Attacked by Relentless Spider

Hello;

I just awoke from a pretty terrifying dream about a spider. The spider was enormous, like a the size of a small dog. It looked like a spider you would see in the Amazon Jungle or something. I was in my bedroom and the spider kept trying to attack and bite me. I managed to cut all of it's legs off, and the thing still kept jumping on me trying to bite me. I was hiding under the covers of my bed, trying to protect myself. My husband, who was under the covers was of no assistance. I kept calling to him to help me kill this spider, but he wanted no part of it (in waking life he is usually the pest remover from the house), and he didn't seem bothered or affected by the situation at all. The spider was relentless, and kept jumping on me. I believe I did feel a few small bites from the spider, but they were superficial. The spider continued trying to attack me until I awoke from the dream.

I know Freud states that a spider usually represent a mother or mother figure and could possibly mean a conflict with a mother figure. I am on very good terms with both my mother and mother in law, so I don't feel it is that connection. Maybe a female energy? I know killing a spider is bad luck, and in the dream I really didn't want to kill it, I just wanted it to leave me alone. I thought by cutting off it's legs would make him go away, but it didn't.

I've been having many vivid dreams lately. One night last week I had a dream about getting out of bed and urinating into a container. I filled the container all the way to the top and was trying not to spill it. I placed a top on it, and set it aside. The following night, I had a dream of walking down stairs in a house that was supposedly mine, and discovered piles of dog feces. It was a combination of feces from my small dogs, and apparently a large dog that was visiting us.

Then of course the most vivid dream of all, which I had a couple weeks ago. I was getting ready to pack and move to a new town. I was traveling around town, being generous to people, giving things to them. Then I was in the country with family, including my grandfather who has been deceased for 30 years. I gave an offering of food to cook which consisted of salmon and vegetables. There was a young girl there who was supposedly my niece, and she came to me stating my grandfather was taking her to a fishing sporting event. I was a little envious since my grandfather and I were very close when I was a kid, but then in my dream I thought since I was moving the next day, I wouldn't have been able to attend anyway. I was about to start cooking on an outdoor grill, and my grandfather walked past me and handed me the receipt for the fishing excursion, as a way to show me he paid for this little girl to go to the tournament, which was expensive. Suddenly, I am holding a baby girl, around 5 months old. The baby is mine, and I am examining and relishing every small detail about her face (he chubby cheeks, every little beauty mark on her face, her hair). She looked a lot like me, and even mimicked me opening my mouth, and I remember thinking, she is just like me. The baby was happy and free spirited, and the baby made me so happy (in real life I have wanted a baby, but it has not worked out for my husband and I). It was probably one of the best dreams I have ever had.

I think I have a pretty good handle on this one. I've dreamed many of the same things, some of them many times (especially the giant spider, and of course the very common dreams of bodily functions - everybody dreams these things at certain times). I'm willing to bet you've just started a new phase of life, haven't you? Well ok, you pretty much already said that. New marriage, new puppies - did you recently move into the house?

First a couple of things I want to reassure you about. Forget Freud - yes, he did some amazing things and he pretty much mapped out the unconscious, but beyond that most of his theories were wrong and incredibly destructive. He was harsh and unforgiving and people who believe too much in his ideas tend to get really stressed (I used to believe in them, I know!) Carl Jung is a lot more forgiving and in fact it was him who corrected much of what was wrong in Freud. Forget about Freud's mother and father figure stuff, except insofar as it might refer to aspects of yourself. Your inner mother and inner father. Which brings up the other thing I want to reassure you about - when we dream of people we know, it usually isn't really about them at all, but about aspects of ourselves. Whatever that person seems to represent in the dream - in this case your sleeping husband probably represents your own inner pest remover or protecter.

In fact, the spider dream is one of the most common dreams people have - mine are usually either gigantic and deformed somehow, or there are impossible numbers of them swarming everywhere. And my suspicion is that the reason your husband slept through it all is simply to increase the sense of danger. Because that's what spiders represent in dreams - spiders and snakes especially. Spiders seem to represent a particular kind of danger - especially the giant ones in your house or your bedroom. I think insects in general, if they're in your house or swarming, represent contamination. When that contamination seems especially dangerous it will be represented by a huge spider that keeps coming at you no matter what. These relentless pursuer dreams always remind me of the words of Kyle Reese in the Terminator (that whole movie is essentially a relentless pursuer dream, and a well observed one): "It's what he does - it's all he does. And he absolutely will not stop ever until you are dead!" I don't remember what was said before that, but it was about the relentless nature of the Terminator. And he kept coming at her even as she destroyed his limbs and his torso, and in the end I think his hand was still trying to get to her across the floor, wasn't it? I think James Cameron knew a few things about bad dreams.

My theory, based on what you've said here, is that you might have reservations about something concerning your new life - some sort of 'contamination' that's gotten in somehow. And don't be too literal about contamination, it doesn't mean a disease or anything like that, but something that might be represented by the idea of contamination. Like maybe a bunch of puppies that mess up the house all the time? Or that constantly demand too much attention and could bring in sickness or dirt into your nice clean house? Or it could be not the house itself that's threatened by contamination, but your life - often in dreams the house represents the dreamers life. Maybe something in your new life seems threatening in some insidious way that's analogous somehow to contamination? Or just to a relentless giant mutant spider that won't stop coming at you and even your husband is powerless to protect you from it? This is the way dreams work, through symbols. And I also think the fact that your husband couldn't protect you means the danger is something internal and personal, something he can't help with. Maybe.

Ok, on to the dreams of waste elimination. I think these also refer to your new life, because to dream of 'eliminating waste' - especially if it's out in the open or in public, usually refers to a feeling of lack of privacy. Something that should be done in private, but is being done out in the open. It's like another way to say that your dirty laundry is being aired in plain view - something embarrassing. And people often get this feeling - and have these dreams, when they find themselves in a living arrangement that threatens their privacy in some way. Maybe oversharing a little too much, or people who now live with you seeing sides of you that you like to keep private? The idea of eliminating your sewage also includes an aspect of dirtiness or possible contamination. And I don't mean the dreams are telling you things are dangerous and you need to get out of the arrangement - it's more like you just have some unconscious fears that you aren't acknowledging consciously that are being shown in the dreams. These fears are common in situations like that, end they'll go away when things settle in and the sense of danger passes.

And finally the baby. Babies in dreams usually represent a new possibility or a new project - something you're trying to create that is very tender and vulnerable right now and needs a lot of nurturing and care in order to grow eventually strong and self sufficient. Like your new life maybe, or a vision you have for your future. People always assume it means an actual baby, but that usually isn't the way dreams actually work. Though possibly for women baby dreams actually do refer to babies? I'm not sure, but that does sound likely - though I think they also can mean a psychological 'baby'.

So I think you can see, from the common meaning of each of these dreams, why I assumed you're starting a new phase of life and that's what they all refer to? I think dreams like these do tend to go together and to happen when a person has made a big change in their life. Marriage, moving into a new house with someone, that sort of thing. Where privacy is being threatened and you're worried about the security of the house or the environment (its ability to withstand possible contamination). And by house I also mean (symbolically) your life - it could be either one. You might be afraid of actual contamination or dirt or dog poop (and hair) getting all over the nice carpet, or it might be more psychological contamination from another person being too close in your life and making you feel a bit threatened.

Thanks for your response and analysis. It may have been assumed from my post that the husband and puppies are new, however I've been with my husband for 12 years, and my fur babies are 14 and 8 years old. I did move into a new house in September after our landlord sold the home we were living in. Ironically I started my doctorate degree in June and didn't find out until the end of June that the house we were living in for 4+ years was going up for sale. I was frustrated because I wouldn't have started this program had I known I would be moving. I also work full-time, so I have been overwhelmed. So there has been a lot of stress with trying to juggle time unpacking, working, and completing school work. My fitness routine has been placed on the back burner which has also been a source of stress. I have been due for a promotion for years, but this step in my career is the most competitive. I have been continuing to put in for jobs, but keep getting passed over. I have felt kind of trapped in my current position, and they keep expecting more output with less and less staff. I was hoping the baby possibly meant the birth of a new career path, and possibly the 5 month old baby was a 5 month time frame.

Wow - it would have been nice to know some of this before doing the analysis!! :lol: Something like a lot of stress would change things considerably. But I think you've found your contamination (stress). And maybe the intrusion into your personal life is from your boss and landlord. I know some people around here believe dreams can predict the future, but I'm not real big on that myself, especially including timeframes. I just don't see how you could know that in advance, though it's quite possible there may already be intimations that something is on its way and maybe you're not consciously aware of it yet but your unconscious is.

Yeah, I can see where dreams predicting future events could seem unrealistic, but I have been known to dream about things before they happen. For example, I may have dreams about someone that I haven't seen or spoken to in years, and after the dream I will hear from them or run into them. One time I had a dream about my high school boyfriend's mother whom I had not seen or spoken to since high school. I never had a dream about her before, and I had been out of high school for about 6 years. The very next day, I went into a store in a completely different city than where we lived and she was working the counter at that store. About 2 years ago, I had a dream that a girl I went to elementary school with was in distress. I had not spoken to her since middle school, although we were friends on Facebook, but didn't interact. The dream was so disturbing that I messaged her through Facebook to ask her if she was okay. I told her I know it was probably weird since we had not spoken in over 25 years, but I was checking on her. She said she was fine, and thanked me for my care and concern. About 6 months later she died in a house fire, and it really freaked me out. Some may say it was a coincidence, and maybe so, but I think there is sometimes more going on than meets the eye :)

Oh, I do believe in those kind of synchronicities - like when the phone rings and you know who it is immediately before checking. I do think there's something to the idea of dream telepathy - but that's completely different from predictions about the future, and especially ones that include an accurate timeframe. Lol I see where this sounds pretty weird - I believe in some kinds of telepathy but not prediction of the future. I just don't see how that could work - where-as it does make a certain kind of sense to me that we could be aware of what people we know well are thinking or doing. Especially if they're thinking about us (like when they're calling or something). So I don't say it's absolutely impossible or anything - I try to avoid extremist views as much as possible. But I just haven't experienced it myself or heard any really convincing examples. So I won't argue with you on that, just saying I'm not the right person for that kind of analysis.

Some additional ideas about your important group of dreams follows which I hope can be helpful in some way.

Starting with the most vivid one about your moving and the baby, it could perhaps be suggesting in part that a “wrong move” might be possible in the sense of leaving, for whatever reason, a certain positive mind-space close to the “country” (e.g. where your deceased grandfather is alive and well) and giving up something important to you (e.g. you’ll miss the fishing sporting event which is “valuable”, i.e. “expensive”). In this context, the image of traveling around town and being generous to people by giving them things could possibly imply that you might be trying too often to “please” people/society/the expectations of others instead of perhaps paying greater attention at this stage of your life to deeper inner needs as probably symbolized by the young “niece” and then by the baby.

The scene changes to a family picnic in the country and the subject of food and cooking is emphasized by the dream (e.g. you bring a salmon to cook and there will be a fishing excursion which you’ll miss, therefore also potentially missing out on eating a big catch). Psychologically, fish usually symbolize contents of the unconscious which have to be “caught” and brought out of the “waters of the unconscious”. Food in general often symbolizes experiences which have to be “eaten” (taken in) and “digested” (reflected upon) in order to provide the “nutrition” of understanding and meaning. Doing this in the context of family dynamics (e.g. you’re at a family picnic) can often provide valuable insights which can help to orientate a person in an effective way.

You’re a little jealous that your young niece will be going to the fishing event and rationalize that your plans, which have led to your leaving the area, will naturally stop you from attending even though you apparently feel underneath how much going could mean to you deep down as a reminiscence of youth and the emotions that you felt then.

For me, this sequence in the dream is an example of the true meaning of the term “sour grapes” as described in Aesop’s Fables but which is often misused in popular speech. In the fable, as you probably know, a fox tries very doggedly and persistently all day to reach a hanging bunch of grapes, finally giving up with a phrase something like “They were green and probably sour anyway”. This has been taken to mean that we often unfairly disparage what we can’t obtain. In this way of looking at your dream, it’s possible that maybe a variation of the fable appears in the sense that, while you have apparently been unable to find a basic level of contentment in some ways, any such state of affairs if it exists might be the result of not “fishing” the depths of your own psyche enough in an ongoing way. Maybe instead of overly blaming outer circumstances (albeit very difficult ones), it would be good for you to invest in looking within more often (which you might “disparage doing” to some extent). The dream seems to show how very valuable this process can be by having your grandfather make a point of showing you the receipt for the money he paid to have your niece attend the fishing event. That is, a lot of energy (money) is required to explore all facets of one’s personality, many of which are generally unconscious and therefore undeveloped to some degree.

The potential result of any such inner search is instantly shown by the girl baby which you’re then holding, an image of your basic inner potential as a woman which has to be “cherished” and “nurtured”. Because it looks like you’re around the approximate age of 35, this dream could essentially be a “memento mori” dream (Latin for "Remember that you must die"). Although we think of ourselves as still being young in our mid-30’s, from the point of view of dreams, we’ve passed the half-way point of our lives, and this type of dream spontaneously appears around mid-life and later in order to remind us of this point. The reality is that if a conscious application to completing ourselves by developing any as-yet undeveloped innate potentials isn’t begun around this time, it could be too late to do so in the end.

The baby is around five months old, suggesting that she might relate to the fact that you started work on your doctorate degree around that time in June. The idea could be that you need to stay especially closely attached to your instincts during this very difficult time (i.e. as symbolized by the country, fresh fish on the grill and the fishing excursion etc.) in order to protect this apparently important part of yourself. For example, you’ve had to give up your exercise routine and your body is under a lot of stress. In any case, something else from around five months ago could spontaneously come to mind (in the form of memories, thoughts and feelings) if you concentrated on the baby’s image in the dream which is very important to do in order to help confirm what she symbolizes.

Your other dreams about urinating and finding piles of dog feces likely relate to a possible understandable situation of having problems dealing with mostly unconscious, turbulent emotions during this difficult time. Peeing, the medical term for which is the “expression of urine”, is linked symbolically by way of analogy to the free and open “expression” of feelings which shouldn’t be “held back”, just like not peeing in a physical sense can lead to serious medical problems if regularly persisted in for long periods.

In addition, excrement and pee can symbolize, as an example, the “disgusting” results of having to “absorb” and “digest” various realities regarding our own lives and those of others.

The “by-products” of this process include such things as anger, resentment, jealousies and grudges etc. etc. which somehow have to be “gotten rid of”.

Because of the appearance of the next dream with its huge, terrifying spider, it looks like this could be a time to just reconnect to your deep instinctive side, including strong emotions, so that it will be reassured to at least some degree about your basic loyalty to it. Perhaps some small but vital niche has be carved out of each day to do this. It might sound like an unusual and even frightening idea, but you could try going back into your dream by focusing on the image of the spider and asking it “What can I do for you?”. It’s possible that a dialogue could start which would help to relieve the tension between you and the “spider” whose “bites” can symbolize, for example, unpleasant physical or psychological symptoms of some kind. Analyst Robert Johnson’s “Inner Work” describes this technique along with a very reliable introduction on how to look at one’s own dreams. And the failure of your husband to help in “getting rid of” the spider might be the dream’s way of showing that it really shouldn’t be gotten rid of (similar to your thought in the dream that you didn’t want to kill it and it’s bad luck to do so). In addition, it really is a “female energy” in the sense that it’s apparently deeply related to your overall potential self so that only your own feminine side can effectively connect with it.

In a nutshell and from a Jungian point of view (which is grounded on an in-depth and sensitive understanding of world mythologies), a spider embodies the frightening duality of creativity (e.g. beautiful shimmering webs with an “eye” at their centre) and predation (e.g. the ensnaring aspect of the web which can lead to death). The image of a spider is therefore a frightening microcosm of nature and of life itself. For you, life has been difficult for years in some ways as the result of stymied career plans and not being able to have a family. Now, for months you’ve been suffering from the additional blow of having your house sold out from under you just as a new phase of your education was beginning.

So the danger could be that the negative side of the spider symbol could tend to become too dominant under the current stresses to which you’re being subjected. Freud’s view which came to your mind that the image of a spider possibly means a conflict with a mother figure is indeed, like the majority of his views, cramped and incomplete as mentioned in another reply to your post. However, it does contain a grain of truth in that the “Mother” as symbolized by the spider is in this case Mother Nature herself but in her symbolic and mythological form as the “Terrible Mother”, the part which kills and devours in order to create new life. But this aspect in oneself cannot be taken lightly and has to be confronted in some reasonable way instead of avoided (e.g. by hiding under the covers and hoping it will just go away). Otherwise, a person can sometimes become susceptible to being depressed when things aren’t going well. So it’s possible that maybe you understandably “didn’t get it” about what the little baby symbolized in your previous dream, i.e. the potential of your overall completeness as a person (as opposed to only a “new job” as it were), and therefore, your basic inner instincts are tending to “rebel” so that you’ll “come to your senses” and embrace this living part of yourself in order to move forward more effectively over time despite your current challenges.

A very short but valuable publication by Jungian analyst Helen Luke “The Life of the Spirit in Women: A Jungian Approach” might be especially helpful in your situation. It’s available on Amazon by way of Kindle but otherwise, it can be difficult to get a print copy at anything like a reasonable price.

Your experiences of dreaming, for example, about a person whom you haven’t seen for years and then running into them is described in Jungian terms as a “synchronistic event”, or more simply as “a meaningful coincidence”. In this type of happening, two events are not connected by “cause and effect” (that is, the image of the mother of your high school boyfriend in the dream didn’t “cause” the meeting with the outer woman), but the two or more events in a synchronistic happening are joined by “meaning” (that is, the chance meeting with the outer woman had some kind of hidden significance).

In you want to explore this part of yourself more fully, some reliable books about synchronicity as written by professional analysts include “There Are No Accidents” by Robert Hopcke, “The Tao of Psychology” by Jean Shinoda Bolen, and “At the Heart of the Matter” by J. Gary Sparks.

Anyway, without knowing much about you, this way of looking at your dreams might not fit your personal circumstances very well, but as mentioned, I hope that these ideas can be helpful in some way.

Please feel free to comment on, or to ask any questions about, this particular way of looking at your dreams.

... And there we see how a dream analysis is really done.