I don't know about symbolic birth experiences, but until I was 7-8 or so (more when younger) I used to have recurring dreams where I'd push/be pushed through tight, pinky-white tunnels (or everything was pink-white, I wasnt clear) and come to somewhere brighter and vaguely pastel-coloured. They weren't very long or focussed dreams, but they felt safe, happy and I enjoyed them. I often described them to my parents, and called them my "somersault" dreams. Certainly wouldn't call them traumatic.
But apparently I had to be delivered in hospital, by forceps, after quite a prolonged birth.
Anyway, some.anecdotal evidence that birth can be "remembered" in dreams and it needn't be a bad memory. I'm not sure how that sits with the analysts...
I certainly wouldn't use terms like traumatic, ordeal, rupture - very far from the feelings I recall from the dreams (n.b. I don't recall "birth" itself at all, consciously at least). Hardly conclusive, I know.
But possibly, if they were basically seeing patients - people with some mental upset - they wouldn't necessarily see any or many for whom any lingering trace of birth memory was pleasant?
They did feel quite "powerful" dreams, very affecting, but the kind that would have personal significance. Not sure how they'd build into myth!
I don't know about symbolic birth experiences, but until I was 7-8 or so (more when younger) I used to have recurring dreams where I'd push/be pushed through tight, pinky-white tunnels (or everything was pink-white, I wasnt clear) and come to somewhere brighter and vaguely pastel-coloured. They weren't very long or focussed dreams, but they felt safe, happy and I enjoyed them. I often described them to my parents, and called them my "somersault" dreams. Certainly wouldn't call them traumatic.
But apparently I had to be delivered in hospital, by forceps, after quite a prolonged birth.
Anyway, some.anecdotal evidence that birth can be "remembered" in dreams and it needn't be a bad memory. I'm not sure how that sits with the analysts...
I like that your experience contradicts the early analysts.
I certainly wouldn't use terms like traumatic, ordeal, rupture - very far from the feelings I recall from the dreams (n.b. I don't recall "birth" itself at all, consciously at least). Hardly conclusive, I know.
But possibly, if they were basically seeing patients - people with some mental upset - they wouldn't necessarily see any or many for whom any lingering trace of birth memory was pleasant?
They did feel quite "powerful" dreams, very affecting, but the kind that would have personal significance. Not sure how they'd build into myth!