Plagued with nightmares and bad dreams

[ThinkPositive]

Compared to most adults, I seem to have a lot of bad dreams.

Some of them are full-on nightmares, like I'm being chased by people who want to kill me, my life feels threatened in some way, and/or there's gory violence.

Some are just "bad dreams," usually involving embarrassment, rejection, or anxiety. My one sometimes reoccurring dream is that I'm very late to something, like a flight I need to catch. There's a pretty wide range though...work-related (supervisor or customer is telling me I did something wrong), or social life related, or...I even have those "finding yourself topless (never completely naked, for some reason) in a public place" dreams.

They make me mad because I wake up exhausted even though I technically got enough hours of sleep!

Anyone else have problems with bad dreams?

By the way -- I usually only drink caffeine in the morning and almost never in the evening, I'm not on anti-depressants, I exercise regularly but not right before bed, I get 7 or 8 hours of sleep a night, and I have a reasonably regular sleeping schedule.

 

[PoWer2tHePeOpLE]

i reckon i've had a good combination of pretty much all the different kind of dreams you described. when i was younger i used to have a recurring nightmare about a giant mutant pig charging at me out of a dark corridor, used to wake up in a sweat on a regular basis..

later on, nightmares of all kinds, particularly about a 'force' that would usually barge in through my front door and pick me up and swirl me around crazily. i remember fear and terror from these dreams.

i figured that the dreams were about. fear and terror. when i was a kid the chaos was wrapped up in a symbol.. a pig, for some reason, probably cause they scared the **** out of me when i lived on a farm for a bit as a tot. later in life the symbols changed until there was no coating remaining and the pure energy of the terror and chaos just picked me up and tossed me around. man, just thinking about those dreams gives me the creeps..

the last 'night terror' i had featured my brother's decapitation after a car accident..

but i mostly have dreams that include annoyances and irritations, perhaps with a bit of low-grade anxiety now, rather than nightmares.. my theory is that on some level i needed to accept the chaotic and fundamentally uncertain nature of the universe.. or i was repressing fears in my conscious life..

it's been a while since i had the 'turn up late to exams without my pants on' dream..

sometimes i do want to slap my subconscious around a bit for being an exhausting pain in the ass though..

 

[PsychoBilli]

I don't often remember my dreams. The last dream I remember was anxiety related. Everywhere I went the time was wrong. Whether it was my own watch or a clock at the bank, none of it was right, but I knew what the real time was. Then I got to work and I was accused of being late. I was on time, but the rest of the world was out of sync.

Now that I look back at it it reminds me of a saying a friend has, "If everyone would just do what I think they should this world would be a much better place." Sadly, I can't blame the world for my problems. All I can do is take care of myself, even if that means I have to fall out of step just like the rest of the world.

 

[SkuzzieMuff]

Have you ever had the ability to control or act freely within your dreams? This is a skill I've always had for some reason, just something I was good at. In scary dream situations, I just fly the **** away. Just take off, and don't go back. Then I usually wake up happy. But it is really hard to do. Sometimes, I still have the running issue, where you're running your ass off but only going really slow. This is a common issue with taking over your dreams....
I don't know if it's a learned skill, or if it's natural. But when you realize you're dreaming, try to take over. GET OUT. Maybe after awhile you'll be able to turn your dreams in a more positive direction. I often do that when I'm having a good dream that goes bad. As soon as I realize it's going the wrong direction, I try to change it. And I've noticed by taking over your dreams, you become more conscious, and are therefore more likely to wake up. So you've got just enough time to relieve your stress, and then you're awake.

This comes in handy with some of my worst nightmares. I guess, because I've always been able to do this, my dreams fought back. XD Now I have dreams where I wake up in my bed, do something, and die. Over and over. Die, wake up, do something, die, wake up..... I friggen hate these dreams. It gets to the point, where I'm so conscious I'm dreaming, I wake up, and sit in my bed with my arms crossed in my dream. Those, I just have to wait until I finally wake up for real... :\

 

[ThinkPositive]

Well, it seems that even the times I KNOW that I'm dreaming, I still have trouble. Like I would try to fly away, but I have a hard time, as if I'm in water trying to stay afloat but sinking.

 

[Badjedidude]

I dreamed I raped a chick once. How's THAT for a bad dream? @_@

Never took the time to think about what it meant. Just swept it under the rug.

@_@

 

[Sean]

Wow, that sounds really annoying .

I rarely can remember my dreams . .
I guess that's a good thing cause the ones I remember usually involve anxiety or embarassment . . like yours.

 

[JamaisVu]

Yeah, mine aren't outright nightmares that cause me to wake up, but they're usually exceedingly tedious and negative. Some dreams are just stupid, like I'll be back in high school and suddenly realize I've forgotten to attend a class all year. Sometimes I dream I've done something illegal and spend what seems like the entire night trying to avoid getting caught. My more violent dreams usually involve someone trying to kill me and my attempts to defend myself. They're just rarely pleasant and night after night of frustrating dreams wears me down.

Sometimes I think my subconscious just hates me. I've considered trying to lucid dream so I can steer my dreams into a better direction, but I end up so tired by the time I go to bed that it doesn't work. The only upside is that lately I haven't been able to remember most of my dreams.

So yeah, you're not alone

 

[trZ]

I have no idea why I'm writing this, but anyways...

I almost never have bad dreams, but those I can remember that have been bad are:

1. Reoccuring for years, I've had it maybe 5 times since my mother died. I live in our old house, my whole family is together again, and I know my mother is somewhere in the house. In my dreams, she is either just sleeping in her bed all the time, under the couch in the basement, or tucket in the closet. I had another version of this, and it was me and my father sitting at his place, he got a phonecall and he said my mother was alive. So we ran to where she was supposed to be, and we had to run across the town bridge, and just before we got to the island, the bridge collapsed and me and my dad drowned.

2. My landlord is annoying as hell, he is always walking into my apartment without clearance with me, and he is always picking on me for not doing stupid stuff like dusting the television or whatever. I keep the place clean but there's always something. <-- This is real life. In the dream he always calls the police, or we end up in a fight. This have been coming more and more the last month. Annoying!

EDIT: Yeah ok this thread is about you, ThinkingPositive. I would recommend getting a good sleep hygiene, like having a routine if you don't, having a good chilled temperature in your room etc. If this doesn't help, you could always se a therapist...

 

[edgecrusher]

i know how you feel but for me they arent nightmares and i wouldnt even really go as far as to call them "bad" dreams. its more just dreams that make me feel lonely and remind me of it. or dreams that i am assuming represent what i wish could have happened with a few girls that i may have potentially had a chance with. on average i seem to have about 1 or 2 a month like this. but by the end of the day i cant remember them for the most part, i just remember how they made me feel. there are a few that i still remember to this day. i would try to recommend a way to deal with this but i dont know how to either. dont really have any control over this, it just sort of happens.