# Anyone else who does not remember dreams, just remembers having dreamed? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 7, 2015, 10:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031 "2015-04-07T10:48:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 10:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/1 "2015-04-07T10:48:11Z")
Of a morning I often am amazed by and envious of my SO’s account of a dream she had - often a longish plot of events (that, of course, do not make sense - so it’s been a dream not a fantasy). On the other hand I, when I remember having dreamed, only remember [ul] [li]the fact of having dreamed[/li]li a sense of not having felt, in the dream, the strong emotions that would have accompanied the same events IRL (and of being puzzled, in the dream, about not feeling them)[/li][li](very rarely) one particular place or event in the dream[/li][/ul] Are some of you in the same case, of remembering having dreamed but not remembering the dream? ---
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/2 "2015-04-07T11:04:52Z")
I will forget the vast majority of dreams within seconds of waking up. If I happen to wake up and immediately discuss the dream I might rememeber it a bit longer. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/3 "2015-04-07T11:10:15Z")
Yes I’d say most of them, but a few I do remember. But I have also found that if I can remember one aspect of that dream, and voice record it, other parts will come back, and I will reconstruct pretty much the whole thing, a process that could take short parts of the next day, which then I have to add to the recording. I use voice recording because I do not like turning on the light or the process of writing while in a semi sleep stage, but others chose to write it. Usually thinking about the dream does not work, but letting it come to you, which makes sense since dreams are a subconscious process. ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_T-Cups](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Sir\_T-Cups](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_T-Cups)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/4 "2015-04-07T12:20:54Z")
I generally remember the details of my dreams, they’re crazy realistic and overall I can just remember what happened in them, but some days (ironically like today) where I know that I didn’t sleep well last night, and I had multiple bad dreams, but I can’t remember WHY the dreams were bad, I just know they were ---
**Author:** ![scruffycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scruffycat/32/200_2.png) [@scruffycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scruffycat)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/5 "2015-04-07T14:04:53Z")
I rarely remember them for more than a few seconds. Except for one or at least part of one that seems to be occasionally reoccurring where I watch a helicopter crash over a large lake. That’s the only part of any dream I can recall. Also I’ve only once in my life had a nightmare or at least only once that has woken me up and that was when I was a kid so maybe 35+ years ago. ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/6 "2015-04-07T14:37:22Z")
sometimes. i do have some memory of some dreams. i can wake with a sense of experiencing something that i know that i wouldn’t have experienced in real life and not remembering what. it is the same sense of when remembering a dream, of being somewhere you’ve never been or talking to a person you haven’t seen in decades; you wake with a realization of having a dream. if you remember the dream you might wake with a sense of exhaustion (a physical dream) or a sense of confusion (things you need to puzzle through), if you remember the dream you know why you feel that way on waking, if you don’t remember the dream then you just wake feeling that way. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2015, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/7 "2015-04-07T16:15:54Z")
I wake up sometimes immediately after a dream and initially I remember it vividly. Typical dream may go something like this: I was drævuzǝliŋ in and amongst the other sɛgwɑar when before and at the same time there was fækstǝls forming and we had to do something about it. Me in particular. So they were plastic, which was good, but I had to make 13 of them! But every time I tɚkǝmkwɑtɛd the fifth or sixth one, it made the stʌk rattle and they could _hear_ it, which was bad! I had to come up with a better idea and quick! I’ll sit up bolt-upright, emotionally involved in the dream’s plot. Annoyed at waking up, I want to find what happens next! I was doing stuff! Things were at stake! Four minutes later I’m going “WTF? I was doing what, and I was one of several whats? Why was I trying to do things with plastic whatchamacallems? Why was it good? Hello?” Then it’s gone like a soap bubble with just the vaguest recollection of complex spiderwebby notions that had been in my dream-head. Something about something that some something and someone whatever. Back to sleep. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2015, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-who-does-not-remember-dreams-just-remembers-having-dreamed/717031/8 "2015-04-08T13:46:02Z")
It’s rare that I remember the details of dreams. Far more often I remember the emotional mood or tone of the dream, but even that doesn’t linger for very long. By the time I finish my morning shower it’s as if I never dreamed at all.