5 Steps to Help You Overcome Nightmares

You’re being chased by a monster. It always seems to be just two steps behind. You run and run, your whole body on fire with fear, and you can’t shake your pursuer. Your teeth start rattling and falling out. Then, somehow you’re on stage, under a spotlight, and you realize you’re not wearing pants and everyone in the audience is staring at you.

Hopefully, you haven’t experienced any of those events in real life. But I wouldn’t be surprised to hear you’ve gone through at least one of these common themes in dreamland and woken up in a cold sweat with your heart pounding.

What are nightmares and who has them more often?

Nightmares are mysterious. Folklore from around the world has attributed nightmares to be demons, the souls of dead people who were wronged in life, and spirits with all sorts of malicious intent. Nowadays, although we haven’t fully solved the mystery of why nightmares exist and how they come about, we know that they're intense mental activity that happens mostly during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Usually, we experience nightmares as very vivid dreams that are terrifying or upsetting. And, naturally, they can disrupt our sleep and affect our mood.

Most of us are lucky and only have nightmares once in a while. But for about 2-5 percent of the population, they happen often or even nightly. Nightmares are much more common among girls and women than their male counterparts. Those who struggle with alcohol or drug addiction are also more likely to have frequent nightmares. People who have posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or have experienced childhood abuse are also more at risk, and most have frequent nightmares.

But for some people, there seems to be no particular reason for persistent nightmares—instead, they have something called nightmare disorder. This is a disorder where you not only frequently have vivid and disturbing dreams, but also suffer major distress or impairment during the day such as anxiety, concentration problems, tiredness, and worry about going to sleep.

There is good news! Whether you have Nightmare Disorder, PTSD, or just more nightmares than you’d like, there are things you can do to decrease nightmares and regain a good...

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