What Happens During a Nightmare?

A nightmare may involve these features: Your dream seems vivid and real and is very upsetting, often becoming more disturbing as the dream unfolds. Your dream storyline is usually related to threats to safety or survival, but it can have other disturbing themes. Your dream awakens you. Frightening dreams, usually during REM sleep, that are normal and common in children under 10 and can also affect teens and adults.

Indeed, studies suggest that nightmares are often linked to unmet psychological needs and/or frustration with life experiences. Yet those links aren’t always easy to make—except in cases of trauma (discussed below), our nightmares tend to reflect our troubles through metaphor rather than literal representation.

An evil spirit formerly thought to oppress people during sleep. A frightening dream that usually awakens the sleeper. Something (such as an experience, situation, or object) having the monstrous character of a nightmare or producing a feeling of anxiety or terror.

The results indicate that although pain is rare in dreams, it is nevertheless compatible with the representational code of dreaming. Further, the association of pain with dream content may implicate brainstem and limbic centers in the regulation of painful stimuli during REM sleep.

Your brain is in a semi-awake/semi-asleep state: Part of it is still in rapid eye movement, or REM, sleep—the deep stage of sleep where our brain is more active, allowing for intense dreams. As you begin to rouse, the dream-like imagery of REM sleep intrudes into your waking state.

“If you wake from a nightmare and have difficulty falling back asleep, get out of bed, do something soothing like a few yoga poses or find a place to sit, close your eyes, and try a breathing technique or relaxation exercise.”

Nightmares are vividly realistic, disturbing dreams that rattle you awake from a deep sleep. They often set your heart pounding from fear. Nightmares tend to occur most often during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, when most dreaming takes place.

Can you stop a nightmare?

Do quiet, calming activities — such as reading books, doing puzzles or soaking in a warm bath — before bed. Meditation, deep breathing or relaxation exercises may help, too. Also, make the bedroom comfortable and quiet for sleep.

But what happens when these frightening activities show up in our dreams? Nightmares may seem totally negative, but research suggests they may have a few surprising benefits. Nightmares could help relieve stress, prepare for real-life threats, and provide insight into suppressed emotions, say experts.

Sometimes the dreams we have seem so real. Most of the emotions, sensations, and images we feel and visualize are those that we can say we have seen or experienced in real life. This is because the same parts of the brain that are active when we are awake are also active when we are in certain stages of our sleep.

Nightmares in children can happen at any age, but they usually start between the ages of 3 and 6, and decrease after age 10. After age 12, girls are more likely than boys to have nightmares. Types of nightmares differ by developmental stage.

In REM sleep, our brain activity is near waking levels, but our body remains “asleep” or paralyzed so we don’t act out our dreams while lying in bed. Since our brain is so active during this stage, it can sometimes scare us into waking up, essentially. As Girardin Jean-Louis, Ph.

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