I am afraid to sleep at night because I am scared of my dreams
Posted by Jenni C. on May 20, 2012
dramatic dream (Photo credit: unNickrMe)
I am afraid to sleep at night because I am scared of my dreams.
I never thought that anyone besides me would ever get what that means, but I recently told a friend that, and she understood it completely. Now I’m wondering to other people experience the same thing?
Again, I am afraid to sleep at night because I am scared of my dreams.
Honestly, I love sleep. I think sleep is a great thing, one of my favorite pastimes, however I’m not really good at it. I am not a good night-time sleeper. Now you would sleep would be something that is easy to do. You don’t have to learn how to do it. Babies are born with the innate ability to sleep. It is a natural body response. Sleep. You can’t go too long without sleeping, and if you try to stay awake past a certain amount of time, your eyes get heavy, you mind gets delusional, and your body begin to take your whole self into a forced shutdown.
So why is it so hard for me to sleep?
My dreams. My dreams make it difficult for my body to rest. At night my body and mind are ready to sleep. It wants to sleep, and my mind is begging for a shut down period after running in overdrive to an over extensive amount of time. However once 11:00 pm to midnight come along, my body starts to despise sleep. It fights with sleep, goes into panic mode. Not an anxiety driven panic mode, but an avoidance panic mode, ready to do anything else besides sleep.
My dreams are intense, they trigger intense emotion that have caused me to wake up in the heart of the middle of the night crying, anxious, worried, scared, and angry. My body responds to the dreams. My heart starts beating fast, if I am having an argument with someone I wake up angry with the biggest migraine because I am upset. Even though the emotion comes from the dream world, in the real world the effects are very much real.
I have intrusive, somewhat annoying dreams about ex-boyfriends. I am working on keeping the past in the past, but when the past pops up as a reoccurring item in my dreams it sends my mental state into a zone of chaos and confusion. This then takes a number of waking hours to recover from. I feel like I went from past to present real quick. I wake up with the thought of wanting to make a phone call or send a text, but I often find myself fighting to stay grounded, it is not a good idea. It was just a dream.
My dreams have caused to me worry about my family. The realness of when someone dies, or when someone gets hurt in the dream world makes it hard to separate that from reality. I wake up with real tears, with real shivers, with a real feeling of emptiness. I become afraid in real life. Once I know that everyone is ok, then and only then can I return to a state of calmness.
Am I crazy?
Probably just a little bit. Every once in a while, I have a very dark and frightening dream about being involved in a shooting massacre. I know this is going to sound very strange. But this dream is reoccurring, and I am not sure why. I am always at a public place, the place my be different each time. It may be a school, a mall, or just outdoors. There is a mass shooting, one shooter is involved, I watch other people get shot, then the gun is pointed towards me, I am afraid, I feel the fright through the dream. I never get shot. As many times as I have had this dream, the shooter never shoots me. My life is spared. Then I wake up. I wake up in shock. It feels so real but, I have never been in an experience like the dream, but the dram is vivid. The tears and rapid heart beat return, I can feel that intensely. That is real. I am alive. That is real. The dream was just that, a dream.
I am afraid to sleep at night because I am scared of my dreams. Does anyone else feel this way?
Positive thoughts, positive energy, positive experiences
Linhlinhh said
Same. My situation is just like you. I’m afraid to sleep at night because of those stupid dreams. Actually I have a boy friend. and we are dating for about 2 months. in 2 months, everyday I always dreams about 1 dream, 2 person and 1 story. But it’s a sad and hurt dream. I don’t want to dream about it. but EVERYDAY when I sleep that dream just replay in 2 months. I’m totally agree with you
I think no one can understand about what I have met and dream about. And now i just wanna share this with you because everythings that you feel is just perfect with my feeling. I don’t know what to do!. should i meet a doctor or do some yoga? Anyways, nice to meet and share my story with you ^___^
suvexa said
i too will totally agree with what *lifechangecounseling* said, however, i am sure you must have heard of Yoga and Meditation. They are not like a Dr.’s prescribed drug nor like a therapist’s fast counseling, hey do don’t work as fast as those two, but in the long run, Meditation and yoga is much more healthier and friendly to health than any either a Dr. prescribed med or psychiatrist’s therapy.
i hope you get better soon… and have a good night sleep real quick!
Jenni C. said
Oh sure I do Yoga sometimes, but it never helps me with sleep. Maybe I should do it before I go to bed, that may help my mind calm down. I am not good at meditation so I don’t do it often but I know that it can put me to sleep. I really need to just work on clearing my mind, don’t want to get addicted to sleeping pills or anything. Well I hope I find something that works soon! Thanks for reading and Thanks so much for the comment!
Things I’m Afraid to Tell You | Ocdbloggergirl's Blog: OCD, Life, and Other Misunderstandings said
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lifechangecounseling said
Not me. But I would encourage you talk to a doctor or another therapist. This is serious stuff.