This is the first dream from which I've woken, bursting in tears. I had to come somewhere to seek some meaning from it. I'm really at a loss. I've had extremely vivid dreams before that are easy for me to work out on my own, and this has gnawed at me all day.

My dream starts out with me in Manhattan - where I do not live OR work in real life. The entire island has undergone a power failure. I have my Blackberry in my hand, and cannot seem to get through to anyone or find any information. Immediately I know I have to get to my car so that I can get home - I make my way to a parking garage (and this is a weird, unrelated part of the dream) and Tom Hanks is leading a leopard around on a leash with laser eyes - trying to find his car. Neither of us can find our vehicles. Suddenly I'm outside the garage with a close friend and his girlfriend - she tells me when the power went out, the garage went on lockdown. It is at this point that I scream "I JUST HAD A BABY YESTERDAY, I have to get home to her. I have to feed her!" It's very specifically a "her". My close friend looks at me in shock and says "You hate kids. When did you have a baby? I had no idea you were even pregnant?" His girlfriend and I squabble about how she can't get to an ATM and how that's less important than me getting my car out to leave. I decide to just leave on foot

I then find myself at a co-worker's house. However it looks to appear like my parents house in Upstate NY. I walk in with muddy feet, fumbling on my Blackberry again. I try to get out a text to my mother who I somehow know will be near my baby, but my fingers can't seem to text. I am at a loss, and my coworker yells at me to get out of her house because I've dragged mud in. I look at her in astonishment and say "I just had a baby yesterday for god's sake and I can't get to her. I can't call my mom, and you want me out of your house? I have to feed her!" She then gives her husband a look, and from his recliner where he's reading the paper, he asks me nicely to leave. I walk out of the house, still trying to call my mom. They don't acknowledge my statement of just having had a child.

The next place in which I find myself seems to be a store of some sort, and they're having a party with some of my coworkers. My CEO is there, making an announcement at how astonishing it is that they have so many "pregnant employees" and how "funny it is they're all pregnant at the same time". He mentions 2 people I don't know, and 1 that I do - and completely disregards me. Again, I am absolutely dismayed that nobody has acknowledged the fact that here I am, at a work function, A DAY AFTER having just given birth, and I state that to the group. Someone, a male acquantaince who is NOT a coworker looks at me and says "You just look like you've lost some weight - I doubt you were pregnant."

My mom then calls me on my phone, she has my daughter. I am overjoyed. She's at a neighbor's house (which in the dream I reason is because they've got a granddaughter and the proper 'supplies' for a baby), and she asks me if my breasts are cold. I say they are - and she says that's a sign that I need to feed (There's a moment where I think this is the air-conditioning in my room that's causing me to dream this). Since I can't get back in time, she's decided to give the baby formula, and she asks me how to make it. "I don't know, Mom! I just had her yesterday, I have no idea how a baby works!", I say. She tells me she'll mix 2-3 oz of formula with an equal part of water. I'm satisfied with this answer, and I hang up.

It's at this point I wake up and I am filled with this overwhelming sadness. In real life, I've never been particularly fond of having a baby. I AM in a relationship, but in the dream it was as if I was a single mother on my own, without my boyfriend. I try to figure out my feelings as I burst into tears, feeling like this is my "bio clock ticking" (I am 31 in a couple of weeks), and this was the first time I've felt maternal at all, and it wasn't even in real life - it was a dream.

I fall back asleep, and I resume dreaming. I am reunited with my daughter, and we're at her 1st birthday. She's blowing out a "1" candle on a cake, and she's got a mop of reddish blonde hair that reminds me of strawberry shortcake. I'm relieved and the sadness melts away - the guests leave and I sit on the couch to hold her in my arms, and I look down and instead she's not my daughter anymore, but my cat. I wake up again confused, this is the end of my dream.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated!