The pandemic is giving people vivid, unusual dreams(nationalgeographic.com)
nationalgeographic.com
The pandemic is giving people vivid, unusual dreams
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/04/coronavirus-pandemic-is-giving-people-vivid-unusual-dreams-here-is-why/
55 comments
IMO it’s a typical sign of onsetting chronic stress.
At first it makes you feel more fresh, you start sleeping less and thinking more. Then half a year later you realise you haven’t slept well for a really long time.
Truly negative sides become more noticeable much later when it’s too late.
Over the years I have tried: meditation, trying to keep my mind off, going for a walk in the middle of the night, eating, not eating in the evening, working, drinking, weed.
The only thing that actually worked is just staying in bed with my eyes closed. No, you don’t sleep - but you still rest mentally by letting your concentration wander off.
At first it makes you feel more fresh, you start sleeping less and thinking more. Then half a year later you realise you haven’t slept well for a really long time.
Truly negative sides become more noticeable much later when it’s too late.
Over the years I have tried: meditation, trying to keep my mind off, going for a walk in the middle of the night, eating, not eating in the evening, working, drinking, weed.
The only thing that actually worked is just staying in bed with my eyes closed. No, you don’t sleep - but you still rest mentally by letting your concentration wander off.
Funny, weed really helped me but despite being a legal medical patient I can’t leave my house to get more!
> Truly negative sides become more noticeable much later when it’s too late.
I slept poorly for years, so I suspect I can guess some of these, but I'm curious which side effects you meant. It's hard for me to know what negative changes are a result from normal aging and which wouldn't be there if I had managed my sleeping better.
I slept poorly for years, so I suspect I can guess some of these, but I'm curious which side effects you meant. It's hard for me to know what negative changes are a result from normal aging and which wouldn't be there if I had managed my sleeping better.
I’ve been having sleep issues lately. The only thing that consistently works is making the room very cold. I’ve tried meditation and less computer time and it didn’t really help, only a colder room did.
If you’re having sleep trouble give it a shot.
If you’re having sleep trouble give it a shot.
making the room a bit cooler and getting a warm blanket.. might give a cozy and relaxing feeling
This is exactly how my sleep schedule has evolved as well. And last night I just happened to have one of these vivid dreams described by the article. Then I wake up and see the NatGeo article posted.
Coincidence? No, I think everyone that participates in society has a rhythm that has been interrupted for the first time in a long time (many decades, see Eric Weinstein "Great Nap"), and the result is all of our cerebral hardware activating in the same way in order to make sense of this new normal. We are told it is temporary, but 3-4 weeks is required to form new habits, and the disruption has lasted that long for me.
On top of all that, after waking at 4am (as you also have been), I look at my phone. Nothing. Then not 30 seconds later, someone replies to one of my YouTube comments on a battery chemistry video.
(Bear in mind I am fresh out of a rather nightmarish vision, which from what I could tell was basically an assimilation of a lifetime of memories of every movie and video game situation ive ever experienced where there are hordes of invasive aliens or zombies. The implication of the scenarii was that I had access to plenty of guns and ammunition, but opted to go without because I did not think the situation was that bad. Then I realized it was perhaps worth worrying about and regretted being without a weapon, at which point I noticed all the invaders being attracted to a local heat source where they were destroyed, like Lost In Space (1998) where Joey from Friends overdrives the fusion core to distract and destroy the horde).
So after I read the comment I am immediately wide awake and completely engaged with the parent thread and video. I get onto an abnormally focused research vector for a couple hours (no need for coffee), and buy a few chemicals to experiment with.
Spent a few hours before the weird REM trip in a very long video chat with friends from way back in high school.
I suppose nostalgia is like an antidepressant at this point (antidepressant implies sweeping the dirt under a rug, which makes the room look cleaner but what made it dirty is still in the room)
Coincidence? No, I think everyone that participates in society has a rhythm that has been interrupted for the first time in a long time (many decades, see Eric Weinstein "Great Nap"), and the result is all of our cerebral hardware activating in the same way in order to make sense of this new normal. We are told it is temporary, but 3-4 weeks is required to form new habits, and the disruption has lasted that long for me.
On top of all that, after waking at 4am (as you also have been), I look at my phone. Nothing. Then not 30 seconds later, someone replies to one of my YouTube comments on a battery chemistry video.
(Bear in mind I am fresh out of a rather nightmarish vision, which from what I could tell was basically an assimilation of a lifetime of memories of every movie and video game situation ive ever experienced where there are hordes of invasive aliens or zombies. The implication of the scenarii was that I had access to plenty of guns and ammunition, but opted to go without because I did not think the situation was that bad. Then I realized it was perhaps worth worrying about and regretted being without a weapon, at which point I noticed all the invaders being attracted to a local heat source where they were destroyed, like Lost In Space (1998) where Joey from Friends overdrives the fusion core to distract and destroy the horde).
So after I read the comment I am immediately wide awake and completely engaged with the parent thread and video. I get onto an abnormally focused research vector for a couple hours (no need for coffee), and buy a few chemicals to experiment with.
Spent a few hours before the weird REM trip in a very long video chat with friends from way back in high school.
I suppose nostalgia is like an antidepressant at this point (antidepressant implies sweeping the dirt under a rug, which makes the room look cleaner but what made it dirty is still in the room)
Two nights ago, I dreamt that someone posted "Ask HN: How can I move a house from South Africa?" He wanted to know the most cost-effective way to transport an entire house from South Africa to either Germany or the US. It had to be that specific house.
I confess I almost used a sock puppet account to submit this question the next morning.
I confess I almost used a sock puppet account to submit this question the next morning.
I mean people have deconstructed castles in England, labelling them brick by brick and reassembled them in the USA. Sounds like an interesting problem to address!
Don't forget the time a bank building was sent by parcel post: https://about.usps.com/who-we-are/postal-history/bank-of-ver...
(OK, so it wasn't actually a case of moving an existing building, just the bricks to build one.)
(OK, so it wasn't actually a case of moving an existing building, just the bricks to build one.)
London Bridge!
https://www.golakehavasu.com/london-bridge
https://www.golakehavasu.com/london-bridge
He was particularly concerned with cost. Perhaps he should have added "on a budget" to the title.
Haha I would love to see the responses to that question, actually...
So would I, to see the really out there suggestions. The obvious answer is some variation of "just put it on a boat", but come on folks let's get creative!
Take it apart board by board, stack it on palettes, then ship it via space shuttle. Reassemble at the destination.
This Newyorker article talks about similar phenomenon in another kind of stressful environment, an authoritarian regime:
https://www.newyorker.com/books/second-read/how-dreams-chang...
https://www.newyorker.com/books/second-read/how-dreams-chang...
Any chance it's also partly due to medications people are taking more of? First-generation antihistamines are known to give people weird dreams.
I've experienced this many times. And these are common ingredients in multi-symptom OTC cold/allergy/flu medications, especially anything that says "night" in the name.
A lot of people may have mild and/or undiagnosed cases of COVID-19. They feel sick, they reach for some medicine.
Coughs are a COVID-19 symptom, so maybe they take cough syrup. If they take Robitussin Nighttime Cough DM, that has doxylamine succinate in it. And Robitussin Severe Multi-Symptom Cough Cold + Flu Nighttime has diphenhydramine hydrochloride in it.
Or maybe they don't have a cough, but their go-to medicine for any time they feel like crap is Nyquil. It also has doxylamine succinate in it.
And/or maybe they don't have COVID-19, but they have heightened alertness about being sick and they're just more likely to take medication when anything (mild allergies, etc.) seems off.
I've experienced this many times. And these are common ingredients in multi-symptom OTC cold/allergy/flu medications, especially anything that says "night" in the name.
A lot of people may have mild and/or undiagnosed cases of COVID-19. They feel sick, they reach for some medicine.
Coughs are a COVID-19 symptom, so maybe they take cough syrup. If they take Robitussin Nighttime Cough DM, that has doxylamine succinate in it. And Robitussin Severe Multi-Symptom Cough Cold + Flu Nighttime has diphenhydramine hydrochloride in it.
Or maybe they don't have a cough, but their go-to medicine for any time they feel like crap is Nyquil. It also has doxylamine succinate in it.
And/or maybe they don't have COVID-19, but they have heightened alertness about being sick and they're just more likely to take medication when anything (mild allergies, etc.) seems off.
I'm pretty sure I had (have?) a mild case of Covid for 12-14 days or so. During the first week of symptoms I had wild dreams, which I remembered all of. I've taken no medication (that includes things like Robitussin, Nyquil).
I might remember one dream per month on average. It's not common for me. With this, I remembered dreams almost every night. And they were surreal, vivid, very strange.
I think it's because the body is reacting to an unusual infection. So called fever dreams from an infection are a normal thing. A high fever would explain it, however I never developed a high fever. There was a change in my sleep pattern, as for 4-5 of those days I slept for extended periods of time due to exhaustion (over two bad symptom days, I slept for 12 hours per day; normal is seven hours for me).
My symptoms were sore throat, mild fever, general sick feeling, some abnormal pressure in my chest, light congestion. I only had a light cough for two days. This all went on for two weeks, with gyrations in the severity (one day I'd feel ~80% normal, then stronger symptoms would return the next day; on and on it went; two of the days I felt sick enough to nearly go to the hospital (I decided to test only if my fever got to a certain line; now I might do a blood test after the fact)).
To put it into context, I haven't had a sore throat in six years; maybe one sore throat in a decade. I haven't had the flu in nearly 20 years. I get about one mild cold per year, which lasts a few days. I haven't been sick longer than roughly five or six days in my lifetime. Odds are it was the SARS-CoV-2 virus (I also had a prominent source exposure, a healthcare worker I know that has been xray'ing Covid patients).
The dreams have disappeared now and I mostly feel better. My dreaming pattern is back to not remembering anything.
I might remember one dream per month on average. It's not common for me. With this, I remembered dreams almost every night. And they were surreal, vivid, very strange.
I think it's because the body is reacting to an unusual infection. So called fever dreams from an infection are a normal thing. A high fever would explain it, however I never developed a high fever. There was a change in my sleep pattern, as for 4-5 of those days I slept for extended periods of time due to exhaustion (over two bad symptom days, I slept for 12 hours per day; normal is seven hours for me).
My symptoms were sore throat, mild fever, general sick feeling, some abnormal pressure in my chest, light congestion. I only had a light cough for two days. This all went on for two weeks, with gyrations in the severity (one day I'd feel ~80% normal, then stronger symptoms would return the next day; on and on it went; two of the days I felt sick enough to nearly go to the hospital (I decided to test only if my fever got to a certain line; now I might do a blood test after the fact)).
To put it into context, I haven't had a sore throat in six years; maybe one sore throat in a decade. I haven't had the flu in nearly 20 years. I get about one mild cold per year, which lasts a few days. I haven't been sick longer than roughly five or six days in my lifetime. Odds are it was the SARS-CoV-2 virus (I also had a prominent source exposure, a healthcare worker I know that has been xray'ing Covid patients).
The dreams have disappeared now and I mostly feel better. My dreaming pattern is back to not remembering anything.
All that, and maybe people are getting enough sleep.
I assumed from the headline that such was the case.
I thought this may the cause of mine...
Not unusual, really. We just never knew what it was like to dream. Now we have full sleep. And some sleep with full stomachs from all the snacking and eating. Dream on. Defragmentation time.
I'm part of a lucid dreaming community on reddit and I've noticed a huge increase in posts from people who just had their first lucid dream. There is also an influx of posts about dream recall being stronger and dreams being more vivid.
Lack of stimulus —> brain goes rummaging around in the attic
Maybe also adequate sleep + no alarm clock = longer peak dream states and better recall
Concur. Not needing to bolt out of bed is key for me. If I can stop myself from reaching for the phone to check the overnight email, I’m rewarded with some satisfyingly trippy characters and images. There was memorable body paint and related contortions involved last night. Who comes up with this stuff... oh.
I think this is probably it, iirc REM sleep is sort of the least prioritized sleep, so you tend to get a lot more of it going from eg 6 hours a night to 8 hours per night.
If thats true, wonder what will happen if the internet goes down for a couple weeks.
Over the past 2-3 weeks I've had several occasions where I'm lying down with my eyes closed and have a sort of swirling visual field coalesce into a vivid scene with people and things in it. At first I just let it run its course but later I found I could steer it thematically quite well and it's been quite a fun experience. I'm 46 and it's never happened to me before.
Look into hypnagogic imagery and Wake Induced Lucid Dreaming (WILD). It's a big thing in lucid dreaming circles to use that sort of thing to enter into a dream conscious and then control (steer?) it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnagogia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnagogia
I just spent last night having a set of bizarre dreams ... I wish I could remember them because I'm sure I'd find them funny this morning. Two summers ago I had a very strong strain of Salmonella poisoning and the dreams during the first two weeks of recovery included very trippy dreams. Last night's dreams were nothing compared to those.
"I wish I could remember them..."
Tips for remembering dreams:
1 - Have a pad of paper and writing implement right next to your bed. I've actually switched to using a voice recorder, because it's way more convenient and I can talk much faster than I can write, so I really recommend it.
2 - Right before you go to sleep, consciously make the intention to remember your dreams and write them down when you wake up.
3 - Also, right before you go to sleep try to remember your day in reverse, starting from the last thing you did before bed on through your day to the first thing you did. The idea is to prime yourself for remembering what happened right before you awoke.
4 - When you wake up immediately write down (or record) what you remember. Even if the only thing you remember is a vague feeling, write it down. Getting in to the habit of recording your dreams will result in you remembering more of them over time.
5 - Restrict your body movement to the minimal possible after you wake up, until you've written down your dreams. I've noticed that even turning over from one side to another can make me forget a dream.
6 - If you have a long, detailed dream to write down, don't start writing it down in detail from start to finish. When I've done that I often forget the dream half-way through writing it down. Instead, start by writing down the highlights or key words or images from the dream, then go back and fill in the details.
7 - Get interested in dreams and read about them.
8 - Review the dreams you recorded and try to make sense of them. Try to figure out how they reflect your waking life, the people you know, and the concerns you have. Make connections between your dreams, and try to pick up on recurring patterns in them.
The more attention you give to your dreams and dreams in general the more likely you are to remember them. If your interest and attention fades and you don't care about them or are too busy for them and don't write them down, you'll remember less.
Having something interesting, notable, strange, exciting, or stressful happen to you also frequently results in vivid dreams, so it makes sense that an unusual, stressful, and terrifying event like the pandemic makes for vivid dreams.
Tips for remembering dreams:
1 - Have a pad of paper and writing implement right next to your bed. I've actually switched to using a voice recorder, because it's way more convenient and I can talk much faster than I can write, so I really recommend it.
2 - Right before you go to sleep, consciously make the intention to remember your dreams and write them down when you wake up.
3 - Also, right before you go to sleep try to remember your day in reverse, starting from the last thing you did before bed on through your day to the first thing you did. The idea is to prime yourself for remembering what happened right before you awoke.
4 - When you wake up immediately write down (or record) what you remember. Even if the only thing you remember is a vague feeling, write it down. Getting in to the habit of recording your dreams will result in you remembering more of them over time.
5 - Restrict your body movement to the minimal possible after you wake up, until you've written down your dreams. I've noticed that even turning over from one side to another can make me forget a dream.
6 - If you have a long, detailed dream to write down, don't start writing it down in detail from start to finish. When I've done that I often forget the dream half-way through writing it down. Instead, start by writing down the highlights or key words or images from the dream, then go back and fill in the details.
7 - Get interested in dreams and read about them.
8 - Review the dreams you recorded and try to make sense of them. Try to figure out how they reflect your waking life, the people you know, and the concerns you have. Make connections between your dreams, and try to pick up on recurring patterns in them.
The more attention you give to your dreams and dreams in general the more likely you are to remember them. If your interest and attention fades and you don't care about them or are too busy for them and don't write them down, you'll remember less.
Having something interesting, notable, strange, exciting, or stressful happen to you also frequently results in vivid dreams, so it makes sense that an unusual, stressful, and terrifying event like the pandemic makes for vivid dreams.
I've had a voice-activated recorder in my nightstand for 30 years ... so many times the solution to a problem I've been working on gets solved by my sub-conscience. My wife got tired of me turning on the light to write in my journal so having something voice activated works well. It does require some editing as it will record other conversations/activities. (though normally I transcribe the important parts and let the tape record back over itself).
What kind? Been looking for something like that.
Replying to this comment on the off-chance you let us know the software hardware stack.
My wife would tolerate me talking to myself about my dreams a lot less than a small light, pen, and pad. When it’s not your dream it’s pretty uninteresting.
To get more interesting and memorable dreams generally, I suggest trying to write short stories. After I write, my dreams are far more coherent, vivid and meaningful - I guess because my brain is trying to continue fitting things into a narrative package.
These are some really smart suggestions.
The biggest helps for me — listed in 1 and 2 above — were to keep a pad of paper and a pen nearby, and to decide willfully that I would wake up enough to start writing it down.
Once I started to write, I would recall a surprising amount of the dream. For me, writing was better than voice.
The biggest helps for me — listed in 1 and 2 above — were to keep a pad of paper and a pen nearby, and to decide willfully that I would wake up enough to start writing it down.
Once I started to write, I would recall a surprising amount of the dream. For me, writing was better than voice.
I always have unusual dreams. But again I'm not that social, maybe that's the same reason?
More time sleeping will give you more time to dream.
And if I oversleep they are especially vivid.
> "The pandemic is giving people vivid, unusual dreams"
Is anyone surprised to hear that "unusual or stressful events may cause unusual dreams?"
Is anyone surprised to hear that "unusual or stressful events may cause unusual dreams?"
The way I think it, the mind is aware that we have more our time.. so it starts processing archived thoughts from long time ago
And the continual drum beat of fear and loathing from the media is definitely not helping.
Zinc supplements such as ZMA have this effect as well. I usually see no dreams at all (or at least don't remember them at all), but when taking ZMA I see dreams often.
All of my dreams lately are nightmares where I find myself at WalMart during prime shopping hours surrounded by crowds, and without a mask.
Chorloquine dreams will make them look tame
A related issue: insomnia. About once per week in the past month I get up around 3 or 4 (often after a vivid dream) and can't get back to sleep as my mind starts racing, not specifically about COVID but about other things going on that have been impacted by COVID, such as kids and work. After about an hour I give up, get my laptop, and start to do some work.
The dreams that I am able to remember are more vivid, and go beyond the reoccurring dreams that I've had for years. One recent dream: I am in a British manor house, being guided by the owner or host to look at some displays of art or very old, ornate machines. At one point he started singing in an almost operatic voice, but I can't remember the song. While I haven't ever been to such a place, I was reading about such a house in Wikipedia the day before (Apethorpe, the favored retreat of Charles I) but I did not know what the contents of that house were, or where my dream brain came up with displays of art or ornate machinery.