Does anyone else have weird recurring dreams?!

[Sandpiperwavedance]

Last night I had one of my two regular recurring dreams, about realising I have an upcoming exam for a module I’d totally forgotten about, which I haven’t revised for at all 😱 (I left uni nearly 20 years ago!)

The other one I have is about getting home and finding the front door ajar, being terrified there’s an intruder in my house or all my stuff has been taken! (Not sure where this comes from, as it’s never happened in real life - touch wood!)

These dreams don’t happen very often, but they’ve been cropping up every now and then for as long as I can remember, and they still really unsettle me!

It’s got me wondering, do other people experience a similar thing? What are the weird recurring dreams you can’t escape from?!

I have one that has been recurring since I was 6/7 and I still have it sometimes as a 52year old.
Im looking out of my mum's bedroom window across the back gardens into the neighbours house. In the window is a ghost (but invisible) and he is wearing a pink gingham dress (that I really wanted and got as a kid!) and a black beret. Nothing happens we just look at each other.

I also have lots of shark related dream....cos Jaws really did a number on me as a kid!! Im always in water that I can't see into and I know something is lurking underneath. And, weirdly, im in a swimming pool but the sides get really tall so I cant get out and there are sharks in the pool.

No wonder I can't swim!!😂

The shark they filmed in the Med the other day is enough to give people nightmares!
What I find fascinating about my dreams is nobody talks in them. You can think things, but they play out like silent films. Not sure if other people have dreams where they speak ?

When I was younger (6-9) and going through a lot of trauma I had a recurring dream about a parent dying, in a very long and protracted way, where I could hear them and couldn't do anything about it. I had it most nights and it gave me a huge anxiety around certain smells and environments because I wondered if it was prophetic. I still get panicked now thinking about it and those quite specific environments.

Car brakes failing. Never at high speed though. Always approaching a junction where I have already slowed down but then can't stop rolling through a red light or over a crossroads. Never leads to an accident but feels horrible and out of control.

Also living in a new house that has loads of extra rooms but they are all filled with random furniture that isn't mine but I'm not allowed to get rid of and are in really bad condition although the rest of the house is fine.

I’ve got two, one is being woefully unprepared for a holiday I’ve got booked. Either I haven’t packed and can’t get it together enough to actually chuck a few clothes etc in a bag or I get to the airport and have to figure out how to get on the plane with no ticket or passport.

My other recurring dream is about vending machines. It’s usually that I get extra things out of it like money or unexpected items but sometimes it’ll be that I can’t get what I’ve paid for. This is definitely the stranger one!

I get the driving a car from the back seat one. Also the manky toilet one.

I also get one that’s a slightly different plot each time but basically years ago I did something terrible but unspecified. I know (in the dream) that some piece of evidence exists hidden away that would give me away, and something has happened to bring it to light. I know with awful certainty that everything I have, my whole life will be over once this gets out, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

AGGH yes I’ve had the toilet one too! Either in a huge place with rows and rows of loos, they are all in use and searching for a clean one becuase they are all disgusting and I have no option.
Or, I’m In a nice place like a yoga studio or a bar and they have one toilet but it’s open to the whole place, so no door at all. And I’m desperate so I have to do a poo in front of everyone and pretend I’m not. Even though I’m there sitting in a loo in the open. Awful.

Yes, same! Exactly like that. Clearly a shared fear.

I've had a couple in my lifetime. I've had the same one 3 times about a torrid affair with a young Art Malik. Just a couple of seconds before I wake up, he hands me some beautiful jewellery!
Twice I've had a dream I'm in a little rowing boat, in the middle of the deep ocean. I'm frantically rowing and panicking because I'm going in circles. Then I hear awful loud, metallic groaning and creaking. Next I'm looking down at myself and beneath me there is the biggest, rusty shipwreck I've ever seen. I can't see the beginning or end of it. Each time I've woken up in a sweat.

I have a constantly recurring one regarding me losing my watch, or my wedding/engagement rings. Always losing something on my hands/wrists. I wake up with my heart pounding, frantically checking my hands! I'd be gutted if I lost my rings, the watch I'd be annoyed but definitely not in the panic that my dream seems to think!

I use to have a dream about my teeth falling out a lot, which I think is a sign of stress, however thankfully haven't had that one in a while.

I had a period of losing all my teeth in my dreams and waking up looking in mirrors to see if they were still there. I do have two gaps ( which I hate) so probably just insecurity around missing teeth at that time.
I do hate the anxiety type of dreams, but nothing goes right for me in my ones!

It is so interesting isn't it? Like @Endofthetunnel25 that is possibly your subconscious saying you don't want to risk your marriage with losing rings, losing time with the watch.

If anyone finds it interesting I found Google AI to be quite deep when I had a particularly vivid dream a few months ago. It ended up feeling like a therapy session to be honest!

I used to work in a pub about 20 years ago that had a bar and a lounge, and ever since then whenever I get stressed I have a dream that it's kicking out time and I'm the only barman still working.

I get everyone out of the bar, but then find they're in the lounge. So kick them out of there, only to find they've headed back into the bar. And so on and so on and so on and so on until I wake up drenched in sweat and incredibly annoyed.

I read somewhere feeling of impending doom could be symptom of heart problems, so maybe worth going to a gp for a quick check up

I was having palpitations due to low iron and these doom laden dreams!

I dream quite often that I am back at boarding school, in my uniform, but in my 49 year old body. It’s weird and I would like it to stop 🤣

Not anymore but I used to dream I had murdered someone and buried them in my parents’ back garden! The police were closing in and getting closer with every new dream. It was so vivid sometimes I’d wake up thinking it was real!

Thankfully, I Googled it and other people had had the same because I was starting to worry about my sanity.

Oh, and when I was a kid, I had a recurring dream that the man who lived opposite my grandparents was a vampire.

I tried to warn everyone in the family but none of them believed me, so when he finally made his move, they invited him in and I was the only one to survive because I knew what he was and ran home!

I have 2 recurring dreams. The first is that i have been arrested because a suitcase full of drugs has been found in my attic. The police don't believe me when i tell them that the suitcase isn't mine as i have never done drugs. The second is that i have moved to Denmark in order to work for the danish police and i get the silent treatment from my work colleagues.

I have the exam one frequently but weirdly it’s about exams for a qualification I already have but when I wake up it feels so real. I’m very far away from university etc and I’ve been having the same dream about it for probably 5 years. Think I mainly have it when I’m worried about forgetting things or have a lot on my mind

🤣 Isn’t it funny how this is such a common dream! I wonder what it says about the human psyche (or the female psyche - I’m guessing men may not have this dream!!)

I also have the toilet dream! I'm searching around a massive building - toilets are all occupied, or in a terrible state, no doors, no looseats, wee/poo everywhere, walls dripping - think The Worst Toilet in Scotland from the Trainspotting film - in the end I just have to go, and it's gross....

I have another regularly recurring one - I'm living in a house (nothing like my actual house, although sometimes it loosely resembles places I have known in the past, like my aunt's house, or a schoolfriend's); in the dream it's my home.....and yet, I suddenly discover a whole new wing, new floor, new corridor, full of enormous and rundown rooms that I've never actually used! A massive second kitchen, vast bedrooms, bathrooms, attics, all full of stuff from 20 years ago, when the last people moved out. I'm thinking oh, I completely forgot about these rooms, how exciting to have all this space, maybe we should start using them?! Then I'm trying to work out how to renovate them, and it all seems a bit overwhelming.

Gawd knows what it means.

I also have the toilet dream! Searching through toilets that are either occupied or too disgusting to use, or out in public 😱

I usually wake up desperate for the loo when I have those dreams.

I’m so relieved to hear that other people have manky toilet dreams - thought it was just me!
I have a lot of weird recurring dreams and for a while kept a diary where I wrote down what I remembered as soon as I woke up. Apparently that can help with purging the anxiety and I think it did but it’s quite an effort! Might try that again as weird dreams seem to be getting more frequent with menopause symptoms.

Yes, I have a recurring dream about a house we have bought. In my dream we already have an old Victorian house that we are trying to do up on a shoestring budget and then for some reason we have also bought a huge, derelict mansion. At one point the front of it (which has towers) collapses and I'm devastated because it was beautiful and I'm determined to rebuild it.

I know all the rooms in this place - they are all needing so much work, and I'm often busy decorating huge 70s style blue or pink flowered bedrooms with en suite coloured bathroom suites. At the same time I'm telling myself there is so much to be done building wise if we are ever going to be able to live in the place.

I've dreamed it so many times now that I know the place inside out - but I'm never managing to actually get it sorted.