Nightmares

[Sonia_Arjan]

I'm recently under a lot of stress. Few days back I had a dream of an intruder just standing in my room. I woke up in a panicked state and went to check if my front doors and windows were locked. I live on the 10 storey of an apartment building, I don't think anyone can climb in easily. The doors and windows were locked. But it seemed so real and had me thinking it really happened. My friends and family have dismissed it as a bad dream. I know deep down its a dream but I have troubles rationalizing and keep thinking its real. I also have other bad dreams like relatives I'm close to dying. Sometimes I wake up just running out of bed after having a bad dream. What can I do? I'm just afraid the intruder dream was real. I can't seem to function.

[Sonia_Arjan]

Thank you very much for the heads up. Oh gosh, its just you know you have to keep reminding yourself its just a dream so you can get on with your day. The intruder I saw was just standing in my room. Just a quick flash and i proceeded to other dreams. As soon as I woke up, I went to check my main doors to see if they are locked. And like you said, you just keep checking to see if your doors are locked.

[Jerry_NJ]

I'm sure the intruder was a dream, from what you say.

I have an concessional nightmare and I am overly cautious in terms of locking doors and we have a number of motion sensing lights, plus I have a loaded weapon handy... but we live out in the country and even if I called 911 (emergency police) it would likely be 10 minutes before any help would arrive.

My problem is more trouble mares, which I have every night.

Something I try to do is master "luicid dreaming"... check the web, and I like a book by Stephen LaBarge (or something like that, at Stanford Universituy in the USA).  Stephen's method works on being very conscious about your surroundings:: shades, textures, sounds, colors, details... and becoming so conscious of your surroundings you will do the same thing in your dreams.  Dreams lack the kind of detail we see during our awake times, so when we can't see the detail we know we are dreaming. Now this offers at least a couple opportunities. Stephen advocates engaging your dream rather than waking up.

The above goal makes one appreciate life more I think an awareness of surroundings adds to the quality of life.

I had a dream a few months back in which I opened the door between our house and our garage.  When I opened the door someone was there looking at me.  I immediately woke up. Given I am a male about 6' 5" and 230 pounds I think an intruder who didn't have a gun might be more worried than I should be.

I somethings still get a chill when I go to open that door at night, I usually check to see if I am awake. This is a step too that could derail that dream repeating as if I am dreaming and check to see if I am awake, I will wake up and not complete the troublesome dream.