Nightmare being attacked

[BigBirdsSister]

I keep having nightmares about being sexually attacked. I do have sexual trauma from when I was 13 but these dreams don't really resemble the actual trauma. Is this a thing? To have dreams of being forced in ways that don't really represent the trauma visually if you get my meaning? The common denominator between all the reoccurring dreams and variant dreams in non consent basically. I would appreciate any insight.

I am also feeling apprehensive about telling my therapist about them. I feel so much shame. What if she thinks I have these dreams because she thinks I want those things to happen somehow. I know logically she won't but the shame keeps that worry in my head.
Thanks in advance for any input. I appreciate you all.

 

[bellbird]

Hey @BigBirdsSister I'm sorry you're having nightmares, I have them too. My trauma is from the death of a close friend, but I think I understand where you're coming from. I very rarely dream of her (I only have 3 times actually- once the night after she died, once the night after her funeral and once on a random occasion), but my nightmares do have a common theme of fear/danger/death/terror etc., involving me and/or loved ones who are alive in real life. So my nightmares don't resemble my real trauma either.
I feel a lot of shame about my nightmares too; I would never ever want any of those things to happen in real life and yet I still dream of them. From my experience, when I have spoken about them to my counselor, I've never felt that she thought that meant I wanted them to happen. But I know how painful and difficult it can be to talk about them nonetheless, and I do feel that too. I just know it helps to process them sometimes- to talk about them. In some ways it scares me to talk about them because it makes them feel more real by acknowledging them out loud. But I find talking about them can also help to take some of the power away from them. My mind is my worst enemy, and sometimes it feels like once I've said them out loud to my counselor in a safe space, it's like it's not just me fighting them inside my head all by myself anymore.
I hope this helps in some way, if anything to know that you're not alone. And I appreciate you for being here too.
-bellbird

 

[BigBirdsSister]

Hey @bellbird I'm sorry you've been through such an awful time. <3 Di it take you a while to be able to tell your counsellor about those dreams? I have been seeing mine 10 months and have yet to even tell her about the trauma in detail, so the dreams are still too raw to touch. I'm glad talking about them helped you and it does help to hear that talking about them does help. I think hearing your story will help me to tell my therapist about my own dreams. Thank you xx

 

[bellbird]

(bit of a back story) so I have actually been in counselling for a bit over 3 years now, for anxiety/depression that pre-dated this PTSD. My university offers free counselling to students (though we probably pay some fee towards it in our general university fees) and normally students can only have about 7 or 8 sessions I think, due to the high demand for the service. But my counselor got to "keep" me due to what I was going through, so by the time my PTSD nightmares started, I'd already been seeing her for 2+ years where we had worked through a lot and so had been able to build up a lot of trust over that time, and so I suppose I was able to tell her about the PTSD nightmares relatively "quickly". But I know if I wouldn't have had that trust foundation, it would have taken a lot longer. Even now there are still things I find too difficult to tell her. This is going to sound terribly cliche, but (as I'm sure you know) these things take time, because like you say things are so raw and it's such a massive step to tell someone. But I think it's really brave you're even thinking about telling her- that's a big step in itself, and maybe one day in a session you'll feel like you're ready. Sometimes that happens to me- I'll have weeks and weeks where there will be something that I want to tell her but feel like I can't, and then suddenly one session that 'I want to tell her' will become (often with just the faintest feeling of courage) 'ok I can do this'. XX

 

[Daydreamer]

these dreams don't really resemble the actual trauma. Is this a thing? To have dreams of being forced in ways that don't really represent the trauma

Hi, it is a thing for me. I also have a sexual trauma from my childhood years. I have nightmares with my abuser breaking into my apartment, which never happened. I actually never had a dream which would ideally replicate what happened.
What my nightmares and abuse have in common is how they made me feel - scared and immobilized.
I hope that helps, you're not alone.
It's ok to take your time talking about it. My therapist was supportive, I'm sure yours would be as well.

 

[Swift]

Hey.
Yep, definitely a Thing with me.
Trauma for me is like radioactive material in my head - it contaminates and mutates other thoughts.
Anything that I think about the trauma and my relation, or anything I have to 'reveal' to a therapist, seems to feel shameful and dirty and wrong and like I asked for it, or it secretly happened because I'm a bad person that deserved it, or I did something to cause it.
This goes for dream-stuff, too.
Thematically, we dream about a lot of things. Like, theme-wise, being somewhere unprepared or naked might mean that we feel unprepared or uncomfortable, not that we actually want to be there with our clothes off.
Also, something being in the subconcious doesn't mean it's wanted. I feel like dreams have this connotation of being fantasies as well? But none of my other dreams are fantasy-based. For example, I don't think that my nan desperatley needing 7 dozen eggs and having to get them from a classroom at my old school is my heart's forbidden desire. I just think it's random projection of stuff that's in my mind.