.

"Is she ok?" I asked.

"She's fine! She lost a lot of blood, but she's ok. Do you want to see some of the blood she lost?" He was holding out a ziplock baggie, and I knew that was where he was keeping her blood.

"No." I said. I did not want to see the blood. I was worried that she was not ok, that she was bleeding internally. I asked him if she could be bleeding internally and he said no. Even though Valerie was standing and wagging her tail, I didn't think she was acting normally. She usually gets so excited when I walk into a room and she didn't this time. She curled up on a pillow and went to sleep. The whole time Matt is talking about how cool the trick is and isn't it great that he can stick all those knives in our little dog and not hit a single organ?And then he reached out to pet her and his face turned serious.

"Oh. We lost her."

She was dead. He moved her body and there was a small pool of blood under her. Maybe the diameter of a baseball. And I knew then, he'd been wrong, he'd hit an organ and she'd been bleeding out right in front of us. And we just let it happen. And then I woke up.

Now, here are some little things you might want to know about the people in the dreams. Matt is the love of my life, the person who takes care of me, who I trust with everything no matter what. We have a wonderful marriage - most days I wonder how I snagged such a wonderful man. Of course there are days when I want to crawl up the walls because he makes me so crazy, but they are rare.

Valerie is, if I were to admit to having a favorite pet, my favorite pet. Both of my dogs are my babies, but I suppose because we've had Valerie for nearly four years, I just have this connection with her that I don't have with the other animals. I feel like I can read her thoughts and she can read mine. She can also piss me off like no one else can. I expect a lot from her and I get really disappointed when she misbehaves. I see a lot of myself in her. If she were a person, I think, she'd be me. If I were a dog, I'd be her. I realize she's just a dog and maybe this makes me sound insane. I'm guessing I treat her too much like a person because I don't have children yet." - Patty, 29

Wow, thank you for sending me this rather bizarre dream for analysis. I have to say, of all the different types of dreams I love to shift through for this blog, my favorite ones are the long ones that make no sense whatsoever. So a double thank you for sending me a long, strange dream.

I've mentioned before that decoding the meaning of a dream is often convoluted by the influence of the personal perception of the dreamer. In this case, it is certainly true, as many of the major symbols interacting in this dream are known to have multiple meanings, and the meaning of some of these symbols is likely morphed by the waking perceptions of the dreamer. This last little paragraph that you've written allows a great deal of access into those perceptions.

Let's talk dogs. The conventional meaning of a dog in a dream is typically a reference to a loyal friend, a trusted companion or even a set of faithful instincts. What the dream dictionaries neglect to mention is the increasingly high number of urban women (myself included) who put off having children because of the demands of work, love, school etc, and wind up having a dog baby instead. In many ways, a dog can satisfy many of the maternal instincts that an infant can- both demand time and attention, careful love and consideration. Having a dog or a baby means you're responsible for the supervision, care, socialization, feeding, and even the poop of another helpless little being. For this reason, I've entitled this post "A Dream About a Husband Stabbing the Dog-Baby." We're not dealing with a hunting dog, or a guard dog, or wolf- this is a baby, to some extent. In that way, I believe little Puppy is a representation of your maternal instincts.

The wounding of a canine friend is commonly thought to be a wounding of one's instinct, or the loss of a good friend; that idea is in line with my assignment of Valerie as the embodiment of your maternal desires. Further, dreaming of blood can be seen as an emotional cry for attention.

Now husbands can mean things that are quite literal, or quite figurative in dreams, depending on the specific circumstances of the dream, and of your life. Being a married woman and dreaming about your husband, there is the obvious literal meaning that you are dreaming of your perception of him. However, husbands are often more than husbands- they are representations of our fathers, or of our masculine selves. Husbands are protectors, guides, trusted friends and allies- but in close relationships like the one you're describing, they are also our "other halves." Though you will be the ultimate judge of what role your husband is playing in this dream, I believe that he is standing in for a side of you.

I think it's also interesting to note that your "husband" isn't stabbing the dog baby with the intention of killing her. In a magic trick, the magician diverts the attention of the audience so that he appears to be doing one thing while actually doing something completely different. A dream involving a trick, then, may be drawing attention to some thing you're doing to divert your instincts.

Now, it's not just a slight of hand trick that Matt's doing here- it's a trick with knives. A knife or a blade is often a symbol of a phallus, or a masculine tool of aggression. This lends back to the idea, at least to me, of your masculine side as the coalescing force behind this dream.

Finally, the yellow pages and the strange house. Who the hell uses the yellow pages anymore??? Why would a person look for solutions in the yellow pages?? Do you actually use them, or is this an anomaly? I would think that a quicker solution more likely to lead to a positive outcome, would be to go online to Yelp.com or another site, to find a 24 hour vet. I think the sense of hopelessness that you're feeling is reflected in your choice- that is, you think you will fail at helping your dog, and then you choose an option of reference that ensures that you'll fail.

The house. Strange houses have always plagued my dreams, whither it's a new, weird version of a real place or an entirely invented place, I frequently find myself lost in houses comprised of endless rooms, haunted houses, decaying houses, or houses with no basis in reality. The general meaning of a strange or unreal house in your dream is that the house is a reconstructed version of yourself. In this case, you're not recalling many of the specifics of this house, either because they are not as important as the actions taking place within them, or perhaps because you simply didn't remember the details. At any rate, I believe that the fact that the dream takes place within a reconstructed version of yourself lends me to believe that this is a case of "you are everyone in your dreams."

So if you want to take my analysis to an A+B+C = D level, we could safely say that your masculine (or practical) side is diverting your natural maternal instincts into taking care of a dog baby. Simple enough, right?

Basically, my overall impression of this dream is that you've found a workable way of putting off your biological clock. You love your dog like you will one day love your progeny, but you realize that this trick you're playing on yourself is only going to be effective to a certain point. Consciously, you may not feel all that enrapt in this emotional issue, but I think the dream suggests that it's lurking!

Thanks for sending this great dream for a free dream reading! Please feel free to email me with any future dreams you'd like interpreted at Rachel.Beezy88@gmail.com, as well as with any comments you may have!