I'm famous for my dreams - outright wacky most of the time! A few nights ago I was watching an episode of "Nova" which addressed some theories as to why we dream, and it made me think about how my dreams have unfolded and changed over the last year. I could see a connection as to how we at night subconsciously address issues that we're grappling with during our waking hours.
One pattern particularly intrigued me and I'm not sure how it fits in - feel free to jump in with your own theory!
When I was first diagnosed with the tumour in my leg, I dreamed often about my leg falling off. Not at all unexpected (and rather unoriginal, don't you think?)
However when I was diagnosed with Erdheim Chester Disease in February every dream (that I remember having) was one that I'd had before in my life. Months of re-runs! Even repeating dreams that I'd had in my childhood and don't believe that I'd thought of since. It was a journey into my past every single night, some pleasant recollections and a few nightmares too. Weird, eh?
Then I started on prednisone (steroids) and I don't think that I had a single dream for almost three months. Steroids can make you pretty hyper and sleepless, I was lucky to get three or four hours a night. It's possible that I didn't even reach the REM dream stage during those very short and restless nights.
Now that my dosage of steroids is considerably lower I'm sleeping normally again on most nights and my dreams have returned. But not one re-run in the bunch! They're all new, all weird and wacky - back to my usual state of nocturnal wanderings of the mind. Most nights I can make a connection to my illness; I try so hard to put it out of my mind during the day but it manages to bite me at night.
But I can't help thinking about that "re-run" stage and wonder what the significance might be. Any amateur dream analysts out there?
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How interesting that your dreams started to repeat after you were diagnosed with Erdheim Chester Disease.
ReplyDeletePerhaps you were having a rummage through your long-term memory stores in order to try to find ways to deal with the disease.
I had the same thought. I know that when I am under alot of stress I tend to dream really bizarre dreams; more so than my ususally strange dreams. Having such an active imagination it carries over into my subconscious.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Denise about stress and how it relates to dreams. The more stress, the weirder the dreams is what I've found to be true. The whole subject of why we dream what we do fascinates me, but I've seldom been able to connect what I've dreamt with what goes on in my waking life. It's something I wish I knew more about.
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