Desultory

Does anyone else have nightmares where they started drinking again?? Or if not drinking as such but giving in to your AV?
The suffering is so real though, the whole feeling of disappointment with yourself, exhaustion, betrayal of yourself. I so can feel it. (Perhaps, it is my psycho issues and my general distrust of myself, of course??)
When I wake up I don't even feel relieved that it was just a bad dream because it's too realistic: the way I try and win against my AV and eventually accept the deceitful reasons and decide for "just a pint" for instance. The emotion of "having failed again" fills me up beyond such nightmares.

DaniBee

I don't have them as much now, but I definitely did. I'd wake up feeling shame, then relief that it wasn't real.

KissMyTiara

Drinking dreams happen. But that's all they are. You didn't. I've had way more disturbing dreams. They will become less and less.

buk1000

Yes, I used to have very vivid drinking dreams in early sobriety. They did cease after awhile.

Jim1958

Yes, I have had dreams where I was drinking. Sometimes they are dreams of hiding bottles or covering up drinking. Behavior from the past. The dreams come and go for me. It is a relief to wake up sober but the dreams can be upsetting. I hope they go away the more time I have not drinking. I am over 3 months now.

tomsteve

holy crap i had em bad early on! more than once i woke up drenched in sweat and not knowing where i was(like id done a lot when drinking) but only to realize i was in my own bed, and actually feel like i had been drinking. thankfully after working at calming down i could remeber what i did that night.

they did diminish with time. i still get them occasionally- maybe one every 3 months or so- but thank God they are only dreams

zerothehero

I have strange dreams, but I no longer call them nightmares. At some point I decided to regard them as interesting curiosities, even if I wake up sweating from terror. I can say that sometimes I enjoy my dreams much like I might enjoy a horror movie. When I drink and feel like an idiot in a dream, I like to think the dream was a helpful reminder. I sometimes have wild psychedelic dreams where I'm tripping and sometimes flying in sci-fi or organic micro/macrocosmic cellular/galaxial environments. Very cool. It's kind of good to know I can still have a trippy experience but without actually taking damaging drugs. Dreams are awesome. To feel that way kind of requires an ability to accept what the mind produces without passing judgement on myself or beating myself up. In dreams I can do things I would never dare in real life and I don't have to feel guilty about it. Just like in meditation, I can't control the thoughts that pop in my head so there's no reason to feel bad about my thoughts. They're just thoughts. Actions, on the other hand, matter.

D122y

I had horrid nightmares. Haven't had one in a while. Thank God. Almost 1 year sober.

soberaccountant

I have them every night, but I guess that's just because of my present circumstances. I dream that I'm in jail again or that I am back in court again for the DUI I got not too long ago. I guess with time it'll pass, but you're not alone in having nightmares about drinking and what drinking has done to your life.

fantail

I got them in early sobriety and I felt relief because I knew that meant that this time I was really going to quit. It was drilled down so deeply in my resolve that even asleep I would play out drinking as a disaster scenario. I think this means really good things for the way your mind has shifted.

Soberwolf

In time they will fade bud