[DanaC]

I was a pain in the arse as a kid for scaring myself at night, and having those horribly real nightmares, where you just go from awake to sleep to awake, seamlessly. Anything happening during that span might just as well be a real event. Like self-motivating puppets for example, or the face at the Wendy-house window...


That not being able to cry out. Oh that's hideous. That's the thing that changes it from my own little horror fantasy ride, to an unwanted nightmare. Very rare I get that as an adult. The disturbing dreams that have stuck with me most from childhood tended to have that as a feature. Usually also had some running away, usually down stairs or a hill, where the distinction between running and falling is somewhat blurred and you feel like any second now you'll pitch over. A real heart in mouth and pulse pounding in throat moment.

As an adult the stuff that gets me tends to centre around breathing and 'waking' to an unfamiliar and claustrophobic setting with a sense of urgency or 'presence'. I wake, scrambling around, panicked trying to find the light switch, trying to figure out where I am and trying to get my breath. From time to time I wake as I am forcing a breath. Don't know but it feels like I've stopped breathing for a moment and had difficulty dragging it in. This tends to happen when I've been smoking too much and my asthma is bothering me. At these times I also have a lot of anxiety dreams where I am trying to find my inhaler, then find my inhaler, and use it. But the dream just resets and I'm searching for my inhaler again.