Keeping A Dream Log

Yes, certainly keep a dream log. You might want to make a note of what happens the day or so before you have the nightmares as this might help you see if there is something that triggers them. Do you think you dreams may be prophetic? Do they seem to happen just before a major event?

I suffer from night terrors aswell as sleep paralysis. it is a nasty little condition where your body shuts down for the night, and your brain goes into REM cycle and you are suddenly laying awake looking at the one place in your room when you had closed your eyes to sleep. Your body pulsates with pins and needles and you feel like you are suffocating, and you try to shake yourself away. it is not a very nice thing to experience. The worse part is when you have one and you have someone in your bed, you can see that person laying beside you and you try to call out and nothing comes out. The ylay there sleeping and you lay there thinking you are dying.. It is actually a pretty common thing to happen, i used to picture things coming for me as i lay paralysed. i would try to scream, try to move a hand, a finger, my mouth.. anything to wake up and get away from what was coming toward me. Now it is only a dream state where your brain is still active while your body needs rest. the REM has shut your body, from the neck down to ensure that you don't act out your dreams, thus protecting you. So you are actually paralysed when you fall asleep. Stress is a major factor with this condition. I remember one from when i was around 5 years old. It haunts me to this day. i find that if i lay on my back when i am really tired i experience anywhere upto 5 episodes of this, i am no longer as scared as i used to be, but still feel a matter of urgency to wake up. Does anyone else suffer this?

I have actully done this myself a few times. It sort of helps you to relive youself of the nightmares or the bad dreams.

Keeping a dream log is a good way to combat your nightmares and should help you to understand and deal with them better. Among the aborigines(sp?)of Australia and some African tribes view dreaming as being extremely important. They believe that nightmares allow a person to deal with things they are afraid in a safe environment. It is common that if a young boy for example has a dream where is stalked or attacked by lion that he makes himself have the same dream again to face the lion. He is expected to report back to the village elders and explain the status of dream quest and share the dreams and what happened in them. There was a time when I kept a dream log of my own. I would suggest keeping a pad a paper by your bed, and telling yourself each night as you drift off to sleep that "I will remember my dreams when I wake up." This repeated suggestion will pay off down the road. It may take a few days to week or two, but eventually you will start to remember your dreams when you wake up. It is very important to write them down immidiately. Dreams will fade the longer you are awake, this is normal. Writing them down helps you to remember them, long after they are gone from conscious memory, in this way you can actually learn to remember them forever. Once you determine what you are facing in your nightmare, it may give you some insight on how to stop having them, or give you the power to confront what ever is scaring you. They are after all *your* dreams. You are the one with the power in them.