Is it normal for a 10 year old to have this kind of nightmare?

[Federico del pueblo]

The 10 year old being me a very long time ago.

To be precise I remember that at that age (and later) I had nightmares fairly regularly, like every few weeks. I'm currently working through my childhood emotions (regression therapy etc.) and in my last psychedelic experience I became aware of two very specific dreams, one of which I'd like you to have a look at here in this thread and I'll make another thread for the other one.

So here's the dream:

In my dream it's in the middle of the night (just like it was in reality) and I'm in my children's room (just like I was in reality).

Suddenly I became aware that I must have seen something outside through the window. Like some dark undefined creature that passed by my window in the back ally behind the house. It could have been a person, but I didn't know.

So I leave my room and go into our living room. Outside of our living room is a terrace surrounded by a fairly big garden and some bushes that kind of separate the terrace from the garden. The garden at some point connects to the aforementioned back ally.

I step outside and see nothing suspicious so I decide to go back in.

The moment I walk back in I realise somebody is crawling out of the bush that's directly to the right of the door. 

The person stands up and I immediately realise that he's holding a knife in his hand.

I don't remember exactly what he said but I know for sure that he said something threatening like e.g. "now you're dead" or "I'll kill you".

Completely in shock I immediately turn around, run back in through the door and manage to shut it before the person can get a foot in.

Then I run away through the living room.

That's when I woke up.

And here comes the even more interesting part: I'm still scared out of my mind and look around in my room. Then I look through the window whether there is somebody there but can't see anybody.

Now I realise something completely weird: When I look at different objects in my room they start to move in weird ways.

It looks kind of similar to the visual effects you can have on psychedelics, when you see visual distortions, like things twisting and wiggling back and forth.

Especially the lamp on the ceiling went crazy. It literally looked like it was doing about 90° turns and moving towards me and then back again, taking the entire ceiling with it, time and again (a fairly big distance like maybe 1 metre/3 ft.).

So basically I was experiencing visual hallucinations as this 10 year old after a very realistic nightmare.

These visual hallucinations would persist for many years until at least young adulthood.

Whilst they still kind of scared me for quite a while I also found the effect kind of cool. It was like some crazy thrilling thing for me, scary but interesting.

But what do you think about all of this? It doesn't seem normal at all, right?

What could that mean about a child's psyche?

[Hojo]

I've had the dream within a dream before mine was trying to tell me something about the real world so maybe yours was too. I had a dream and in the dream I woke up out of my bed and went to my computer and 50 people messaging me that there was a demon coming into the building and I had to leave so I went to the door and it was locked and started shaking  so I went under my covers and hid then I woke up in real life and was under sleep paralysis and I saw the demon or death come into my room and he was going to touch me then I pushed myself out of sleep paralysis and the demon was gone. Shortly after I had an nde from drinking too much alcohol so I felt like the dream was trying to tell me something was going to happen. It had never happened to me after or before that. I think they might be glimpses into something or a warning. But if it has a  impact on you and you remember it its probably important. But having regular dreams within dreams could be schizophrenia too you can never really know as we don't even really know what schizophrenia is. I used to get sleep paralysis alot and got used to it and am able to get my body moving through sheer will. I could play around with it as when you push yourself out of it you wake up but are like so insanely tired you fall right back into it. It makes a sound in your consciousness like you are driving down the highway with all your windows open

Edited March 4, 2023 by Hojo

[Federico del pueblo]

@Hojo That's really interesting stuff you experienced.

I don't know if you misunderstood me though, because my dream was not within another dream (even though I've had that in some other rare instances), so I woke up into normal reality. 

The weird visual hallucinations I experienced in waking reality, that's why it was so scary.

I also contemplated whether such a dream, in which I see someone with a knife trying to attack me, could also mean that there was indeed somebody out there with some bad intention and that we might have something like a 6th sense that can sometimes warn us from things that are about to happen (or could happen).

I don't know whether this is a thing though.

[BipolarGrowth]

Heavily charged emotional states can lead to hallucinations in my experience. Your experience makes sense to me. The scariest moments of my life were when I was about 8 years old and woke up from an alien abduction dream to feel something cold touch my arm and hear a noise of movement in the room. I doubt that I was actually abducted in any objective sense, but I think the level of fear I was in while exiting the dream altered my perception and interpretation of what was going on when I was awake again in this reality. 

Edited March 5, 2023 by BipolarGrowth

[Federico del pueblo]

@BipolarGrowth Interesting! 

That sounds like the scariest type of thing you could experience as an 8 year old, it would scare the shit out of me as an adult ?

[Osaid]

I think this is actually "normal", as in it occurs frequently and is well-documented. It's called a hypnopompic hallucination. It seems it is more common as a kid. Mystical experiences in general tend to be more common as a kid at the baseline state.

 

[Federico del pueblo]

@Osaid OK, cool. Good to know! Thanks!

[Carl-Richard]

Hallucinations are more common in the transition between waking and sleep. As for the nightmares I had in childhood, they were otherworldly, contradictory and demonic, but still they had a structure to them. I would dream that I was an infinitely thin needle that was stretched infinitely far in both directions, for some reason in my living room suspended in mid-air together with other needles, feeling the sensations of being poked by these needles; pure horror and agony.

Then, the dream would progress to a dark underground world of what I can only describe as infinitely large, meaty and organ-like round structures, and they were kind of fractal in nature, like one of those Mandelbrot set zooms. They were infinitely heavy, and it felt like I was being squeezed and choked by the pressure of these things on top of me. I would need to become a painter to really describe these things.

Then, the dream would progress to a peaceful and serene bright space without any defined boundaries with a tiny translucent chair sitting next to a single translucent wall with a window in it, with a wind gently blowing amidst white angelic curtains. I would have a sort of dissociated calm-after-the-storm feeling, sort of numb and shook by the previous parts of the dream, but it was very calming. At the same time, I would sometimes be struck by a supreme feeling of wrongness, that everything was upside down but still acting like gravity was holding things in place. 

This dream would repeat many times during my childhood.

Edited March 5, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Federico del pueblo]

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

I would dream that I was an infinite thin needle that was stretched infinitely in both directions, for some reason in my living room suspended in mid air together with other needles, feeling the sensations of being poked by these needles, pure horror and agony. Then the dream would progress to a dark underground world of what I can only describe as infinitely large meaty organ-like round structures, and they were kind of fractal in nature, like one of those Mandelbrot set zooms.

That's quite freaky. Did your parents put Salvia Divinorum in your evening tea? ? 

2 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

They were infinitely heavy, and it felt like I was being squeezed and choked by the pressure of these things on top of me. Then the dream would progress to a peaceful and serene bright space without any defined boundaries with a tiny translucent chair next to a single translucent wall with a window in it, with a wind gently blowing amidst white angelic courtains. I would have a sort of dissociated calm after the storm feeling, like sort of numb and shook by the previous parts of the dream, but it was very calming.

That's an interesting transition. It remotely reminds me of the experiences of people who relive their own birth. Stanislav Grof writes about this in "the way of the psychonaut". First you have a lot of pressure because you get squeezed, then you get released and feel much better.

[Yimpa]

On 3/4/2023 at 7:46 AM, Federico del pueblo said:

But what do you think about all of this? It doesn't seem normal at all, right?

What could that mean about a child's psyche?

When I was 16, I had a therapist who told me he had a patient who was 5 years old. 
 

There’s nothing wrong with you unless you believe it to be the case. You’re unique - use that to your advantage and embrace it. Find those who want to  nurture you; not shame you. 

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, Federico del pueblo said:

That's quite freaky. Did your parents put Salvia Divinorum in your evening tea? ? 

Lol. Who knows? My dad knew a shaman once.

 

1 hour ago, Federico del pueblo said:

That's an interesting transition. It remotely reminds me of the experiences of people who relive their own birth. Stanislav Grof writes about this in "the way of the psychonaut". First you have a lot of pressure because you get squeezed, then you get released and feel much better.

It was so oddly specific: three phases with different types of pain, progressing in the same order every time. I wonder what a dream specialist would say about it.

I also had a very significant awe experience that is imprinted into my memory. I was watching the stars when I was maybe 3-4 years old, and it was like I became the night sky and traveled among the stars. It's a really faint memory, but at the same time rich, and sometimes I can connect to that same headspace. I don't remember if it was a spatial-temporal out-of-body experience, or a vision in my imagination, or an expanded sense of perception.

Edited March 5, 2023 by Carl-Richard

[Federico del pueblo]

1 hour ago, Carl-Richard said:

It was so oddly specific: three phases with different types of pain, progressing in the same order every time. I wonder what a dream specialist would say about it.

Was that phase that you described like below...

Quote

Then, the dream would progress to a peaceful and serene bright space without any defined boundaries with a tiny translucent chair sitting next to a single translucent wall with a window in it, with a wind gently blowing amidst white angelic curtains.

...one of the three phases or like an extra 4th phase?

Because what Grov describes are 4 perinatal phases (basic perinatal matrices). 1 phase right before birth, which can be nice and comfortable if pregnancy was all good, but can also be ugly if the mother was stressed or consumed toxins.

Then the second phase is when the contractions of the womb begin, which creates lots of mechanical stress and is experienced as threatening.

In the third phase the fetus is moving through the birth canal which is still more of a struggle, with potential strangulation, temporary lack of oxygen, contact with biological materials etc.

The 4th phase is when the fetus is actually born and leaves the vagina.

When people reexperience this e.g. in a high dosed lsd therapy session, each phase is accompanied by very vivid hallucinatory imagery full of symbols (sometimes archetypal entities appear like dragons, gods or half gods etc.), e.g. when the mother did smoke during pregnancy the fetus as which you identity experiences the toxins entering through the cord while seeing images of toxic waste dumps or similar things.

So I don't if this could be related to your dreams as a child. But I could see how a psyche might be processing the traumatic experiences from birth in such types of dreams, like a sequence of phases that kind of resemble the sensations during the basic perinatal phases.

These phases often influence people for a lifetime if they don't get processed at some point, like people will develop neurosis or very weird sexual perversions etc.

[Carl-Richard]

38 minutes ago, Federico del pueblo said:

Was that phase that you described like below...

...one of the three phases or like an extra 4th phase?

One of the three. There was the needle phase, then the abyss phase, then the serene phase.

 

41 minutes ago, Federico del pueblo said:

Then the second phase is when the contractions of the womb begin, which creates lots of mechanical stress and is experienced as threatening.

In the third phase the fetus is moving through the birth canal which is still more of a struggle, with potential strangulation, temporary lack of oxygen, contact with biological materials etc.

The 4th phase is when the fetus is actually born and leaves the vagina.

Interesting. Seems to map on pretty well: contractions causing poking sensations, moving down the birth canal feeling like entering the abyss with organ-like structures, and being born feeling like coming out into the light 

[Federico del pueblo]

Yep ?

[Ulax]

@Federico del pueblo I think these videos could be of value (I'm not that savvy when it comes to dream analysis though. Also, I haven't actually watched these vids, I just like the youtuber when it comes to trauma related stuff).

 

Edited March 7, 2023 by Ulax

[Federico del pueblo]

@Ulax thanks mate!

[Rahra]

It’s normal to me.

I’ve seen spirits and demons since I was 5-7, and also a lot of insane non-normal dreams.

There is a fight within and outside between evil and goodness, between light and darkness, between celestials and demons. No doubt.

I’ve not known normal for many years.

Indeed, such people are labeled as insane or delusional.

But it is them who is insane and delusional.

[tuku747]

4 minutes ago, Rahra said:

It’s normal to me.

I’ve seen spirits and demons since I was 5-7, and also a lot of insane non-normal dreams.

There is a fight within and outside between evil and goodness, between light and darkness, between celestials and demons. No doubt.

I’ve not known normal for many years.

Indeed, such people are labeled as insane or delusional.

But it is them who is insane and delusional.

Have you ever considered God fights itself for fun?

You know, there's a reason we love boxing, MMA wrestling, fighting games, superhero movies...

From a higher perspective; Fighting is another form of play. Like two lion cubs pretending to maul the shit out of one another.