h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

An inability to dream could indeed be psychosomatic. I have some friends who said they tended towards insomnia because when they went to sleep they had terrible nightmares and so they did all sorts of things to stay awake. Can you remember if you've ever had any nightmares that seem to be connected with your bad experiences? Or just nightmares in general?

Yes, I have had terrible nightmares for years, until I stopped dreaming altogether about a year and a half ago. I've had periods of insomnia on and off over the years but fairly consistently for the past three years or so.

I can't remember lots of details, and can't think of how they relate to my past experiences or anything. When I have nightmares, they're usually being trapped someplace and not able to get out, like a long hallway with a series of locked dorrs. I also recall a recurring one where being chased by something/someone and waking before I'm caught, so I've no idea who or what is doing the pursuing. Weird, huh?

>>Do you think it's possible that my inability to dream might be psychosomatic... my unconscious protecting me from dreaming of things which might be terribly painful by jerking me awake before I hit that stage of sleep?<<

That's a very interesting idea. No idea if it is true or not, but it certainly sounds logical. I wish you could dream more, I think dreaming is important! I have very vivid dreams, in fact I keep a dream journal at U208521. (Comments always welcome there! )

JEllen

Hey JEllen, thanks for that link to your dream journal! It'll be interesting to get to know more about you from there as well.

I've always heard that dreaming is important, and sometimes wonder if not dreaming is preventing me from moving forward or dealing somehow. I've tried hypnotherapy, even, and it didn't do a bit of good.

Yeah Ellen, I think I'd also like to check out your dream journal when I have time! I'd like to start my own dream journal as well, maybe ... I just have the problem that I dream lots and lots of different dreams every night and I can't usually remember most of them. Just small snippets of detail here and there. But I do know I dream about plants a lot, and I have recurrent 'themes' in my dreams. I want to note here, Psychocandy, that dreams are *supposed* to be weird! In my own dreams stuff overlaps in a strange way. For instance one of the recurrent themes of my dreams is that of going to a particular place. This place is at one and the same time the following: it is a mountain, and an island, and a building. It's not just a mountain, but it usually 'stands' for a specific mountain, namely the Blouberg which is seventy miles or so north of Pietersburg. But it also is an island, and again, a specific island, namely the island of Madagascar. It is also a building complex and the buildings and grounds are reminiscent of the University of Pretoria and other buildings in Pretoria as well as the Pretoria Botanic Garden. But always I go to this place with a view to exploring the plants there. I have to climb the mountain but I can also 'climb' by entering the mountain/building and going up stairs or up by means of escalators and so on, and I usually manage to reach the summit in this way, which summit is just a typical mountain summit again with rocks and grass and plants. I then manage to do a very limited bit of exploring of the place, during which I see all sorts of wonderful and weird plants, but always my time runs out long before I've explored and seen as much as I wanted to. But anyways I am able to analyze this dream for myself and I know precisely what it's about. Like I said its a recurrent dream theme ... but every time I dream about it the dream is subtly different than other ones. I have a very, very large repertoire of such themes that recur in different dreams. These 'themes' definitely tend to revolve around things/ideas/concerns etc. that are very important to me.

I used to have bad nightmares in the past. In some way I've been succeeding in overcoming them. When I was still conservatively Christian the nightmares had satanic elements in them, but now that I don't believe in the existence of Satan any more these elements also don't occur very often any more ... well it's been ages since they did, and I know they might recur because I still believe there is such a thing as 'Evil' ... and I still believe in God and I pray that they won't recur. But there are still other nightmarish themes that still recur in my dreams. Again they revolve around very specific things that I recognise as being problems of mine that go back frequently to very early childhood. But my nightmares do commonly involve being chased and especially being cornered, trapped by something extremely dangerous in a place from which I can't get out.

But there are many other such themes. And, Psychocandy, I think this will answer your last question: I have found myself making progress with my nightmares, in my nightmares! As time goes by the nightmares have started changing, I myself have been becoming more active and in control in them, and I've found that in them I've become capable of dealing with them better. I could note examples, but they're really nasty, and I don't want to alarm people, and the way I 'deal' with the problem in the nightmare is often not a way I would deal with a problem in real life, I mean, I do some nasty stuff myself, and 'real-life' ethics don't appear to apply. But anyways ... like I said, I am learning by various to face and conquer my fears in my nightmares so that by now many of the nightmares are not as scary/disturbing any more. Most of the time I'm not afraid of nightmares any more. I can now deal with most of my worst fears when I face them in my nightmares. But I know there are still many things I still have to face and conquer, and I know my dreams help me to do this.

So I hope you can find ways to overcome your insomnia, naturally without the drugs so you can sleep deeply and peacefully (or not so peacefully if that's necessary as it sometimes is) and dream, good dreams or bad, whatever is necessary. Because I do think dreaming is necessary, the good as well as the bad.

OH yeah I want to add this ... Psychocandy, perhaps if you can sleep well and dream again ... and if you could learn to 'face' your nightmares ... maybe they could progress to the point where you can see or otherwise glimpse something about who/what is pursuing you and then you might learn something important.

I've been sleeping a bit better recently, due to utter exhaustion from all the hours I'm putting in at work. I'll have to try and take notice if I have any dreams, and if I can remember any details. Perhaps facing nightmares can help one to face real-life fears as well?

I reckon facing your nightmares can help you get context on your real-life fears - as I understand it, they're a way for your unconscious to get out some of the anxiety, kind of the emotional equivalent of taking a dump. After all, we don't have enough time to deal with them in real life, with so many obstacles, it would make sense that your mind would look for a channel, when everything else is re-charging.

As I understand it, nightmare fears *are* real-life fears, or aspects of them.

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Anyways I'd like to say a few things about fibromyalgia. I asked my psychiatrist about it recently and he said basically that fibromyalgia is a kind of problem that affects lots of people, including people who've been traumatised in various ways, and people with certain kinds of psychological problems. The problem of fibromyalgia and related things like chronic fatigue syndrome has various aspects ... such as a neurological aspect, or a virological aspect, or so on ... but in truth the problem is one of Mind-Body Unity. What he said is this ... in the autonomic nervous system there are two divisions, the Sympathetic and the Parasympathetic systems. The Sympathetic system releases noradrenaline into the body. Noradrenaline does the following:
- it stimulates heartbeat
- raises blood pressure
- dilates the pupils
- dilates the trachea and bronchi
- stimulates the conversion of liver glycogen into glucose
- shunts blood away from the skin and viscera to the skeletal muscles, brain, and heart
- inhibits peristalsis in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract
- inhibits contraction of the bladder and rectum

In short, stimulation of the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system prepares the body for emergencies: for the "fight or flight" response.

This response is *supposed* to just happen very occasionally, and to last just for a short while. After this the parasympathetic system comes into operation. Parasympathetic stimulation causes the following:
- slowing down of the heartbeat
- lowering of blood pressure
- constriction of the pupils
- increased blood flow to the skin and viscera
- peristalsis of the GI tract

In short, the parasympathetic system returns the body functions to normal after they have been altered by sympathetic stimulation. In times of danger, the sympathetic system prepares the body for violent activity. The parasympathetic system reverses these changes when the danger is over.

Now what is happening in the case of trauma victims, or people who experience too much stress (and WAY too many people in today's ridiculously mad world experience too much stress) or people with other mental health problems is that the sympathetic response gets overdone and the parasympathetic system cannot work efficiently enough to correct it. My doctor said that in some cases it's even as if the switch gets stuck in the 'on' position and can't be switched off. So we find ourselves with too many 'fight-or-flight' responses, or stuck in a permanent 'fight-or-flight' response. This ends up totally overburdening lots of different systems of the body. Everything gets frazzled and burnt out. Then problems happen such as chronic fatigue, or a weakened immune system, susceptibility to diseases and viruses, intense and seemingly inexplicable pain, etc. The bottom line is that the problems and pains of the mind inevitably affect the body. To get relief from this calls for a unified strategy addressing everything.

Hi Willem that was very well put, I learnt it at Uni, but to read it in a more user-friendly context was quite useful, thank you!

stunning insight, Will, and it explains a great deal. Thnk you sir!

Thanks for explaining it so well, Willem. I've been aware since my diagnosis that my syptoms are caused as much by anxiety as by my physical injuries which set the whole thing off... but I didn't really understand what was going on physiologically. Even my rheumatologist has told me that they're "not sure" what causes it and all they can do is help to alleviate the pain. Reading what you've written here, a perpetual "fight-or-flight" response sounds like an accurate assessment. Thanks so much for sharing this!

I've decided recently that I'm going to try to use the holistic approach to treating my symptoms rather than simply relying on anti-anxiety meds and pain killers. Believe it or not, it seems to be helping somewhat... have only needed codeine once this past week and valium not at all. Of course, as I'm writing this, I feel like I've had my butt kicked and I can't bend my knees well enough to tie my shoes...

Glad we didn't do any walking yesterday.

And didn't someone say laughter is the best medicine?