La Mulatta Tragique

Because the dog features in so many ways in dreams, you have to consider the context in your dream. It can symbolise, depending upon the dream content, your own feelings of anger and aggression.

As it sees in the dark, and has keen ears, it is sometimes used as a symbol of instinctive or intuitive knowledge. The dog here also represents the instinctive life. That is, the person who lives without much feeling or thought, like an animal. In some dreams, the dog is used in a similar way to the Egyptian symbology, as a guide into the unconscious, or land of the Dead."

~ This is what I get from this summary: Unconcious anger or aggression, instinctive life without much feeling or though.

More on anger -- the dog is seen as a subconsiously aggresive, sexual being:

" The dog appears more often than other animals in dreams. It depicts our natural drives that are well socialised, but still have the tendency to revert back to the spontaneous or 'wild' state quite easily. For instance our anger might usually be well under control, but if someone teases us we might surprise ourselves by the amount and strength of our anger. Similarly our sexuality may be usually expressed in a socially acceptable way, but if we are in a situation where our sexual pleasure is stimulated or allowed easy expression we might deeply shock other people and ourselves by what we do"

Well that about sums up the past four years of my life. A bit more intrigue for ya:

"The dog was also thought of as a guide or guardian of the hidden side of life."

As for the dolphin portion of my dream, I'm guessing a dead dolphin is bad news if any of this holds true":

"Dolphins are highly intelligent mammals, and as such represents the mental attributes and accomplishments involved in the dream itself. It also denotes that the dreamer has made some giant strides upward through the use of his mental faculties, and, if the rest of the dream bears it out, a dolphin is like a pat on the dreamers back with a well done thrown in for good measure. "

Shit.  More specifically:

They are water dwelling mammals and in our dreams they represent our willingness and ability to navigate through emotions. They represent positive messages from our unconscious minds. Dolphins could also represent a positive connection between our consciousness and to those parts of the psyche that is a mystery and largely unconscious.

So what does the dead dolphin actually mean?

"May symbolize communication between the unconscious (sea) and conscious (sky). May represent some specific unconscious content that is speaking - or trying to speak - to you.

This is starting to make sense. My unconscious is trying to tell my conscious that the link to my emotions and intuition has died from neglect. I am no longer fostering this connection through the passion I usually devise in my life and expunge through writing and other measures. My subconscious had to scare me into realizing this through this nightmare.

I thought a little more on why it was my therapist who had given me the assignment to care for these animals in my dream. It seemed, strange since I consider her such a benevolent figure in my life as she helped me so much, for her to have a role in the nightmare. After some contemplation (something I am afraid to say I don't do much these days) I recalled that she was the one who told me not to worry so much that my desire to write had left me even though I feared I was sacrificing my writing for my sanity by taking mood stabilizers. In essence she told me it was probably just a dry spell I was going through and in the long run I was better off living a long life in stability and approaching my writing through that state of life that living my life in chaos on the chance to create art.

 Although  consciously I understood and agreed with her, I have reaped the consequences now. The dogs symbolize the burden of senseless, automatic living I feel on some level she burdened me with. The side note of caring for the dolphin I feel I was supposed to know on my own but was her responsibility to remind me of, as an authoritative mentor. This also draws back to the reference to my job as I often feel that when I make mistakes I know I am supposed to know better, but had an authority figure intervened they would have guided me and I wouldnt have created such a mess.