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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

... to ask if anyone else has constant bad dreams?

41 replies

Dieu · 11/04/2015 09:50

Hi everyone
Just for once, it would be nice to wake up in the morning having had a pleasant dream, but it never seems to happen. In my daily life, I am a generally nice and easygoing person, so I can't understand it. In the past couple of nights I have dreamt such gems as being pregnant with my ex husband's child, and a teacher at my children's school abusing the kids Sad (I should add that it was a made up teacher, not someone real at all). I am sick of it. I love my sleep and have no problems sleeping, but I can't understand all these over-the-top vivid, depressing dreams.
I thought there might be someone on here who possesses a better understanding of these things than I do!
Thanks for reading.

OP posts:
Original poster
Dieu · 11/04/2015 09:53

Oh, and the other thing is that I never seem to NOT dream Confused

OP posts:
DistractedAgain · 11/04/2015 10:04

I could have written that, except I don't always sleep in the first instance. I have looked up my last nights Dream Meaning already, just to try to find a positive spin for last nights horrors. Some days they really stay with me. Mindfulness helps in the morning but not during the dream!

Pollyindia · 11/04/2015 10:08

Well yes, I do. I put it down to being on larium, the anti malarial drug, for 5 months 17 years ago. Definitely seemed to start then. My dreams are always exhausting and violent. I was actually halfway through writing a post to your thread then got distracted by the paper and saw this article:
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/apr/10/experience-anti-malaria-drugs-made-me-psychotic
I sympathise. I agree, deep breathing and yoga/meditation helps.

Original poster
Dieu · 11/04/2015 10:09

Thanks for replying DA! Is 'Mindfulness' a book? Difficult, isn't it? Do you have a lot going on in your everyday life? I know dreams are supposed to be about all the unprocessed stuff going on in our heads ...

OP posts:
Pollyindia · 11/04/2015 10:10

Obviously the guy in the article's experience very different and a lot worse than having bad dreams!

Original poster
Dieu · 11/04/2015 10:11

Gosh Pollyindia, it must at least be a relief to be able to put it down to the medication! And very fortuitous timing to spot the article like that! I am on no medication whatsoever.

OP posts:
GoEasyPudding · 11/04/2015 10:14

Recently I have had a run of very bad dreams. Really fraught depressing stuff.
Annoying isn't it?

I get recurring dreams too that seem to be trying to tell me something but I'm not sure what.

I do get a break sometimes though as I do get to dream very fun and nice things.

There must be a new age and woo solution to this problem for you...guided meditations on you tube... that sort of thing?

Original poster
Dieu · 11/04/2015 10:21

Will look into it, thanks GoEasy. And I have a recurring one too; a neglected room in my house (well, the house in my dreams!) that I never seem to want to enter. Not because it's spooky or anything like that, but I suspect I'm a bit OCD and I just can't face sorting the room out, so it niggles!

OP posts:
GoEasyPudding · 11/04/2015 10:50

There's certainly no harm in having a think about the themes that recur. It can be a lot of fun to try and work out what's going on.

I have the common one about being back at school. For me its about feeling stuck and yet not working hard enough to get what I want. In the dream I am old but being held back at school for decades as I haven't studied and have somehow forgotten to sit my exams!

Apparently its useful to analyse how you feel during the dream.

However do not dwell too much on the scary random things you have dreamt. Its good to dismiss some stuff as just crazy nonsense and nothing really to worry about.

MagelanicClouds · 11/04/2015 10:58

I get recurring bad dreams when I'm feeling under long term stress or worry. When pg last I had a run of dreams about losing the baby - we'd race to hospital and then be forced to wait endlessly behind a long queue of time wasters.
The reasons for those dreams were obvious but as for why I get the dream where my teeth start falling out a lot I have no idea!
Do you drink a lot of tea or coffee?

DoJo · 11/04/2015 11:55

I sometimes wake up feeling more tired than when I went to bed after dreams that are particularly stressful, usually just about a series of tasks that I must complete, a group of people that are being particularly irksome or something that I am trying to avoid that keeps seeking me out. I have had these kinds of dreams since I was tiny though, and now it appears my son is prone as well.. Sad

ChipDip · 11/04/2015 12:03

This is me!
I have very rare nights were I don't dream. And these dreams always are not good ones. They are very detailed and always with people I know, not random strangers iyswim.
They're also sometimes with people I probably haven't spoken to or seen maybe 10yrs.

Gruntfuttock · 11/04/2015 12:07

In my case my nightmares are a side-effect of the antidepressant I take (citalopram) and some upset me for days. I take ages to get to sleep and when I finally do, I have really bad dreams.
When I was on Seroxat I had lucid dreams, which were amazing.

Yddraigoldragon · 11/04/2015 12:11

I had really bad dreams when taking statins. Yet another side effect they don't tell you about.

TruJay · 11/04/2015 12:19

I had awful dreams when I was suffering a patch of anxiety. It was always my DH and DS going out in the car and dying in an accident and the police knocking at the door to tell me. Another was DS drowning, mostly falling into a well at one of the reservoir walks we go on.
It's not a nice experience at all.

trashcanjunkie · 11/04/2015 12:22

Most of my dreams are bloody harrowing or violent slasher type things. Seems to have bugger all to do with anything.

I have a female friend who is similar age and she has the same. We are always delighted at the occasional nice dream. Although my nice dreams seem to involve cakes and sweets, which I feel anxious about as I'm low carbing!!!

My one best ever dream I have every five years or so is a horse riding dream which then turns into a flying dream. I love it and zoom about everywhere.

DisgraceToTheYChromosome · 11/04/2015 12:35

My bad dreams are tiresome. Last night's night's was about driving a school bus full of chavs round Hull.

My nice dreams are usually about Heaven. It resembles the Auvergne, and involves flying from restaurant to restaurant with my DF.

gingerparkin · 11/04/2015 12:46

This is me. Every night I dream. Never nice dreams, not always nightmares but always exhausting. I repeatedly dream that I am watching an aeroplane crash and feel helpless at not being able to do anything. Have had this for as long as I can remember. Also dream that I am sitting exams that I haven't revised for. I wonder whether it's more a symptom of a disturbed sleep pattern and I wake at the point of being able to remember my dreams if you see what I mean. I have recently gone through surgical menopause and my sleep is impacted by the menopause symptoms and the dreams seem to have increased in intensity. I would love to have a nice dream for a change. The other repetitive ones I get are having to dial 999 and not be able to make my fingers connect with the right buttons and one where I am running and can't stop! Hmm

RevoltingPeasant · 11/04/2015 12:54

Me too, with the disturbing slasher dreams, and also these very creepy dreams about moving into or staying in a house or motel which is largely deserted, and night is coming on, and there's an odd light everywhere. Or roaming deserted country landscapes.

The teeth falling out one is meant to be about fear of ageing magelanic

cinders456 · 11/04/2015 15:31

Frequent bad dreams can be a sure sign of depression/ anxiety. Is that a possibility?

ilovelamp82 · 11/04/2015 15:39

I used to get horrendous dreams when I was giving up smoking. Really horrible. It's common for withdrawal. My friend suggested taking a multivitamin before bed and they stopped.

Could have been that my withdrawals had just stopped coincidentally at the same time, but it's something that certainly won't do any harm to try.

I also find I feel like I've had a great nights sleep and wake up refreshed rather than groggy if I have one before bed anyway.

upthedamnwotsit · 11/04/2015 15:41

It's bloody horrible OP. Mine have calmed down a little now, but when I was taking the SSRI sertraline every night was in full technicolor. The nightmares were absolutely horrific. It felt like I was living two lives- the waking one and a sleeping one that took place in strange dystopia and left me exhausted and unhappy whenever I woke up.

I put the ongoing bad dreams down to poor sleep hygiene and being quite an anxious person. What's your routine like before you sleep?

MrsTerryPratchett · 11/04/2015 15:42

Pollyindia I had the worst dreams with Larium. I hate horror films and my dreams WERE horror films for a few months. My friend was very badly affected while awake. Nasty drug.

I once read that the people living in Nazi camps only had good dreams. I don't know if that's true, and it probably isn't for everyone but it is interesting.

UncertainSmile · 11/04/2015 15:44

Every night; not nightmares, just hugely imaginative and disturbing. Probably Citalopram related.

bookbag40 · 11/04/2015 15:54

Yes not always bad but exhausting. I never wake feeling relaxed and rested.