My horrible nightmare......sigh!

Steely

Active Member
So, I really have some of the worst nightmares of anyone I have ever encountered. Most of them stem from PTSD stuff that happened when I was a kid........but they are real, tangible, breath taking nightmares that leave me mentally wracked far into the next day.

So last night, I had one of these larger than life nightmares about my son. He was killed in a motorcycle accident in the dream - but every aspect was so vivid and real, it has left me a mess today. It incorporated every aspect of our real life all in metaphors, down to the minutia of:
~he had the wreck because he was racing his dirt bike on this small road "of life" with no care to the dangers that others had told him about
~the guy in charge of the track told him that this run would not be a good one because a tanker truck was coming the other way. difficult child told him it "would be fine", "he would just go around it". Everyone told him that he could not go around it, he had to just not be on the track. difficult child ignored them.
~I was watching from far away, knowing it was all dangerous, but he had done stuff like this since the day he was born - so I did not intervene.
~I watched the whole dream unfold as he zoomed down the track and into the wheels of this tanker truck, and then I hid my eyes.
~No one could find his body, and they blamed me for hiding my eyes.
~I had to convince everyone that I knew he really was dead - because I had watched him go under the wheels - despite the fact we could not find the body.

This dream was so real - I was screaming and crying as if Mat really had died. And it encountered every feeling I might have if difficult child really had died. Even, my guilt ridden relief that I would no longer have to deal with his crud, was in the dream. In fact that was the point I seemed to wrestle most with in the dream. Was I really relieved, in some small way?

At the end I decided there was no part of me that was relieved - that I simply could not live without him - and all I could do is scream and cry in this life without him. Then the dream morphed into death as it pertains to my life - my grandparents were in it, who are both dead. And my dad, who has brain cancer, was dead already in the dream, and my mom had also died..........and I was ALL alone. It was horrible.

I guess the thing about this dream is that so much of it was metaphorical for what I really feel and am experiencing with Mat - that I feel there was some sort of message in it. Am I really hiding my head in the sand as I watch him wreck his life? Would there really be some small part of me that is relieved if he disappeared? What a horrible thought! Do I have enough anger at him for all of the things he has done that I wish him dead sometimes? Again, horrible! Or the worst, most haunting thing is, am I sensing a potential disaster but not consciously aware of it that this dream was trying to warn me about.

I know........I can spin things. :blush:
It is just that these dreams like this - almost always have deep meaning for me - so to have one of this horrible of a magnitude has me reeling.
Oh, how I wish I did not need to sleep! I hate, hate, hate, dreams.
 

totoro

Mom? What's a difficult child?
Oh I am sorry, I have had some bad dreams that seemed to bring up crud from from my past and mix it with things that are going on now... always very scary out of control usually violent. I usually feel them the next day, kind of a haze.

husband has worse ones kind of like what you describe, he will wake screaming... his get worse when he has to travel, he dreams alot of me and the girls getting killed and the despair he has to go through.. it is horrible for him. I watch him struggle in his sleep.

I hope you can get a better night sleep... I put a sound machine on for us, and spray lavender on our bed... hoping it will help him.

Hugs
 
You poor thing.

There is nothing worse than dreaming that your child is hurt. I will pray that your mind can settle down. Please try not to look for the hidden meanings, or you will make yourself crazy.

Understanding hugs.
 

Star*

call 911........call 911
Willow,


Sometimes our dreams uninterpreted can appear like it's all bad. There are books that will define the meanings behind dreams.

Seeing a son in a dream signifies success. Dreaming of death is rarely a bad omen. Dreaming of motorcycle racing is a sign you will get suprise help to solve a problem. Speaking to someone who is dead (grandparents) and soon you will get some good news. Seeing your grandparents in a dream is a symbol of protection and security. Dreaming of someone else's death can mean a birth or a small warning for you to slow down as you're taking on too much.

Usually accidents on land relate to business matters. In general whatever the accident involves: fire, electricity, knives, etc. try to avoid them.

Overall understand that our body is made up chemically and stores bits and pieces of information in pictures. We store these pictures, sounds and smells as life. IT's almost like your head is a big warehouse of boxes upon boxes of stored data. When you are stressed out the body is forced to put pieces of these chemically stored thoughts into missing places. Sometimes the pieces just don't fit or mean what we think they do.

Overall true nightmares occur in the non-dream phase of sleep, and have very little remembered content. Sometimes what we see in our dreams is a casting off of our old selves.

IT really is a different way to look at it, and it's frightening. But there are more interpretations to what you "saw" in dreamland that just the obvious. Ask your son if he's had any odd dreams lately.

I hope you can find meaning in your dream. All things are not what they appear at first - remember that.

Hugs, love and peaceful sleep
Star
 

Steely

Active Member
Thank you guys.....I will definitely try not to read too much into it. It is just that, in the past, I have had dreams that have become a reality. I know that sounds too weird, and like I am bonkers (well maybe a little :crazy: ) - but it is true none the less. My last one was when my grandmother got deathly ill. She is 2000 miles away, but I had a dream of the exact circumstances the night it was happening, only to awake to my mom calling me to tell me the same dream I just had, was true. It was like the freaking Twilight Zone.......and very unsettling.

Ever watch the show Medium? That is me sometimes. I know it is rather unbelievable, as I am not superstitious, or believe in ghosts, or spirits, but yet I seem to have some kinda 6th sense about things. When Matt was having such a hard time 5 years ago, I dreamed about it all in detail 3 months before it happened. So.....bottom line is.....I scare myself!!!! I don't like it!

Does anyone else ever have this happen - or am I just WAY out here, in my own little weirdo-ville? OK, never mind, don't answer that! :grin:

None the less, I will try and not worry about it. You are right, the dreams could mean or be any number of things.
 

DammitJanet

Well-Known Member
WW...do you ever sleep with the tv on? Also, are you on medications?

The reason I ask is because I get these types of really awful dreams too but we have pretty much assumed it is because of the medications I have been on and the fact that my tv is on while I sleep and I somehow link the words from the tv into my brain even though Im asleep.
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
WW, I am so sorry. I know the feeling. I have weird dreams, too, and wake up in the middle of the night covered in sweat. I sometimes walk around the house to make sure everyone is all right.
One time I had a horrid dream about easy child, where I was driving to a cemetery where everyone came out of the graves at night, and they'd take over your mind and invade your body. husband had already been "taken," and I was desperately trying to save easy child, even though she was seated next to me and the doors were locked. Then she turned and looked at me and her eyes had glazed over and I knew it was too late. I grieved as though she had truly died.
Funny thing is, husband, when I told him, said, "Oh, I saw that movie!" and it was almost an exact copy of a movie I'd never seen.
I've had things come true, too. I like to think that it's because I'm connected to the people around me and I'm letting my subconscious "work" while I'm asleep. Often, you see and hear things during the day and you store them in your brain, but you don't consciously realize it. While you're sleeping, you put all the pieces together and thus, "predict" the future. It's amazing how our brains are always working, even when we're asleep.

Oh, one more thing. I often sleep in the guest room, because husband snores. When we first moved into the house where we're now living, I had repeated, horrid nightmares to the point I called it "The Nightmare Room." I even asked easy child and husband to sleep in there to see if the same thing would happen to them. Of course, they weren't interested. I decided to rip out the carpet and pad, replace it, repaint the whole room, and scrub everything down. The nightmares were cut down by about 50%.
Don't know what sorts of toxins were in there but since I don't believe in ghosts, that was my only option. And I was pleased with-the results.
Now, to get rid of the other 50% ... but then, I've always been like that.

Good luck! I feel for you. Nothing like waking up exhausted from a good night's sleep. :frown:
 

Fran

Former desparate mom
Weeping Willow, I seldom remember dreams, seldom have nightmares, have no psychic abilities.
Recently after 2 nights of little sleep, I dreamt about easy child in NYC. The emotions were so raw, so vivid and devastating. I sobbed in the dream, in real life and sobbed for hours afterwards. They wouldn't let me see his body and I collapsed. It was as vivid and real as anything I have expierenced. I have never felt despair like that in my life.
I, too, worry that this is telling of something but I mustn't keep easy child in a glass bubble.
Believe me what a leap of faith it is for me to let him go to NYC. Every time he is out at night, I am a shade more aware of phone calls.
I don't have interpretations. I don't know if it means something.
It will color his whole 4 yrs of education for me. I don't think I will ever forget the rawness of the pain as I have never felt before.
You have my sympathies.
 

Steely

Active Member
Yes, Fran and Terry.........that is exactly it! Feeling a feeling so deeply and profoundly as if it is happening - but yet it is a dream - and even when you wake up you feel it has really happened and continue to have those emotions in your throat throughout the day. Truly - I believe that if someone wanted to torture me, all they would have to do is cause me to dream incessantly!!!

Terry, it is funny - I did the same thing about moving rooms - and it did really help. I have to have my bed against 2 walls also, it makes me feel safer. Something about FengShui (sp?)...........?????

Janet, I only take Celexa, and I do not think that effects the dreams in any way. And no, I cannot sleep with anything on, not even the radio because I can't fall asleep if it is on. In fact, one time, I bought one of those fountains to add peace to my room - and I could not sleep with that in there either!! I kept waking up and thinking the faucet was dripping! Good Grief! I know!

Anyway........thanks so much for listening, and empathizing. It is good to know I am not alone.
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
Oh, fountains. We bought a fountain for our room, yrs ago. It lasted a wk b4 we unplugged it. Same thing ... we thought it would be peaceful but it drove us crazy.
I like it in the lobbies of hotels, or spas, or dr ofcs, but not in the bedroom.
 

Marguerite

Active Member
I used to have really horrible, vivid nightmares as a child - I can still remember them. A number of them were recurring. One huge blessing for me in getting married, was in having someone I could have near when I woke from a nightmare too terrified to move. As a younger person I could lie awake for hours (listening to the clock chime) and too terrified to move or even make a breathing sound, in case whatever-it-was I'd been dreaming about was still nearby and waiting to pounce.

Having a sympathetic husband made a HUGE difference, but he has had to be patient for many years. It's been a while since I had a really nasty dream and I handle them much better these days, but I do still feel the grief, the terror and the ghastly sense of doom they could raise in me. Some were so bad I will NOT relate them here, they would literally make you ill.

What worked for me (besides having husband to cuddle) was learning to interpret my dreams. I tried Freud, felt that his symbols were just downright weird, and so I began to read across the spectrum and came to the following conclusions:

Some dream symbology is universal, some is not. When a dream involves spiders, most of us would cringe and see this as a negative, fearful image. But to someone who studies and loves spiders, such an image has a very different meaning.
Freud's symbolism was relevant more to the culture in which he lived as well as the times - more people were openly religious, so religious symbolism would have been more prevalent in dreams. There was more sexual repression, so sexual dreams would have used more symbolism and been more subtle (and maybe more frequent?)

But back to now - you need to think about what the various symbols mean TO YOU. Who was there? What else did their presence in your life mean? What other objects were there? Were you really you in the dream, or were you somewhere else? Was there a sense of ownership of any place or thing in the dream?

All this can be very important.

As a rule, dreaming of death does NOT indicate death, it more commonly means change. In this example, I think it represents fear of change especially what that means for your son's future. You have been worrying about what will become of him, whether he is going to totally wreck his chances in life by stubbornly pursuing his dream instead of at least listening to advice and finding another option, another way around his obstacles. (I'm not being psychic here, you've hinted at this yourself in recent posts).

I think this dream is telling you just how concerned you are for him, and how afraid you are that people will blame you for his failures in the future. The dream is making you face this fear NOW, to help you deal with it now and move past it so you CAN help your son.

Dreams are generally made to help us. They are our brains assimilating and filing away the input of the day. Anything we have been worrying about chronically, which we are unable to resolve, will often show up in a recurring dream. If we allow ourselves to be overtired and/or overstimulated, we are more likely to have a very full night with busy, confused nightmarish dreams. I find my dreams change a lot while I'm on holiday, getting worse the longer we are away. I know when the nightmares begin to turn up, that it's time to go home. Or at least, arrange for a rest day the next day, doing something very familiar.

And speaking of familiar - if you dream of home, even if the 'home' in your dream is not your own, the contents of that home represent you, the real you inside yourself. Is it cluttered? Or spartan? Is it bright and airy? Or dark, dusty, in need of a clean? This may be something only on the fringe of what you recall of a dream, but ANY information can be useful, and if the dream is saying that your own mind is cluttered, dark, gloomy - take note and do something to bring about a positive change. Your mind is warning you...

As you try to analyse your dreams you will notice some symbols keep recurring. To try to work out what the symbol means TO YOU, concentrate on how you feel when focussing on that symbol in your dream.

Writing down your dreams can be very helpful. Sometimes I've had a dream which I wrote down because it was interesting, although I couldn't work out what it was trying to tell me (if anything). I've even written stories from dreams, although this usually doesn't work - what seems so logical the instant you wake soon can become a total mess when you try to sort it out. But writing it down helps you get better at finding out what the dreams are telling you, which makes you a lot better at resolving a lot of your own issues before they get really big and out of control (like a runaway semi). You can also begin to recognise recurring symbols and even work out what they mean - from within the dream! When you find yourself analysing the dream while still dreaming - you know you are doing well!

We all dream, quite a lot - but we only remember those dreams which were happening while we were on the edge of waking.

A dream book is a very helpful thing. You need to keep it right beside you with pen handy, and write as soon as you wake. You will be surprised by how much you don't remember when you go back to read what you've written. it doesn't matter if you don't remember more than a fragment well enough to write down - what you DID remember is clearly what is more relevant to you, and this is what you work on.

There should be nothing "oogy boogy" in this - it's sound, ordinary psychology. If you look at the parapsychology stuff ("did I really dream the exact details of grandma's death before it happened?") you can often see that enough information filtered to you IN LIFE, in your days beforehand, to give your subconscious fears for that person, some reality.

Mind you, I am not saying that there aren't paranormal dreams - nor am I saying there are. I've had a few odd things happen too. The mind and brain - amazing things. If you dissect a brain it's hard to see any identifiable structure - yet look what a brain can do!

Marg
 
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