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Are these nightmares related to my trauma?

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agender.exe

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Quite a few years ago now I found myself in a situation where I believed that someone was going to rape me. I won't go into too many details regarding the situation, but I was in a stranger's house, I wanted to leave after he had initiated physical contact, and this person locked me inside the apartment with himself to prevent me from leaving. Luckily, he let me go, but for those 15-20 seconds where he wasn't letting me leave I truly believed it was going to happen.

Since then, I find myself every so often having nightmares about people either being or being in danger of being raped. Some of them are clearly related to the actual traumatic event, as the person in danger is me and often the perpetrator is preventing me from leaving the room. More often than not, however, the person (or people) being raped is someone else, and I can't do anything but watch as it happens.

Do you think the latter kind of nightmare (when it's someone else being raped) could be related to that traumatic event I mentioned? Or is it more likely something else?
 
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i believe my own nightmares about witnessing my trauma being perpetrated on someone else have been both dissociation and detachment. the diff between the two is dissociation being a form of denial. those are often recurring nightmares. the detachment was a phase in my healing where i was stepping away from self-blame for having been the victim of a crime. those dreams evolved as my healing progressed.

buttttttaaaaaaa. . . interpreting dreams is tricky business. at best.
 
You really need to work out your nightmares in therapy. If you pull out the real meaning without someone to guide you through what comes next you can end up in really bad shape for a while.
 
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