night terrors | Charmed Reflections

I woke up this morning mid dream and cannot shake the feeling of what I experienced in the dream. It was sheer terror. It was like I was being held hostage and forced to a life of servitude in more ways than one to a group of elite cultists.

I think that means I need to lay off the conspiracy section of youtube. Or something.

I’ve had lots of nightmares and night terrors throughout my life – stemming from a young age. Recurring dreams happen often too. Or at least recurring themes. But this one came out of no where and it felt so real.

You ever have dreams like that? Where they feel so real that you wake up convinced what happened in the dream must have happened in reality too?

I don’t know what could have brought on the dream. Maybe I’m watching too many episodes of Xfiles but I only have two more seasons to go and then I’m finished the show. A first re-watch in over five years. I just love it so much.

Sometimes I think these dreams would make really good short stories but I’m never in them long enough to see how they end. Some dreams just fade as soon as I wake up. While others, I can still feel everything I felt in the dream – upon waking. The feelings linger throughout the day. And sometimes for days after.

All I know is the terror I felt in the opening of this dream – felt so real that I can still feel a hand around my neck.

One time, I even woke up with bruises on my shoulder. They looked like bruises left by a hand print. I tried to recreate the marks with my own hands but it was physically impossibly. It was like someone had grabbed me from behind and squeezed my shoulder tight enough to bruise it.

In my last condo, I remember waking up and finding scratches on my legs. There’s no way I could have gotten those scratches when I was sleeping. They were deep and lasted for at least two or three months.

There is an old saying that if you die in your sleep you die in real life. And sometimes I wonder if what happens in your dream can follow you into real life – like scratches, bruises and other marks.

I know that some people think receiving scratches is a sign of demonic activity. But I honestly do not believe in demons. I believe in spirits and spiritual energy – I believe that some energy can be positive and some can be negative. Some energy can linger on for years. But demonic entities? With horns and rotten skin? Nah. That’s too Stephen King even for me.

Even though Lucifer is one of my favorite shows in recent years. Because, that role was made for Tom Ellis who is so dreamy.

Maybe one day we’ll have technology to record our dreams and record how we felt during them – kind of like a virtual dream journal.

I’ve been meaning to write down some of my dreams here in this blog but have just hit a writing funk. I think I’m just bored in general and need to get out more and back into a regular schedule.

So, that’s where we are this cloudy Tuesday morning. My condo is nearly 30 degrees. I have both fans going. The windows open. And there’s another rainstorm heading our way.

Happy Tuesday.

Last night, I crawled into bed at exactly midnight. I tried staying up late but I was so tired that I gave up and caved in at 11:56. I put in a good effort. But sometimes my sinus issues makes me more tired than I actually am. Or this is life from now on. Who knows.

I woke up from a stress dream that left me a bit perplexed. I’ve had a lot of those lately. Random dreams about random stresses in my life.

Most of you who read my blog know that I play the organ for a small church in town. This is something I’ve done for 15 years. And love it. But when stress creeps into my life, it usually manifests itself in all it’s ugly glory and appears as stress dreams. Or even more fun, night terrors And even better than that – sleep paralysis. I’ve had fully blown hallucinations from sleep paralysis. Not fun at all, I tell you.

Last night’s dream threw me off a bit. I was sitting in a pew in a crowded church. It looked very much like the Catholic church my mother used to drag us to every Sunday. That’s where I learn to read sheet music. I was bored to tears and would sing along to the hymns.

I was surrounded by strangers who were chanting and singing along to “Now we thank our god” when all of a sudden, I found myself sitting at the organ. I had already missed playing a verse because I couldn’t find the hymn in their hymnal book.

I panicked as the crowd started singing the second verse. No one seemed to notice that I wasn’t playing. I played the first chord. And started having flash backs to the first wedding I played the organ for. It was a scary experience.

Everything I played on the organ, came out wrong. Then they moved onto the next hymn and I was still trying to find the hymn – the number 345 appeared on the wooden board where they displayed hymn numbers. But that didn’t make sense. To me, number 345 was Morning Has Broken – a favorite of mine (and my mother’s).

Finally, the singing stopped and I found myself back in my seat. Next to me, sat friends from the church were I play the organ. I couldn’t figure out how I got there so fast. That’s how my dreams are. They seemingly flip from one scene to the next.

And then I moved to another dream. A handsome and dashing man from the crowd honed in on me to tell me how amazing my performance was (huh? what performance?) and asked if he could take me home. I said yes. And the dream turned into… um. Let’s just go with, something else.

All I know is I woke up from that dream and scratched my head. I have no idea what it means. But … is it a bad sign that I started off a new decade with a stress dream about doing something I’ve loved for fifteen years?

Ponder that scenario for a moment if you will.

I hopped out of bed at 8:15 am and by 9:00 am, I had cleaned up my kitchen and had coffee and breakfast ready. Plans for a semi-productive day are now on hold as I’m considering crawling back into bed. I don’t even know why I got up so early on new year’s day.

Eh, fuck it. I’m going back to bed. Maybe I can slip back into the dream and find out what it all really means.

How does stress manifest itself in your life?

Asking for a friend.

Happy new year!

Charmed Reflections

Tag Archives: night terrors

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