A dream like that can fuck you up.
Back in high school, I had a dream that was too real. I tend to have hyper vivid dreams to begin with, even now.
But this one? Fuck.
It was a love story. No specific person, it was an imaginary girl that my brain cooked up for the dream. We met, dated, fell in love. And it kept going. Getting married, having kids, and in such detail that it is still in my memory as strong as some things that happened for real.
She died in the dream and I woke up just sobbing uncontrollably. An entire fucking life crammed into a few hours of sleep, however long the rem cycle took.
It changed me. I like to think for the good, since it made me much more willing to work in a relationship, to put in the effort it takes to be a good partner (well, my definition of such any way, might not be the same standards that others have, I dunno).
It also made me willing to end a relationship that isn’t working instead of clinging to the idea of being with someone. Not that I never had trouble letting go, but on average, when it became obvious that it wasn’t going to work, I could step away and not carry any animosity or regret. I think it’s a big part of the reason I can be friends with most of my exes.
Vivid life long dreams like this are my every night. I have friends, family, relationships that last years. Full lifetimes. And then gone. I have such vivid memories of these lives I sometimes have to double check with my SO, family and friends if a particular memory is real or not.
It’s wonderful but also insanely painful…
Had a similar dream like that. But in my dream I think I died?
So like your dream, mine was hyper vivid too.
Met a girl, we dated, we got married, even had a couple of kids. And then at some point we celebrated our wedding anniversary with a big party. Our kids and grand kids were there. It was an amazing feast. And we go to bed happy, I kiss her good night and tell her how lucky I am, and then I startled myself awake and I find myself alone in bed in my darkened house.
I figured that she must have gotten up earlier or something, so I go to the bathroom, but I don’t recognise my face in the mirror initially, looks too young and I start to panic. Rush to kitchen, shouting her name. But the kitchen is empty too, obviously. She was never real. I mourned that loss for a few days, it really messed me up for a while. Wanting to go back to the dream. But I never saw her again in my dreams.
Scumbag brain.
You can look into mirrors in your dreams?
If you had dreamt so vividly that you were 80-ish years old, and then immediately after waking up you look in the mirror and see a 40-ish year old looking back at you. For a short time you can’t comprehend what you’re seeing.
I’ve had a few of those life-time dreams, and they fucked me up real good. Several times I’ve fallen in love with the man of my dreams (literally) and been depressed for days afterwards when I realize I don’t have that anymore. It feels like genuine loss.
And one time I was married to an agoraphobic whoopie Goldberg for 40 years, and woke up just as her sister and I convinced her to leave the fake house we lived in for 4 decades, that was 23 years ago and I still wonder if she would have been able to do it or not.
It was a love story. No specific person, it was an imaginary girl that my brain cooked up for the dream. We met, dated, fell in love. And it kept going. Getting married, having kids, and in such detail that it is still in my memory as strong as some things that happened for real.
Same, I felt so much love in that one particular dream (and I for one don’t usually remember dreams at all), but this one holds a special place. Met this woman, felt in love, have a daughter whose name I remember when I woke up but sadly not anymore.
You know, seeing these responses with other people having experienced it too is cathartic.
I’ve never met anyone irl that had that kind of dream, and the last time I mentioned it online, nobody popped up that had. It’s nice to know that it isn’t some kind of isolated thing, that it’s not just me being weird.
I am now middle age, the dream was when I was like 20, 21, and have a real life children (daughter+son) and wife. But I do think of my dream wife and daughter now and then and felt a tingle of old love for them. Maybe in a parallel universe that they exist.
I honestly sometimes wish I wouldn’t experience dreams. Most of them are bad, and the few good ones usually make me yearn for something I don’t and can’t have.
![Bad dream [Azul Crescent's silly scribbles]](https://lemmus.org/pictrs/image/dbfe3c35-1735-4138-921f-25cdb7f3b409.webp){kind=link}