Strange 'dreams' (in Off-topic)

I'm posting this to kind of see if anyone else has this sort of dream. It is oddly realistic, and I often am either awake or borderline when it occurs. Anyways:

I usually feel like I'm 'waking' to find that I'm being held down and am unable to move. I can't see him, but I can feel a dog biting my hand and mangling it. I try to open my hand, to spread the dog's jaws apart and prevent him from chewing my hand up, but I can't force them open and his teeth keep cutting into my hand like sharp little knives...and that's when whoever is holding me down stabs me, and I feel a sharp pain. The dog lets go, and shortly after I am capable of movement and I roll over in the bed. It's like I already had awakened, but there was a dream or hallucination still happening. My hand still feels like it's been bitten, and my back is sore, like my body literally has had something happen to it - but of course there are no marks or anything to speak of.

So...does anyone else get these kind of 'waking up' dreams? They occur right on the borderline between sleep and consciousness. Another unique aspect to these dreams that differs from ordinary dreaming is the pain that occurs during/afterward, despite nothing happening to me and only sleeping. Does anyone get that sort of thing either?


It's a recurring dream, in any case, and I hate when I get it. Very disturbing... Yet I still periodically do.

Anyways, comments? Is this something common, or do I have some sort of weird dream hallucinations going on here? I swear I didn't smoke any pot! xD

I would blame it on stress
or
a recurring situation in your daily life that somehow mimics this in any weird way

I'm no expert, but I've known a lot of people who experience the 'awake but can't move' elements you're describing and yes, I've had it before too, one time it felt like my soul was being sucked out of me - harry potter/dementor style, another time was having rats crawl all over my - both times I couldn't move, but I was aware of where I was.

Psychosis

eep...that would be a very unhappy thing. If stress can manifest itself into physical pain and hallucinations, I won't make it halfway through this semester! *grins*

Told you I'm not expert - Sleep Paralysis.

Same thing, but a fish from a beer commercial bites me.

Double yeeps! Psychosis, too?

LOL Bast!

No, forget about the Psychosis link. :)

Haha, great House! I don't need any more connections to words beginning with psycho...;)


That sleep paralysis link sounds rather close.

The most common example which doesn't involve quite so much pain although does tend to make you feel winded is the 'falling' dream.
I get it every now and then and feel like I've just hit the bed when I wake up (hence the feeling winded).

I can't speak to the pain part, but the not being able to move happens to many. The brain mostly paralyzes the body during REM to stop you from injuring yourself with physical reactions to your dreams. This can sometimes persist once the REM period is ended. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis .

I've had a "strange" dream kind of like yours as well. I don't quite recall what the dream was about because it was sometime ago, but I do remeber waking up and following happening: I'm pretty sure i was hallucinating but i felt/saw that my hands were "growing", and "shrinking". This was non-stop by the way, so it would grow rapidly out of control, and then shrink back into my original size. Not only was it the hands that was getting bigger and smaller that was freaking me out but the fact that when it grew it became very "thorn" like, (kind of like Swamp thing, if you guys have seen the movies, except rather than gooey it was more hardened, dry and solidified, which would be more like normal roots) and when it shrank, it went back to my original hands.

Its ridiculously hard to explain actually, but anyway long story short: I was up for a few hours freaking out (the entire time I could feel and see, it shrink and expand) and trying to do things to make it go away (e.g. soaking my hands in water) but eventually it went away after I tried sleeping multiple times. I woke the next morning, was like ............wow

I've never actually figured out why it happened and I seriously doubt I would, but I have a tendency to have reoccuring dreams; but only with different endings so hopefully it won't be as freaky the next time around.

i have, throughout my life, had dreams where i experienced pain or injury and then woken up to find that the place hurt or the injury was real, if somewhat lessened.

i have a theory that something we do in our daily life, or even the position we sleep in may cause our body to feel pain and then our mind kind of assimilates that into our dreaming subconscious. kind of like if you have ever been dreaming and your alarm clocks sound has been worked into your dream at first. so perhaps you often sleep on your hand and when it goes to sleep and the pain starts, your mind works it into your dream.

our minds also have an amazing ability to tie one thing to another. perhaps the first time you had that particular pain linked to the dream of the time and now your mind replays that particular dream when your hand hurts. the sleep paralysis is fairly common and i think indicative of changing sleep states.

as usual, this is just a theory regarding something i know very little about other than personal experience (much like cb : ) so take it how you will.

If you had enough Evasion, stabs and dogbites wouldn't be a problem ~_^

But yeah, changing small habits can lead to much bigger changes than you may have anticipated

I'd be quite happy to feel physical after effects of some of my dreams. Especially that one. Yes that one right there. ;)

JW, that's the hangover after she roughed you up a little too much ;P