Causes – In adults, the most common conditions associated with recurrent nightmares are acute stress disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and anxiety. Certain medications and substances can induce or exacerbate nightmares, during either treatment or withdrawal (table 1).
Depression and other mental health disorders may be linked to nightmares. Nightmares can happen along with some medical conditions, such as heart disease or cancer. Having other sleep disorders that interfere with adequate sleep can be associated with having nightmares.
It's true. Nightmares occur frequently in people with Bipolar Disorder. In The Reinterpretation of Dreams, the authors write: Bipolar patients report bizarre dreams with death and injury themes before their shift to mania (Beauchemin and Hays, 1995).
In addition to stress and anxiety, other mental health conditions, such as depression and schizophrenia, are associated with vivid dreams. Physical illnesses, like heart disease and cancer, have also been associated with vivid dreams.
Indeed, studies suggest that nightmares are often linked to unmet psychological needs and/or frustration with life experiences. Yet those links aren't always easy to make—except in cases of trauma (discussed below), our nightmares tend to reflect our troubles through metaphor rather than literal representation.
There can be a number of psychological triggers that cause nightmares in adults. For example, anxiety and depression can cause adult nightmares. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) also commonly causes people to experience chronic, recurrent nightmares. Nightmares in adults can be caused by certain sleep disorders.
In a way, chronic nightmares can be a warning about your physical or mental health. If chronic nightmares are disturbing your sleep, it's worth bringing it up to a doctor or therapist. They'll be able to help you create a plan for more peaceful sleep.
Nightmares can arise for a number of reasons—stress, anxiety, irregular sleep, medications, mental health disorders—but perhaps the most studied cause is post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
DARIEN, IL – A new study suggests that symptoms of depression and insomnia are the strongest predictors of having frequent nightmares. Results show that 3.9 percent of participants reported having frequent nightmares during the previous 30 days, including 4.8 percent of women and 2.9 percent of men.
For some people, medicines, alcohol, drugs, lack of sleep, fever, or anxiety sometimes cause nightmares. Often, though, nightmares seem to be triggered by emotional issues at home or school, major life changes (such as a move), trauma, and stress — even if what happens in the nightmares seems unrelated to your life.
NIGHTMARES AND SCHIZOPHRENIA
In the context of schizophrenia, approximately 10% of persons with this diagnosis have been reported to experience frequent nightmares[12]. Some reports place the prevalence from somewhat to substantially higher in schizophrenia[13].
Although bipolar disorder can occur at any age, typically it's diagnosed in the teenage years or early 20s. Symptoms can vary from person to person, and symptoms may vary over time.
Anxiety dreams are unpleasant dreams that cause distress. They can be more off-putting than nightmares and can result in you waking up panicked or nervous. These feelings of angst tend to remain in your mind throughout the next day.
Common causes include stress, negative life events, the experience of trauma as in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, other psychiatric disorders, and medication side effects.
The overall pattern seen in the analyses reflect the significant relationship between nightmares and stress, while the finding that nightmares were positively associated with coping bolsters the supposition that nightmares may help to alleviate stress.
People with bipolar disorder also commonly face Night terrors. Disparate nightmares, night terrors do not occur during REM sleep. A night terror isn't a dream, but rather sudden awakening along with the physical symptoms such as intense fear feeling, screaming or thrashing, and increased heart rate and blood pressure.
Some general causes of nightmares and anxiety dreams include: fear or stress. recent life changes, especially ones that provoke uncertainty or other distress. traumatic events.
Night terrors and nightmares are different and happen at different stages of sleep. During a night terror you may talk and move about but are asleep. It's rare to remember having a night terror. Nightmares are bad dreams you wake up from and can remember.
1. Being chased. Being chased is one of the most common nightmares. If you dream that you're being chased by something, whether it's an 8-foot-tall rabbit or a shrouded figure, then it's an indicator that you're running away from something or someone in real life.
While most people have nightmares from time to time, nightmare disorder occurs when a person has frequent nightmares that interfere with their sleep, mood, and/or daytime functioning. It is a sleep disorder known as a parasomnia. Parasomnias include numerous types of abnormal behaviors during sleep.
Trauma-related nightmares generally occur during REM sleep, which is when we tend to have vivid dreams. When you wake up from these nightmares, you may experience fear, anxiety, panic, distress, frustration, or sadness. You can also wake up soaked in sweat and with your heart pounding.
Somniphobia is an irrational fear of sleep. People may worry throughout the day about not being able to sleep. This worry can cause difficulties with focus or concentration. Often, somniphobia arises from a fear of having nightmares or experiencing sleep paralysis.
Parasomnias are disruptive sleep-related disorders. Abnormal movements, talk, emotions and actions happen while you're sleeping although your bed partner might think you're awake. Examples include sleep terrors, sleepwalking, nightmare disorder, sleep-related eating disorder and sleep paralysis.