I dreamed I could not get my husband off the Internet. I dreamed we had a fight and I told him I knew he was emailing another woman. He started to lie, then he told me it was true. I felt like someone had kicked me in the belly. In my dream I suspected he was having an affair, but I didn’t really believe it.

My husband said he was confused and that he loved me. He didn’t want us to get separated, but I had lost all respect for him, and although I still loved him, I asked him to leave.

He kept following me around in my dream and trying to get us to get back together, but I would not do it. I enrolled in exercise classes and while I was at the rec center people that had known both of us tried to avoid me. So I said (to a group of guys I saw), “So exactly how many of you knew about this?”

One guy that I have never seen before (but he seemed familiar in my dream) told me that they had seen this girl coming and going from my husband’s office (I am not sure if this is important, but in my dream my hubby was in a new office, and soon he will be moving to a new office) and that she had a reputation for going after happily married men and dumping them when they got a divorce.

I asked this man what she looked like and he told me she had long, reddish brown hair, had never had kids, was built very nicely, and she was half Cherokee Indian. Earlier in the dream my husband had told me she was 23. This really hit me hard as I am 34 and my husband is 41.

I realized in my dream that I would be fine without my husband and that I would find love again.

When I woke up from this dream I was totally overwhelmed physically. I could not breath. I felt like some one had punched me. I was trying not to puke. I had to get up and I could not go back to sleep. I felt like this dream meant something because I was in so much physical turmoil when I woke up.

My husband and I have been married for 19 years and I have had dreams of him leaving me before, but in these dreams he didn’t love me anymore and I felt like I could not make it without him, and I would beg him to stay. When I had the other dreams I was experiencing marital problems because of my jealousy, but I have not been experiencing marital problems recently.

In fact, for the first time in our marriage, I can honestly say I am not jealous. I have been going through a kind of new birth. I am a stay at home mom and I have been for most of our marriage. In the last 2 years though, I went back to work and quickly got promoted to manager. This made me feel a lot better about myself. I have gone back to college and I am doing pretty good at it. I have faced a lot of problems lately that I refused to deal with years ago, and I feel I have moved on. In fact I have felt much better about life in general lately.

Please help me if you can. I feel like this dream is going to wreck all the progress I have made in the last couple of years. This dream has made a big impression on me because of the very strong physical sensations with it, and I can’t seem to shake the feeling that this was in some way a warning.

—Debbie, Age 34, Female, Married, Rawlins, WY, USA

Hi Debbie -

Just when you think you’ve put those old demons to rest, they come flying back out of the closet, ready to haunt you again! Before you get too distraught over this dream though (and start kicking him out), a few items included in your report are worth reviewing.

First, it’s important to recall that this is not the first time you have had an “infidelity dream.” For better or worse, dreams of a partner wandering (or leaving) actually are fairly common. And, as you point out, they typically occur when we are feeling especially jealous or insecure.

What is curious about your recent dream is that it occurs when you have been feeling neither emotion. Your life in the last few years has taken a decided turn for the better. You are a manager at work, and in your personal life you are facing problems instead of avoiding them. You even recently returned to college, where you are doing well. So why this dream, and why now?

I am curious if your husband’s new office isn’t a source of greater concern than previously you imagined. In the dream, the new office is the location of the infidelity. The new office also is the one factor in the equation—judging by your dream report—that has changed recently. Has the uncertainty of the new office caught the attention of your wary, unconscious eye? Is it also possible that you are worried about what new staff may be hired at the location - who might just find your hubby fair game?

It would indeed be a “terrible blow” to learn of an infidelity in your marriage—your dream leaves little doubt of that. My suspicion, however, is that your dream is a simple repeat of your former “anxiety dreams,” brought on by your husband’s new work environment. Given your 19 year track record of fidelity together, I also believe your husband deserves the benefit of the doubt, while you deserve the benefit of an unworried heart.

In the meantime, have you given yourself credit for the dramatic metamorphosis of these infidelity dreams? You used to feel like you couldn’t make it without him in these dreams, and you would beg him to stay. Now you realize that you will be fine without him, and that you will find love again. (This is before you tell him to hit the road!) All that hard work you’ve been doing is paying off, Debbie. You’re growing stronger by the minute!