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Most people who haven’t themselves been plagued with nightmares, or watched a loved one suffer with nightmares, are probably under the impression that a person having any form of a bad dream during the night is having a nightmare. This is not strictly true; there are in fact nightmares and night terrors which occur at different stages of sleep.

Nightmares

Nightmares are disturbing, visual dream sequences that occur in your mind and wake you up from your sleep, are very common and can begin at any age. Nightmares are an indication of a fear that needs to be acknowledged and confronted and are a normal response to unacceptable levels of fear and stress. They are emotionally disturbing dreams that occur during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and provoke feelings of fear, terror, distress or extreme anxiety.

Night Terrors

Night terrors are fearsome waking experiences that can terrify even the strongest person; the word “nightmare” is often inadequately used to describe the suffocating, paralyzed state of a night terror which may leave the unfortunate sufferer with a conviction of suffocation, choking or entrapment. Night terrors, or sleep terrors, occur during deep, non-REM sleep, where the brain’s waveforms are long and slow, and it is also when sleepwalking, sleep talking and sleep screaming can occur. Often the person doesn’t completely wake up during a night terror which happens during the first half of the night, often about 1 to 2 hours after the person goes to sleep; sometimes it can occur almost immediately after a person goes to sleep if they are particularly disturbed at the time.

Health

In general, trauma, stress, fears, health problems, insecurities, feelings of inadequacy, marital problems, grief etc may all be reasons for having nightmares. In persistent cases, patients may be referred to a physician or mental health professional for further evaluation. It generally helps to deal with these bad problems in a healthy way to try and find some form of closure within ourselves and a healthy lifestyle, particularly some form of exercise such as walking regularly for around 30 minutes every day, does seem to help. However, if parents have any concerns about their children’s nightmares, especially if children are having other problems, it is best to consult their children’s health care provider.

Disorder

Panic attacks may occur during sleep in patients with panic disorder, anxiety, or depression and are experienced as nightmares. Sleep disorders are common among children of all ages and are hard on the children and their parents. When nightmares occur in the context of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), they tend to involve the original threatening or horrifying set of circumstances that was involved during the traumatic event. Nightmare disorder is characterized by repeated episodes of a frightening or unpleasant dream that disrupts the person’s sleep. Dream disorders may respond to medication, but behavioral treatment approaches have shown excellent results, particularly in patients with post-traumatic stress disorder and recurrent nightmares.

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