Nightmares

[iwbus]

What is the point in nightmares? Seems totally pointless to have something where you wake up from a nice sleep feeling really bad and upset. Is there a sensible reason?

[Buffy]

The only reason I can think of is that it's better for people to have such attacks of anxiety at night, than during the daytime when they are up-and-about and interacting with other people! Anxieties have to work themselves out at some point...better when you are alone and no one else can see you or perceive what you might be thinking & feeling...! At night we can just curl up in a ball and focus on the worst, even if it causes us to tremble or cry... we certainly can't do that at the office, with our peers looking on. The "dark" topics that nightmares consist of have to be worked out mentally at some point-- keeping them bottled up inside indefinitely would cause everyone to go mad.

[tonic]

Totally agree with Buffy about resolving issues in your sleep, although some people believe you run through a senario many times in your sleep in order to come to a solution regarding a problem, a nightmare occurs when the senario keeps repeating because there is no positive solution or outcome. Not sure I believe it myself!

[Rainbow]

I had nightmares after my house was broken into whilst I was asleep. Over a period of time the nightmares changed until eventually rather than being a victim I was running downstairs yelling at the top of my voice & beating the burglar with a bat/stick. Although I still class this as a nightmare, through these dreams I had managed to turn the situation around, I now have these 'dreams' very infequently & sometimes now I even sit down & talk to these burglars about what went wrong in their lives. Very bizarre.

[Amylazy]

Psychological research suggests there are many different reasons for dreaming. Nightmares are often explained in terms of problems in which you cannot solve in waking life. For example dreaming you are trapped somewhere could relate to a submissive relationship you cannot get out of. However with all dream theories they cannot be proved or disproved and psychoanalytical theories especially, are subjective and don't always mean the same thing for everyone

[Gracie]

Nightmares are usually a manifestation of built up stresses and worries or are triggered by traumatic events ie being attacked. If you have problems that you're not facing up to or worrying about a nightmare is telling you to wake up to those problems and deal with them