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I'm in college again. Months ago, I signed up for a class — maybe a complicated math class, but more likely a class with lots, and lots of reading, such as a study of Shakespeare's entire works, or perhaps it's Dostoyevsky.
And here's the thing: I meant to drop the class. I realized early on it was too hard, too time consuming to do the work… but somehow, I never got around to actually getting to the registrar and dropping the class. It is now near the end of the semester, and I am responsible for taking the final for this class — and I don't even remember where or when it meets. I have a week to learn everything, or face an F on my transcript.
Does this dream sound familiar to you? I've been having it for as long as I can remember, probably once every few months or so. A few years ago, while part of a small trial team, my colleagues and I would sit around and have fairly inane conversations over shared lunches and dinners, gobbled quickly in conference rooms, and the topic of conversation turned once to stress dreams.
I remember being amazed that all of my colleagues had had stress dreams (even the partner who had had an incredibly enviable and successful career!) — but more specifically, they all had this stress dream, the meant-to-drop-the-class-but-totally-forgot dream.
{2020 Update: Come check out our latest discussion on how to deal with stress dreams!}
Readers, what stress dreams do you have repeatedly? What message do you take away — for example, does it help you recognize that you've reached a certain point in your stress and that you need to force yourself to relax?
Some great sleep aids if you're struggling with sleep issues…
(Pictured above: Shakespeare, originally uploaded to Flickr by Hellebardius. Image updates via Stencil.)
Whit
I’ve never had the missed class/exam dream, but ever since having children, I do dream that I have left them somewhere / can’t get to pick them up on time / not sure where they are.
Basically a variant of the real life panic at 5 pm every day for years that I wouldn’t be able to leave work by 5:15 to get them from daycare by 5:30!
Jules
Wow, so many of us having the same stress dreams — definitely an overachieving chick thing, I think.
First, though, I’m one who had Kat’s stress dream IRL. I promised myself I’d get serious and start going to that 20th century American history class, finally showed up and sat down as the professor handed out the first mid-term. I got back up out of my chair, want straight to my advisor’s office and dropped the class.
I’ve have had this same anxiety dream as just a dream, and when I was waiting tables in both college and law school, it translated into a waitress nightmare — I’d give a table of, oh, 12 people, their menus and then forget about them. For the whole evening. Instead of leaving, they stayed and got more furious until I finally went back to their table, where they would scream abuse at me. Most of my current stress dreams involve travel — I absolutely have to be in court or somewhere out of town and it’s like Planes, Trains and Automobiles, everything breaks down or goes wrong. And I’ve also got the chased-by-bad-guys-and-evading-them -in weird places dreams. It’s odd that I have very few stress dreams about the actual practice of law. Too close to home for my psyche to handle, maybe.
RRugosa
I’ve often had variations on this one. Also frequently have one where I’m in the midst of moving from one residence to another and I don’t have all my belongings together and there doesn’t seem to be any way I can get them together, packed and moved, in time for leaving the old house and getting into the new one. It’s all terribly anxious and nasty and desperate. Since I added a little Ativan to my daily SSRI, I get them a lot less.
Cajunqueen
I’ve been a lawyer for almost 30 years and I still have the dream where I forgot to attend a class, or I don’t remember my schedule. It always takes place in high school, because I always seem to go to the principal’s office, as opposed to a college registrar’s office. This dream shows up about once a year, and I don’t think any particular thing triggers it.
But my FAVORITE dream (and this was at least 10 years ago and I still remember it) was about an ice hockey game and a small dog on the rink chasing the puck. It made me laugh so hard I woke myself and my DH up.
I wonder if guys have stress dreams.
Peony
I’ve never had the exam dream – I guess classes don’t scare me. My stress dreams are one of two things.
Typically, they involve tornados. Usually multiple tornados. Sometimes they’re town flattening giants, but sometimes they’re pretty benign. I once had one ask me the way to Vegas.
The other is that I have a fish tank or small animals in an aquarium and they’re multiplying too fast for me to spread them out to other tanks to save them. :(
I have big expansive bathroom and mile long stairway/elevator dreams, but I don’t think they’re stress related. For some reason I often find myself in huge 1920’s – styled tiled public bathrooms that go on forever. Sometimes they’re filthy or co-ed or doorless – hah, I get that too. But I think they’re not stress related. I’ll have to pay attention.
How strange we tend to have such similar dreams! Must be cultural.
Leigh
I have stress dreams where I have to go back into the Army because there was something wrong with my paperwork when I got out. I’ve been out for a few years, but I still have this dream.
ning
I have the waiter’s stress dream (though I’ve had Kat’s nightmare in the past). This is probably from all the years I spent waiting tables to pay for college… someone else I work with has the same problem.
I’m at a restaurant, waiting tables, and for some reason, the number of tables I need to take care of keeps increasing, and everyone needs something, and I just can’t keep up with it. It gets to the point where my customers are waiting hours to get their food or never receive their drink because I can’t handle all the tables. Talk about a job haunting you for years to come!
Miriam
Now that it’s been mentioned, I now remember that I recently had a dream in which I was supposed to and was trying to insert a contact lens about the size of a poker chip or larger into the eye of some celebrity, can’t remember just now who, and not someone I’d ever think about anyway.
I write down most of the dreams I can remember, and sometimes go over them with my therapist, who’s helping me through a rough patch. As she points out, and of course I already know, everything in the dream is me, including the empty house, my [last night’s dream] mother and father when they were about 40, they’ve both died , in the last 7 years, Mom when she was 91, Dad when he was 101.
Lilly
Forgotten class dream – yep.
Teeth falling out dream – yep.
Airplane dream – yep.
Sideways elevator dream – yep.
I still have all of these. I used to have dreams/nightmares that I was being chased by people with guns. Then, one time, I dreamed that I turned around and shot back, and I have never had another one. In addition to the list above, I have dreams about really, really bad storms and I also have dreams about court. For this whole post, you can substitute “nightmare” for “dream”. If I have good dreams, I don’t seem to remember them.
Lilly
Oh yeah, I have the bathroom dream too.
Miriam
OK. So now I’ve been following these comments.
Last night’s dream: I walk into my office and the computer screen is covered with colorful cartoonish scribbles that keep changing and moving around like the old Windows screen savers. I’m not able to stop this, to turn off the computer, even by unplugging it, nothing will work. I just know that my computer is completely trashes and possibly worse, is being used by the evil hackers. end of dream.
And, No, I don’t have children or roommates or very talented pets that can walk on the keyboard!
I’m not under any particular or even generalized stress. I think everyone’s dreams are stressing me. ;-)