I have these too. Same reason.
Ugh, the teeth dream! Got to be the most disturbing for me. It’s also supposedly a very common dream theme. (That’s actually “dream seem” as said after those teeth fall out).
I also have the multi-layered dreams like **Zeldar ** was talking about. Holy cow, they can go on for what seems like hours with me “waking up” six our seven times before waking up for real.
Most common - the exam - I registered and forgot and never went to class.
Had the teeth thing - only mine are loose.
My favorite - I dream Brainiac4 is cheating on me. I wake up mad at him and it takes several hours to shake it, even though I know its completely irrational.
My kids still talk about the night I woke up the house screaming. They were really little then, too - like two and three. I’ve only done that one once.
My most common bad dream involves not being able to get to a firearm in time. A variation on tiltypig’s no arm strength thing, maybe.
Ding ding ding! That’s the most common “bad” dream I have. I also have the naked one (though usually I’m in boxers,) and the “final exam” one several times. Though the “final exam” one usually isn’t so much showing up for an exam for a class I never showed up for, as it is I’m back in HS (yet still my same age,) cause apparantly there was some kind of mix up and I never passed XYZ class, so I have to take it again.
My wife leaps out of the closet and screams “Gotcha ya!”
I’ve had the one where I didn’t attend class all semester, but the most common one for me is about ghosts in the attic of my grandparent’s old house. (Side note - when I mentioned these dreams to my mom she said my grandmother and uncle always claimed to hear footsteps in the attic when no one else was home.)
In all the nightmares I can recall I know it’s going to be a bad dream because it’s dark - at the beginning of the dream the power is out, or I turn on the light switch and the bulb burns out. Ever happen to anyone else?
I have the losing teeth one ALL. THE. GODDAMNED. TIME. I hate that.
Another recurring one might be my version of the Final Exam dream - I’m either tending bar or waiting tables, and everything is going very smoothly, then suddenly I turn around and there are hundreds of customers all wanting something and they’ve apparently been waiting awhile, because they’re getting pissy. And every time I get this dream, I am trying to figure out how and when I lost it - how come I didn’t notice these people before? Why didn’t anyone tell me THAT section was part of my station?
The recurring house dream: I’m in a house that I don’t think I’ve ever been in before, though as I go through it I of course realize that I have, only I don’t really remember it well… it’s not the house I live in, but I am somehow responsible for this place. And oh wait! There’s a secret room full of neat stuff, I remember! And then I take some impossible, or at least improbable, turn through a doorway or a hidden closet and oh yeah, I DO remember this, this is the room where… and then I wake up.
The only time I’ve had nekkid dreams, they were also NC-17, so I don’t think that counts.
I have a variant of that one. I get to the theatre, and find out that even though we’ve been rehersing one play, we’ll be performing another. Everyone else seems comfortable with this, but no one mentioned it to me. Here’s a script. I have an hour to learn it, apply makeup, get in costume…
This was a nightmare I had very frequently throughout my entire life until about 10 years ago. Specifically, someone or something was chasing me and I just could not run. Or I would run very slowly and painfully. In my dreams, my legs felt as if they weighed hundreds of pounds. About 10 years ago, I figured out why this was happening and I no longer have those nightmares.
I only sleep on my back. I would, on occasion, fall asleep with one knee bent and pointed out to the side, so that the foot on my bent leg was against the knee of my straight leg; like the figure 4. That leg would ultimately get very stiff and painful as I slept, and that pain would, for some strange reason, translate into in inability to run while dreaming. Also, for some strange reason, that inability to run would always mean that I had to run from some type of danger.
Weird, huh?
So once I figured that out, I never allowed myself to fall asleep with a bent leg and those bad dreams never returned.
I’m surprized this was only mentioned by one person. Practically the only dreams, good or bad, I ever have are these (also, I can always fly in some form (telekinetic, superhero, sorceror, flying broomstick, flying frizbee, etc.), but that’s not scary and more plain awesome). Most of the time, I don’t even have a clue who/what is pursuing me, just that I either “move it or lose it”.
Also, ditto on the once actually facing and killing the pursuer, and waking up freaked out afterwards. …Though come to think of it, that was actually the last run-away dream I had that I can recall, so maybe it’s something symbollic. Did yours continue afterwards?
I have dream #1 (final exam) fairly frequently.
In my version of the naked dream, I’m never completely naked. Either I am inappropriately barefoot, in a nightgown, or am wearing something too skimpy to conceal the fact that I am not wearing any underwear.
But my most frequent nightmare theme can occur no matter what the actual “plot” of the dream is. In fact, it is sometimes combined with the two scenarios above. At some point I am required to use a telephone in some urgent situation. I repeatedly try to dial the number I need, but I mess up in some way every time. Or I forget the number entirely. Or the phone is out of order.
I should mention that I am mildly phone phobic in real life.
I used to have a lot of the “forgot to go to class all semester, but now the final’s in two hours!” dreams. Once it was a course in phrenology that I had forgotten to go to.
Now, usually, bad dreams are me being pursued and being really slow (not much different from real life - except for the pursued part). It’s generally being pursued by many people - generally the authorities. I have a lot of dreams where I’m a hunted criminal, usually a murderer or a reviled and hated subversive of some generic variety.
A lot of the times I’m trapped in some kind of maze or hopeless situation of being surrounded.
I don’t get it. I’m not tempted to commit crimes of any kind and I’m a pretty mild mannered person. I’d damn well never kill anyone. Boggle.
My most common nightmare is that I’m running from some one, usually a group, Cylons, zombies, Borg, whoever. I can run, but I can’t hide. I try, but I always get found quickly. So I have to keep running and running, never having a chance to rest and knowing that eventually, I’ll slip and won’t be able to stay ahead of them.
I have the final exam dreams - usually, my problem is being unable to find my locker, then finding it and being unable to remember the combination. I almost never had them while I was still in school, but now they’re pretty frequent. I have the teeth-falling-out dreams too, and I usually feel like my teeth are loose for the rest of the day.
I also have a dream where I’m in a public place (usually a shopping mall) and the roof keeps getting lower and lower until I’m on hands and knees, trying to crawl for the door. The only way out is through some impossibly small space, and I end up on my belly, a few feet from the door, panicking because I can’t get through. Why yes, I am claustrophobic.
But my most frequent bad dream is not particularly scary, just weird and uncomfortable. Again, I’m in a public place (usually high school or college, sometimes a shopping mall), and I need to pee. I go into the ladies’ room, and there are dozens of stalls…and I can’t use any of them. The toilets are backed up, or broken, or beyond vile, or are strange contraptions that I can’t figure out how to use. I go from stall to stall, but the toilet in each one is unusable. Strangely enough, when I wake up from this dream I usually don’t have to pee in real life, so it’s not my brain trying to convince my body to get up and go to the bathroom. I’ve never found anyone else who has weird bathroom dreams, and I have no idea what it means or why I dream about it all the time.
I have the test-I-forgot-about dream fairly often and also the naked dream, except in that one I am not totally naked, usually. It’s more like “Oh my god, I forgot to put on pants!”. A variation on the test dream is one in which I didn’t actually graduate from high school because I am missing one class and I have to go back and take it. Once I had to go back to middle school. And I dream about my teeth falling out a lot. I distinctly remember the dream sensation of having a mouth full of loose teeth. Creepy.
For some reason, I dream about video games a lot. Like I’m playing one and suddenly I am in one. It’s usually a Super Mario Brothers kind of game, which I haven’t played in years.
As I am speaking to somebody, my teeth begin to crack and fall out - one by one.
My classic frustration dream involves every problem having a higher one which must be solved first. It’ll start out simple, like needing to go and buy something. So I get in the car, but I’m nearly out of petrol. So I go to the petrol station, but it’s closed. I go to another one, but they don’t take my type of card, then I go to a third, but run out of petrol on the way, so I’ll have to walk there and get a container of petrol, then I come back to the car, and my keys are locked in, so I have to go home to get the spare, but I have no money for a cab, so I call somebody at home to come, but they can’t because I’ve got the car… Then I forget what it was I had to do in the first place. That sort of thing.
Teeth falling out is one I’ve only had a couple of times, and recently.
Elevators. Dream about these A LOT. In the dream though, it’s almost a nightmare, but also almost fun - a bit like a roller coaster or scary movie. The elevators are VERY high speed, and going down, you can float in the cabin for a few seconds.
I will dream I’m going down an impossibly steep hill in a train (one even a 4WD road vehicle would baulk at). In real life, the train - if such a track existed - would plunge to the bottom in a pile of flaming death, and in the dream I’m worried about this, but the wheels maintain adhesion but only just. I have this one a lot.
Plenty more of them too. I’m a prolific dreamer. Full colour, surround sound, multiple screenings nightly. And I tend to remember them in the morning. I’m happy about that.
Another one I’ve had multiple times is of being in a place where the people (who may be family or friends or co-workers or total strangers) don’t seem quite like themselves, then I realize it’s because they’re monsters. Once it was vampires, another time zombies, another time possessed, but it ends in a chase and getaway.
I have two reocurring bad dreams; they usually happen when I’m stressed. Dream one is that I can’t remember my high school locker combination and I’m late to an important class (I graduated in 1985!)
The other dream is that I’m trying to call someone on the phone, usually a pay phone, and I can’t get the numbers punched in correctly; or I’ve forgotten the number; or I get through and it’s a wrong number.