Awful nightmare...

Today I woke up feeling so relieved to be alive and yet so shook up.

You see, I had a nightmare, and I was convinced it was real during the nightmare, and so when I woke up I was confused about where I was and what time it was. I was happy to not be in that bizzaro world of my nightmare; however, there was more than a little bit of a residual feeling carrying over from that strange world.

In the dream, I was dating a woman with conservative values. Specifically conservative social values (I think I could deal with a libertarian). I'm not sure what details where in the back story of how we got together, but I think it was a case of "Me Gustas Cuando Callas." In the dream, it was causing major problems between us; however, I couldn't break it off with her because I couldn't bring myself to say, "I can't be with you because I'm a heathen." After adding in the cost of having to "admit" that, I felt that the whole thing would be a Pyrrhic victory (especially if it had any long-term impact on my conscience). So I was stuck... abiding by her invented rules... (of which many were literally written down to remind me) Whenever I broke one I would get this condescending yet polite, "I thought we discussed this. Remember? Rule #4?"

I feel so awful. How could a dream make me feel so awful?