Relayer

Feeling very weary and exhausted to day. I've been 8 days sober now after a long relapse... after 11 months sober. So it's been back to sobriety and with just a lot of physical discomfort the first 4 days. Have felt great the next 3 days, including all day yesterday... then, last night I could not sleep at all until close to 5:00am! Then I had these crazy, vivid dreams... especially one; One of my kids was getting married and there were these house cleaners (wish I could afford one now!!) and setup people prepping the house for the wedding. They kept finding bottle after bottle of hidden vodka!!! I was frantically running around behind them trying to throw them away so that none of my family could see them. I was sober in the dream, but out of my mind afraid and freaking out because I knew that nobody would believe that the bottles were just old one's I had hidden and not found yet to throw away. Very disturbing!!!! I woke up in a terrible sweat and had the first super craving I've had in 8 days.

So, I know these kind of dreams are "normal", but I was taken by surprise that they showed up so late... would have thought they would have been here while I was detoxing also. Anyone have a thought or comment? Any ideas about how to reduce/eliminate them... or at least deal with them. Thanks.

Freedom1990

I had plenty of dreams like that early in sobriety. They have decreased greatly over the years. I have found a connection between those kinds of dreams and when I am under a great deal of stress.

Congratulations on your eight days. I can appreciate how difficult it is as I relapsed after 4 years clean/sober. It was a long haul back to recovery, but I am grateful I made it back.

Sending you hugs of support!

Leemzer

I would just view them as very vivid ways that your body is reclaiming the REM sleep you have deprived yourself of for so long...same thing is happening to me and I am on day 11...same thing happened when I gave up smoking 15 years ago tomorrow...I think it is a sign of progress......and the fact that alcohol is showing yourself in your dreams is a good thing, in that you are horrified in the dreams....think of it as coming out of anesthesia, and each vivid dream is a little bit of surgery that is helping you heal bit by bit, day by day. =)

InsertNameHere

havent had them yet but not looking forward to it especially since I take methoquine to prevent malaria, one side effect of it is very vivid dreams. I am in for a whopper of one if it comes within a few days of me taking it haha. But I am sure someone will respond to tell you they are pretty common. Yours is the first one I have read about where the person was sober during the dream most of the time it is active drinking hu weird.

sugarbear1

I call those horribly vivid dreams "self-cleaning-brain washings!"

Yes, you are on your way to healing!!!!

Relayer

I agree with you Leem... I'm trying to look at it as a positive thing! Still pretty disturbed though...

Relayer

I didn't know it was unusual to be sober in them.

Relayer

I truly hope so... and thank you!

debsam

"pillow slips"

They will decrease Relayer. Great feeling though when you realize it's just a dream.

stillsleeping

Hi sweetie,

What a horrible night, you poor thing

Two things: we had horrible nights when we were drinking too. I know it feels massively unfair that with all this hard work life might suck sometimes, but it's gonna. You can shake it off more easily now tho, because you didn't spend last night poisoning yourself.

And...two close friends here tell me about their drinking dreams. One shakes them off, the other is left feeling really depressed and saddened by them. I feel like Debsam above - an amazing feeling of relief and celebration when I realise it's just a dream. I guess ultimately they're like any nightmare - they can shake up your day and leave you feeling pretty weird.

Teaching is a profession teaming with anxiety dreams. Well, you can imagine When the TES started a thread on their forum asking about people's back-to-school anxiety dreams, it ran to something like 30 pages. Almost all of them are on a variation of: new in school, being observed, haven't prepared the lesson and the kids are running riot. Ha! That also happens in real life

Recovering alcoholics dream about the thing we're the most afraid of. I dreamed a couple of weeks ago that it was a parent's evening, and one of the kids had left bags of coke lying on the seats.

Shopping bags. Full of coke.

I didn't take any -

(fool! no, Still, taking coke is a bad thing. back in the corner)

- I was freaking out cos I knew the staff would all think it was mine.

Sound familiar?

Maybe you could start a thread asking people if they want to share their addiction dreams, or maybe you'd be better shaking it off...either way, whatever time you wake up, SR'll be here, right?

As to eliminating them, I understand that dream analysts recommend keeping a dream diary - but that's not psychological advice, just something to Google (SR does not endorse the use of Google. Other search engines are available hehe )

Thanks for letting me know hon - drop me a line when you get up okay?

xxx

TDP

your nightmares are pretty normal in the first few weeks. i had really vivid ones from day 4 to day 13 and those are just the ones i remember. they can be pretty scary cause they feel so real but hold in there they do get less and less as the days roll by. your body is just trying to get used to not having its dose of "numbing" from alchohol. stay strong we are all here for you

IndaMiricale

I can only say it for me is somewhat enjoyable to awake and come to the realization that its just a dream.

stillsleeping

Nice one - I hadn't thought of that. Our sleep patterns must change dramatically when we quit. And REM with it. Plus our bodies feel different, almost like in puberty - nothing fits, nothing familiar...

I dreamed a lot that I was falling in the first few days - you know that dream where you trip and jerk awake? Same thing, I guess...

Relayer

Thanks so much, sweetie!! That was a really thoughtful and generous reply. I appreciate it. I've been up since 9:30am here EST in the states... after only getting to sleep at 5:00am. The nightmare was betwixt! I am not sleeping the day away... it's 2:20pm here now... been keeping myself busy. Maybe I can sleep better tonight by not napping. That's my theory and I'm sticking to it!

Spending most of the day rewriting my resume' and also dealing with a huge email problem. I have an appointment at 3 to bring the puter to my puter repair guy. Hopefully he'll fix it in a hurry.
xoxo

stillsleeping

Hey any time, dude We've been up since 3:30 (don't ask) so is nearly bedtime here for us. Hope you have a better one tonight...

xxx

Relayer

Thanks again and sleep well!! I forgot to mention... you better get those students in rehab fast, unless it's already too late. They weren't singing "we don't need no education... we don't need no thought control...", were they?? Nighters

Relayer

What you say is SO true!!!! Not going anywhere near alc! Thanks for the response and be well.

Pojman

I have not smoked pot in 10 years... But! I still have, at least, one dream a week about smoking pot. In my dreams I am doing whatever I can to secretly get my hands on some it. Weird thing is, I am also an alcoholic/drug addict, but of all the drugs out there I wish for pot the most.

I don't know if there is much we can do other than to accept the dream for what it is, and appreciate the fact that it was just in our dreams.

ChickenStu

The dreams go in time. I'm almost two years on the wagon - and I get them very rarely now. So rare, that when I do get them they are quite managable.

In the early days I got them all the time. They were quite debilitating - but you just gotta roll with the punch and ride them out dude. Give yourself time. Recovery is a journey.

eddie73

Hi there,
I had the same issue last week. The worst one was when i was drinking and I was normal in it. I was drinking as if it were a normal thing. That really freaked me out.

i asked my sponsor about this, he told me that I am grieving the death of my old friend alcohol. I cannot turn to it anymore when the chips are down, this is the reason I am dreaming about drinking.

i expect this to happen in the future too. This is part of the thinking disease that is alcoholism