I have always had vivid dreams. When I was younger, I thrashed so much when I slept that I woke up every morning to find my sheets and blankets on the floor. If you dared to share a bed with me, there was a high probability that I would kick and punch and elbow you in my sleep. I used to joke that the result of being so mild mannered during the day was that I got all my aggression out at night.
A couple years ago, I stopped thrashing around, and suddenly making my bed every day wasn’t such a chore. Along with this change, though, my dreams made a leap from vivid to straight-up crazy.
I try to explain this to people, but I don’t know that they take me seriously. I really mean that my dreams are crazy, and they interfere with my daily life.
I think it was Psychology 101 that introduced me to delusions of grandeur. While awake, I do not have delusions of grandeur. If anything, I have delusions of insignificance. But, night is another story.
How do I explain my dreams. First, they are very vivid. Second, they are really complicated, and usually have several different threads, involving people I know, celebrities, things that have happened to me, things I’ve only thought about, and things that have never crossed my conscious mind. Third, I’m usually way more important than I am in real life or I’m friends with important people or I’m having some kind of movie moment where the future of the world depends on me. Fourth, they are so real that I can’t separate them from reality right away when I wake up.
That last one’s the worst, and that’s what makes me feel crazy. I sometimes have a hard time waking up, because when you’re busy saving the world, getting up for 8:30 class doesn’t seem all that important. I’m not kidding. I deal with this on a regular basis. I set multiple alarms to combat it.
I’ll give you an example. This happened last week. I’ve been thinking a lot about my applications to doctoral programs. The worst part of the whole process is getting the recommendation letters. Then it occurred to me, Barack Obama could write me a recommendation letter. Yes, that’s perfect. Why didn’t I think of this before? I mean, he taught at the University of Chicago, and I’m applying there. Also, he was just elected President, so that makes the recommendation weightier. We have a good relationship. I’ve been in a couple of his classes, and we’ve had good conversations in his office. He’d be happy to help me.
As I woke up, I struggled to sort out whether I really knew Barack Obama–or, whether he really knew me. I knew it sounded a little crazy, but I wasn’t convinced it wasn’t true. Somehow I thought he was one of my professors here. Yeah, here where I study theology–not law or political science. Really, it would be perfect. His recommendation could get me into any program.
I’m serious! I know we all have crazy dreams where we’re making out with Robert Pattinson or something, but we’re not shocked and confused (though definitely disappointed) when he’s not laying next to us when we wake up.
I was genuinely confused for at least an hour about whether I knew Obama or not. And, once you’re awake, such thoughts pass from dream to delusion.
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I move around in my sleep a lot too (I often wake up with fresh bruises on my legs)! I love having crazy dreams… It makes a nice change from an uneventful life. :)
My dreams are just ridiculous. I’m a teacher, and the other night I had a dream that I threw a Christmas party for my high schoolers. Only, I really did throw a party – complete with beer and tequila. Sooo not okay!
I can relate to waking up and not really knowing what to think. I’ve woken up in panic and been uneasy for a whole day, I’ve woken up thinking I wasn’t really awake several times thanks to dreams I have where I dream that I wake up but then find out it isn’t so. These are probably the dreams that affect me the most. I walked around for over a day once wondering if I was really awake, not kidding. I get affected by my dreams a lot, but I somehow enjoy it. My dreams are one of my main sources of inspiration when I write.
been there and done that, just not necessarily with barack obama. THough I did have one about tom cruise (he was lestat in interview with the vampire in my dream)
I move around in my sleep like crazy. So does my brother. I think it runs in the family. My poor cat is always getting kicked out of bed when he tries to sleep with me. I also have trouble telling dreams from reality. I’ll mention things in conversation that have never happened. And I’m horrible about texting in my sleep. If I have a dream about my ex where we’re back together, there’s a good chance that I’ll text him and say I love you. It’s really awkward in the morning.
OMG – for real this has happened to me too! I have a love hate relationship with those dreams. It’s great to be so carried away – it’s great to be in such a deep sleep – but I HATE that feeling in the morning when I can’t discern the difference between my memories and my memories of dreams.
oh wow! That IS really vivd! And a pretty funny dream too — I hope you don’t have very many scary ones that convince you something really bad is real. :/
I move, talk, and scream. I used to sleepwalk as a kid, but that has abated somewhat. I used to have a lot of Schindler’s List-esque dreams, and I would wake up terrified, but my dreams aren’t usually nightmares now.
Eric is constantly amused by my recounts because he doesn’t have dreams he remembers.
Um does this mean I’M crazy?! I also have very vivid, VERY realistic dreams. And they’ll sometimes be about the most mundane things like running errands for the to do list I really did make. It’ll be later, after work and I’m like wait, did I ACTUALLY get that stuff or was I dreaming?
i only WISH my dreams were that cool. while equally vivid and complicated, for some odd reason, even since i was 12 or so the only dreams i remember having are my nightmares. talk about a crappy deal. though i will admit that i’m usually trying to solve some heinous crime or capture a mass murderer who has targeted me and my unsuspecting friends. so they’re terrifying, but very nancy drew.
if i could dream of robert pattinson (and we could be doing anything, not just making out), i’d probably sleep a lot more. lol.
Hahaha.. I love it. I want a recommendation letter from Obama too! Can you hook me up?
lucid dreaming, that’s what you’re having. the fact that you can’t get up because you’d rather dream means in a sense you “know” you are dreaming and when you in some way know you are dreaming, its called lucid dreaming. when i read your blog, i felt like i was reading something i’ve said before because for me it’s a lot the same. ive had dreams so vivid and so real, that i feel more tired when i wake up than before i went to sleep. also, since i was a child i had trouble establishing sometimes up to 24 hours after i woke up, that it was just a dream i had. i would literally wake up thinking it was real because it felt so real as if i wasnt sleeping at all and was living it. on a stranger side, a lot of what happens in my dreams happens to me in real life. ive woken up crying, shaking, literally jumping out off the couch and over coffee tables to avoid something coming after me in my dream, ive dreamt about sex and literally orgasmed, and i sleep walk too. i never realized all of this was possibly a lucid dream until i would briefly wake up, and then go back to sleep just to continue dreaming, or in mid dream, i could change what happens. the ability to change your dream or have it play out exactly how you wish is lucid dreaming. you are aware of what you are doing.