Question Anxiety dreams...

[PhantomCruiser]

My wife had one of her reoccurring anxiety dreams the other day and I got to thinking… How common are these really, and what is most common dream?

Most often her dream is where she is taking an exam on a subject on which she didn’t study or prepare. I’ve only had one similar to that once.

I’ve never had the one where I’m naked in public, but I've heard that it is a common dream. Mostly my anxiety dreams are where I’m driving a car and the brakes do not work.

I don’t have them often, perhaps maybe once every few years, but wifey gets them regularly. My kid says she gets a “late for class” dream every now and again.

What about you guys?

 

[MeDiCS]

As far as I remember, none.

 

[rseferino]

I remember something which to me is common: [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis"]Sleep paralysis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]. Since some years now I spend a couple of times a month. I wake up and not to move. When you do not know what to be, I terrify.

Naked in public ... I dream several times.

Another is being persecuted and unable to escape or feel very close to the tracker and not see it.

Another I've had is I die. It's actually drop dead, and keep looking around, paralyzed.

And big, the apocalypse I dreamed several times, being away from home and worry about my family (mother, brother and nephew). Nuclear apocalypse, and a nightmare world of disintegrating as a chapter of Stargate.

To you happen to be half asleep and suddenly feel like going to fall down and jump on one leg?

 

[RisingFury]

Me? I drown, then wake up gasping for air...


EDIT: Great, my 2000th post and I wasted it like this

 

[iamwearingpants]

I had a dream where I would be standing in my backyard with a friend and there would be a nuclear explosion. The sky would turn red and we would run inside and die, and the dream would repeat.

It didn't bother me at all, although the dream strangely resembles the current state of our backyard and North Korea just said they were going to start WWIII :hmm:

 

[Jarvitä]

I usually get the worst nightmares when I wake up early in the morning (4-5 am) then go back to sleep. Most of the time it's an everyday life scene turning into something like a scene from an Electric Retard comic, ridiculous but utterly terrifying for those few moments after you wake up.

 

[Artlav]

Happened from time to time.
It seems to be linked to stress.

During exams i had dreams about having to pass all the exams again (US president comes to moscow on a visit, i walk a little too close and got put to cold sleep for a year as they investigate why i done it, i get out in terror of needing to pass all the exams again and start making a time machine to get back to were it started, at which point it first loops as whole, then loops around the machine not working, parts missing, everything shrinking, the machine is too small to ride or make any sense, and then it's morning).

Since graduation i can't remember ever having another such dream.

Another pattern i noted - what you did during the day affect what would you dream of. I once played minecraft for a whole day, and got dreams in cubes and pixels.

 

[JonnyBGoode]

I have a recurring dream of being in a front-end collision. Those usually jolt me awake when they happen.

 

[DanM]

My dreams that are like that are almost exactly like rage comics.

 

[fireballs619]

When I was 3 to about 9, I would always have this dream where a monster would be coming towards me, but I was unable to move or shout (I know, a typical child's dream). I later realized that my sleep paralysis probably hadn't taken effect completely, so I was still semi-conscious but still undergoing paralysis (hence the not being able to move or speak).

Since then, I haven't had many re-occurring anxiety dreams, except occasionally I'll have one where I'm driving and take a turn sharply, resulting in me spinning out. This is strange, because I've never driven a day in my life :lol:.

 

[Rtyh-12]

My dreams are absolutely, incredibly stupid and idiotic. I'm having the "falling off something when half awake" feeling quite often, usually it's about me standing on top of a shelf full of Coke and falling off together with the shelf. I occasionally fall off other things, but it always includes coke. It's really weird because I've never drunk one in my life...

My anxiety dreams are even more idiotic. Once I dreamt that my mum wanted to destroy the living room because me and my sister where jumping around too much and mum called a team of professional room destroyers and they came with one of those cranes with black balls and then the entire room was in ruin, although I wanted to stop her. I woke up and immediately I looked around to see if it was true. :hmm:

 

[Keatah]

I dreamed of a failed x-15 drop from a b2, or something like that. Except that the b2 was like the size of a stadium or something.

I also dreamed I had to backup a 25 TB hard disk (that had frozen gas platters) with an 8-Track ZipDrive, or else I couldn't get any candy.

An offshoot of Stephen King's 'Wordprocessor of the gods' short story - I had overclocked my pc so fast that it ripped a whole in the space-time continuum. Or it did something equally strange.. hard to remember.

 

[DanM]

When I was 3 to about 9, I would always have this dream where a monster would be coming towards me, but I was unable to move or shout (I know, a typical child's dream). I later realized that my sleep paralysis probably hadn't taken effect completely, so I was still semi-conscious but still undergoing paralysis (hence the not being able to move or speak).

Since then, I haven't had many re-occurring anxiety dreams, except occasionally I'll have one where I'm driving and take a turn sharply, resulting in me spinning out. This is strange, because I've never driven a day in my life :lol:.

When I was really little, about two I think, I would have night terrors. I apparently had bad dreams after watching trains hitting crash test dummies and during these dreams, I would sit up with my eyes open and scream "AHHH! THE TRAIN!"

Last night I had a bad dream, I can't remember what it was though, but I woke up from it with my head under the covers, and it was very stuffy. The same thing happened a few weeks ago, but I had to use my inhaler.

 

[Quick_Nick]

Generally, my notable bad dreams are of being just unable to do something. Like barely able to make a whisper no matter how much i try to yell, or being too extremely weak to do something, or running in slow-motion. (or indeed, brakes do a lot less than they should) Almost like being paralyzed I guess, except I'm still asleep. (so not sleep paralysis)
I've had numerous dreams about school. Not much pattern other than being in trouble and to an unusual degree.
But these dreams aren't very common for me, they just stand out for me to remember. For a while, I had no bad dreams (or often memorable dreams whatsoever) regardless of what I do before going to sleep. But I think stress lately has reversed that. :/

 

[computerex]

My dreams always have to do with what I was doing. The day that I played minecraft all day, I was making an underground base in my dream. When I play League of Legends, I typically see myself playing LoL in my dreams. It is bad when I code, because in my dreams I am trying to solve some unsolvable problem.

 

[Fabri91]

I rarely even remeber my dreams, and when I do they are often rather boring...most often they are about a very normal and everyday situation that has some strange things in it, such as people I know that are smaller than me appearing taller, and the other way round...
once I also dreamt about some people trying to hunt me down for no apparent reason, but that only happened once a couple of months ago. Never had real anxiety dreams, as far as I can remember at least, but sometimes I had the "falling while half asleep" feeling, although even that has happened only very seldomly.

 

[n72.75]

Being dissected by a large insect...

 

[RisingFury]

Being dissected by a large insect...

Oh, the joy! :lol:

 

[Krys]

Well some of them are too private to share but my usual ones;

I've shoplifted something and am running through the shopping centre trying to keep away from the security guards.

I've left my baby in the nursery and there is a fire going to consume him/her.

and the most recurring nightmare is that I die in many different ways on the day I turn 36.

 

[Arrowstar]

It is bad when I code, because in my dreams I am trying to solve some unsolvable problem.

This happens to me all the time. Typically the "problem" I'm trying to solve is only vaguely defined and usually nonsensical, but the frustration that comes with it is quite real. I have to actively calm myself down in the middle of the night before being able to fall asleep again.

I've had the dreams described in the Wikipedia "sleep paralysis" article, but not since I was in elementary school.