Page 2 | to ask you about recurring dreams

NotNob · 2015-05-01T19:50:00+00:00

I have a recurring dream, slight variances but always in the same vein. It is a few days before my exams (usually A levels) and until this point I have completely forgotten to revise. I am terrified and have an impending sense of doom; I must pass them but realise there is not enough time. I feel literally crushed by the weight of the paperwork. I always wake before the exam. This is probably a classic anxiety dream - I was very conscientious at school but the stress of A levels made me ill. But this was 20 years ago fgs!! Anyone else get recurring dreams? Do you attach any importance to them?

LetticeKnollys · 01/05/2015 22:29

I have the teeth one whenever I'm stressed or anxious! I notice one is wobbly and it falls out, and before I know it they're all falling out faster than I can cope with.

I used to have horrible dreams when I was a young child, I would go as far as to call them night terrors, they are some of my earliest memories and I can still remember them so clearly.

SmartiesMakeMeNaughty · 01/05/2015 22:31

I have a ridiculous recurring dream about repeatedly kicking a football at a duck.
In the dream it's really stressful because it's a horrible thing to do and I can't stop but when I wake up I just think what the fuck!?

SilverBirch2015 · 01/05/2015 22:32

Oh yes, I have the pet guilt ones too. Awful.

I can relate to the drinking ones. I gave up smoking 15 years ago and sometimes dream I am secretly smoking, or just trying one and then realise I can't stop.

I sound a total neurotic mess!

Sidalee7 · 01/05/2015 22:34

For a couple of years after splitting up with DH I used to frequently dream that we got back together.

Before that I had a recurring dream that I was marrying my DH but it wasn't him, when he turned around, it was my ex.

I think it sums up my relationship history!

BloodyDogHairs · 01/05/2015 22:36

Mines is usually I need to phone someone but the phone doesn't work/I forget the number. Also I dream alot that I have left my young dc's in the house by accident and I can't run or the car won't drive.

I'm going on holiday shortly and my nightmares are about my dogs going into the kennels......I've forgotten to take them so they are locked in the house.

I seem to have a theme going on

HelenF350 · 01/05/2015 22:36

I quite often dream that my teeth fall out. Although the last 2 nights I've dreamt that my waters broke ?? Freaking me out as I'm only 31+4!

MumsKnitter · 01/05/2015 22:36

Oh Notnob, I'm an ex smoker, and occasionally dream that I'm smoking. I feel gutted that I've restarted - so disappointed with myself!

FrChewieLouie · 01/05/2015 22:40

SilverBirch, I've had the one about a murder being found out years after the event. Absolutely awful, by far the worst of my recurring dreams. Interestingly, dd1 (poor her) has had this one too.

I also get a degree-related one, where I've done no work on my dissertation or handed in any essays all year. Similar but different is an A-level dream where I realise all along that I've already got A-levels, so I've no idea what I'm doing retaking them, but can't seem to explain it to anyone.

Two horrible themes that recur frequently are plane crashes and plummeting elevators.

One I had all the time when younger, but not so much these days, was going into a darkened house and none of the light switches working.

Hm, think I may have issues...

BloodyDogHairs · 01/05/2015 22:43

oh you've just reminded me I get the elevator one too.

FrChewieLouie · 01/05/2015 22:46

And you've reminded me that I get the phone one too - either my fingers can't push the right buttons, or I'm using an old-fashioned rotating dial phone and my fingers slip out of it while I'm trying to dial 999. Stressful!

Shallishanti · 01/05/2015 22:46

my worst exam dream was dreaming I had a maths exam - at university- and I'm thinking why on earth did I sign up for this course and then not go to any bloody lectures??? esp since in reality I studied psychology
I've had variants of the exam dream, but also a recurring dream where I discover previously unknown rooms in my house, or even a whole wing- that's usually a nice dream, I just wonder why we have never found or used the rooms before

DrHarleenFrancesQuinzel · 01/05/2015 22:48

I forgot about my house one.

For 7 years we lived in a council house on an estate at the edge of a city. We hated it. So we moved 3 years ago. Anyway for the first year or two I would dream that we were back in the old house. We had moved out and we weren't supposed to be there. I was anxious about being discovered, but DH would tell me that it's fine. I don't want to be there, but feel like i have no choice.

As time has progressed this dream has occurred less and less, but occasionally I do still dream it.

GinBunny · 01/05/2015 22:55

I get the toilet one too! Very often in fact. Really freaky.

And I frequently get one where I am in my old home town and I can't get back to where I live now because I remember when I am on the train or coach that I have to get the underground at the other end and I'm phobic about going on the tube (this is actually true!). Or I'm at the underground station and I have to get on the tube. I've only ever managed it once in my dreams. I did have one where it was a Super Marios version of the underground, that was weird and quite entertaining

I had one recently where someone was trying to kill me. It was really vivid and disturbed me enough to google it the next day. One of the reasons given was that I was losing weight and fat me was trying to kill thin me. Never had it before - but I have just lost 1 1/2 stone

Primafacie · 01/05/2015 23:08

I have often dreamt that the house or flat I'm living in, has rooms I'd never known about.

Crocodopolis · 02/05/2015 07:36

I have recurrent dreams about going down stairs or ladders. When I am stressed, the steps / rungs are completely vertical and there are no handrails.

I occasionally have nightmares about my former line manager trying to kill me. A couple of weeks ago it was with a gun.

This is a person who threw a book at me in meeting while giving me a bollocking for not doing something correctly even though I asked for help for weeks. The person who ignored my multiple requests was the other person in the meeting and never spoke in my defence. She is also Very Christian with a statue of the Virgin Mary in her office and talks about how important her religion is to her.

StampysLoveGarden · 04/05/2015 11:20

silverbirch discovering new rooms in your house is supposed to mean that you're surpressing a side of your personality. I@ve had that dream too.

StampysLoveGarden · 04/05/2015 11:23

ps, x -smokers who dream they're smoking again I think that means that you feel you've let yourself down somehow.

I sometimes have a dream where I'm back with an old boyfriend who dumped me with a brutal (and unfair) character assassination. I was devastated for a long time afterwards and would have done anything to get back with him when I was in a fragile sstate of mind. But, post-recovery, to dream i'm back with him makes me feel uncomfortable and disappointed in myself and I do dream this still occasionally, and I can usually wake up and remember some minor incident in my real life where I had disappointed myself slightly, or compromised my integrity slightly. It doesn't have to be anything big, it can trigger that dream.

StampysLoveGarden · 04/05/2015 11:23

ps, x -smokers who dream they're smoking again I think that means that you feel you've let yourself down somehow.

I sometimes have a dream where I'm back with an old boyfriend who dumped me with a brutal (and unfair) character assassination. I was devastated for a long time afterwards and would have done anything to get back with him when I was in a fragile sstate of mind. But, post-recovery, to dream i'm back with him makes me feel uncomfortable and disappointed in myself and I do dream this still occasionally, and I can usually wake up and remember some minor incident in my real life where I had disappointed myself slightly, or compromised my integrity slightly. It doesn't have to be anything big, it can trigger that dream.

SilverBirch2015 · 04/05/2015 11:48

I get the meaning about the hidden rooms. Sometimes it's linked with the pride of getting a fantastic house (for a bargain) and then discovering lots of scary flaws.

Most of my reoccurring dreams seem to me to have some form of guilt associated with them. I am aware that in my psyche I have a heightened sense of responsibility, desire to do the right thing. It's always been there from very early childhood, in my mum's eyes I was the golden child and I have never truly believed I deserved her or others positive views about myself.

LittleprincessinGOLDrocks · 04/05/2015 13:33

My dreams at the moment feature my parents helping me with some issue or another. My mum died 15 years ago and I haven't seen my dad in years. I'm an adult in the dream and my children are there with us. It is usually in my parent's house (which dad sold 14 years ago). I often wake believing for a few minutes that mum is alive.
I have a feeling it is because I am back in hospital again going through a tough time and want to feel cared for or safe like I did with mum.

StampysLoveGarden · 04/05/2015 13:57

The opposite of me SilverBirch! My mother always thinks I could be doing everything a bit better. I have dreams where I go under the stairs in my house and I come out another door and I'm suddenly in a bigger, cleaner, better decorated version of my own house. It feels like my secret treasure in the dream.

I had that dream a few nights ago and it was triggered by a couple of commentss from relatives at a family gathering. One from my aunt that I needed to work so that I had an identity and wasn't just a mother . I've never struggled with being ''just a mother''. I had a strong sense of myself before I worked and I've haven't bolstered up my identity as a result of beinng a part-time receptionist. So, that dichotomy between how you're perceived and what you really feel you are, sometimes when the two collide, it definitely prompts the house with secret rooms type of dream for me!

LikeABadSethRogenMovie · 04/05/2015 14:02

This is so bizarre! I've had the dreams where you find secret rooms too and they often culminate in finding one with a really scary presence. What does it mean? We're all scared of secret rooms?!!

TropicalHorse · 04/05/2015 14:06

My recurring dream requires very little analysis to understand it: I am kicking, punching and clawing at my (abusive) father whom I have been NC with for 15+ years. Like some previous posters, I don't find this upsetting, particularly, just tedious. I am very non-violent, I don't even kill insects!!

daisychain01 · 04/05/2015 14:11

I'm a vivid dreamer. The exam one is a regular, it has left me with palpitations, the feeling that I have to read 3 English books and understand the plots and characters 5 minutes before the exam is about to start. The panic is awful.

I also have a dream which is normally when I fall asleep very quickly, where I'm driving down the road, go round a sharp bend and the door flies open. I jolt myself awake out of fright! Another one is getting in a lift, and it starts to go down, then it speeds up and makes my stomach tie in knots, then I wake up.

Haven't got a clue what they mean, only that DP thinks I'm anxious about something, we know not what - and I'm very relieved when I wake up, so maybe an outlet for stress?

daisychain01 · 04/05/2015 14:18

I dream at least once a week about my DF, always that he is very ill and he always ends up dying a horrible death in my dream. I know what that's all about. Awful unresolved things that we ran out of time to sort out.

I don't have any anger towards him only deep sadness that, although he left this world as friends with me, we could have had happier years. I think he would like how I turned out and having the dreams reminds me I still care, so it is bearable.