Thread: Trying to save a Pleco fish!

Hello jorafc,

I too used to keep many fish.
There was a time I was visiting one of my aunts who lives in the countryside, with an old gf with whom I was living in London (she was also a great fish enthusiast and we had several aquariums and many different species of fish living well together, caring for their own environment, etc...), and I awoke from the shock of a dream - I said to Claire, as this was the girl's name, "the fish are dead, I dreamed that they died". We were both sad.

We had left the keys to our place and the fish in the care of my best friend at the time (a 72 year old Indian man and his white wife - they were often ill and required assistance, which I was happy to lend - they had a lot of stories to tell about how life was in the 60's for them, and they enjoyed having a younger couple over for cold-cuts and dinner and wine and whatever, since they couldn't get out much themselves).

Even though the instructions were clearly explained to Kishore and Jean, and written - he had turned off the pump and turned on the light, essentially suffocating all the fish while they were slowly being boiled.

When we returned to the apartment in Highgate, upon opening the door, a thin fog was evident in the hallway. Claire and I looked at each other and tears appeared in her eyes.
We had nursed many of these fish back from illness and (in one instance) a perceived death.

The smell was unbearable, and so - with sadness - we steeled ourselves, opened the balcony doors and, with rags tied like a pair of bandits, we grabbed nets and buckets and started the grisly task of cleaning out the dead.

Inside the big tank were many dead, half-eaten or decomposed fish and the flaked food sat thick on the surface. Claire suddenly became excited - the Weather Loaches (Alfie, Angus and Nessie) had survived! (they can breath air in certain circumstances, and are quite hardy, burying themselves in clay and sand).
There was no trace of the Griffins (a bunch of river minnows), nor Stan, Kyle, Kenny and Cartman, nor Stimpy (a ranchu that is the fish who "died" and was ressurected). Ren was so big, he required dissolution to be flushed (he was actually a river trout, sold as a something else) - he probably ate everyone. There was no trace of anything else other than the sludge of the wrong kind of food, floating.

In the small tank, nothing survived. It was the Fishpocalypse. Only the snails survived and they must have eaten everything, although - to be honest - neither of us was going to go through that mess too closely...

In the medium tank - it was like a thick brown soup. It made me gag when the lid was lifted. As we were dredging it, you can imagine our joy that our oldest and largest Pleco (big plec) suddenly started gasping and thrashing in the net, as he was on his way to the death bucket.

Frantically, we dredged faster and faster and it soon became clear that the smaller Pleco (mini plec) had also survived.
Consuela had died, but she was a fragile, old bulb-fish, and nuclear 1 and nuclear 2 (Canary yellow goldfish) must have served as food for the Plecos, and their remains and Consuela and Clarke 1 and 2 - they were what must have comprised the soup stock of this tank.

I was very angry at Kishore. He was adamant that he had followed instructions to the letter, and the smell was from where he had accidentally spilled 2liters of milk in the kitchen (which he didn't clear up).
But - how can anyone remain angry at an old man for doing his best..? (at least to cover up that he hadn't, hehe).


Now you have paid the piper by listening to my story, so we can continue with yours.

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Onto your dream.

Pleco's are, evidently, rather hardy fish, long-lived and "bottom-feeding suckers" that you may have seen latching onto something - perhaps a symbol of dependency. Maybe you didn't realise just how hardy these little spiny buggers were until you read my story. Sometimes they thrive in filth, being bottom-feeders.

You must have some familiarity with them to call it a "plec", and know their appearance, even if you say you don't like them

They are actually a type of Catfish, did you know this?
They grow as big as their environment allows. I have seen some very large plecos (big plec was about 12" long last I saw him, a decade ago, but I have seen bigger in public aquariums). They are very gentle - they will eat from your hand, if you allow it, and they seem to like being tickled or stroked sometimes, like the Weather Loach.

This one is a literal fish-out-of-water, huh, that you are desperate in trying to keep alive in the best way you can (which, apparently, since you know fish live in water and not handbags) is not the best way in which you are able, if you think about it... I wonder why you did not take the fish to the glass of water instead of pouring it onto the fish, like fighting a fire?

Thinking positively, the fact that it was silver may be a representation of your intuition (which might or might not be on the ball, no offense).
If we think less positively , that it was silver may be viewed as a stroke of bad luck or futility of action.
Perhaps you can think for yourself what it means? The moon, a month, some time, a precious metal, mercurial aspects of personality or whatever branch of the belief/bullshit tree you are currently climbing.

Perhaps it is both positive and not-positive. It's usually our intuition that tells us before anything else, when something is futile, is it not? Even if we ignore it and continue.

It is my belief that this fish is representing some relationship or person close to you.
Is it money or a telephone that you keep in your zip pocket of your handbag? Perhaps it is your own identification..? A license, even?

Perhaps this is important, perhaps it is not.

It is my belief that a woman's handbag may also symbolise to her, her baby making bits, since it contains everything she needs to complete her daily life's journey.

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Without knowing what you keep in the zip-purse of your handbag, exactly, there are a few speculative analysis that I might offer:

You are obviously a caring person, to try to keep something alive that you don't even like (not to say you don't like whatever it represents...) who is carrying a responsiblity that you feel needs more attention than it currently is receiving to stop what you perceive as its suffering.


The fish might represent your relationship to your family or a family member in particular (via cellphone?) and you may feel that you are not finding enough time to really keep those relationships alive, what with working full time... But if you are not constantly working (carrying the water) then you fear the poor little thing will suffer more than it already is...

In this instance, the dream tells us that you are feeling there is nothing you can do but keep trying your best to keep the family relationships alive, constrained by time and resources even if your waking intuition knows that this is not being done in the best manner that you currently see fit to employ. Perhaps another way of doing things is needed? Take the fish to the water, instead of the water to the fish, so to speak.

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It is my belief that you may be feeling that your work (full time) is providing only barely what you need to keep your darling fish (family, child, partner, finance, friends, self), who you consider to be suffering and gasping for life - that lives in your handbag (womb, possession, clutch) - alive. While you feel that you are maintaining enough to keep attention (the head), you perceive is barely enough.

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More specifically, I would say that you might be feeling that your work is not giving you enough time to care for your relationship with your child or partner (or both, perhaps a friend, I would say child), and that you feel that - even though you have some contact and there are still tet-a-tet moments (head to head, heart to heart, you know...) - you might feel you are not there often enough to give them all you believe they need (whatever that is), and they are suffering (in your eyes) as a result.

As an aside - My pleco's survived the fish-pocalypse without their "parents" and as a result are bigger and stronger than ever (the relationship with Claire ended many years ago - she was too young, really... I am a difficult man, and we both wanted different things, it became apparent). I myself haven't ever really had a father or mother in such a sense, and I'm ... fine (and I still draw breath, even if along with the dole occasionally).

What I would learn from such a dream myself (if it was not bad luck to interpret your own dreams), is that you intuitively know all this already, regarding your situation.

It is a difficult situation, to divide your time so much and be able to provide all that is needed and do all the things you need, let alone want. No juggler ever wants to drop a ball, but the pro's make it part of the act by learning new tricks to pick it up.

I would let that [cat]fish out of the bag and take it to fresh water, where it could swim as it pleases (a family discussion can be a scary thing, but it can also be the best thing).

How you would go about this... I cannot say. But generally, love is found in action rather than strings of words or pearls.

https://youtu.be/_nW5AF0m9Zw

Isn't the open water a more beautiful place than the water spilled into the inside pocket of a lady's handbag?
Not sure they make tampons and towels absorbant enough for a fishbowl of water, despite the claims on the packets...

Whenever I have to buy, "lady products", I always buy them with some cookies or cupcakes or icecream.

Perhaps a short family outing to get ice-cream is in order?

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There are many other interpretations of such a dream - perhaps it is yourself - your own identification - or a friend, or your own financial security, or your partner, that is represented by this fish (no man truly knows what lies in a woman's handbag... nothing but strangeness in my experience...). Maybe your rings are white gold, and not yellow...

I was going to leave you with three, as is customary, but I write a lot, and most of it is repetitive, and I do not think that this would be helpful to you.

I hope that you can make sense of the words I have written above, as they apply to your situation as a mother, lover, worker and woman.

Feel free to correct me, if you believe I am wrong - as I am an eager student of my life, and lately I've misplaced my ire, so...

I read lately that as a person's financial dependency on their spouse increases, so does their propensity to have an affair?
It's a way of regaining independence and/or "masculinity".

Here is an understandable article, rather than a researchgate link:
Extramarital affairs more common in dependent spouses, study finds | Life and style | The Guardian

I guess my ire's not out of me yet.

Probably I shouldn't have mentioned anything, because - asides from being none of my business - a little fish in a special compartment of a handbag is likely most people's internal expression of a child dependent.

Sorry.