Screaming In A Dream, Can You Do It?

[hazen]

I can't scream in my dreams. Have never been able to do it.

Luckily I don't often have nightmares, but the ones I have had have been memorable, and I can't make a sound. One nightmare involved me creating an elaborate plan to escape a jail, only to get caught, and then I went outside of myself and watched the guards beat me to death, and I couldn't make a noise no matter how hard I tried. Ugh.

That one stuck with me. Ah, childhood...

I agree with njray. Defensive classes!

 

[SimplyComplex]

In dreams I used to scream but no sound would come out (I don't know about in my sleep, but nothing would come out in my dreams, I was voiceless, which happens when I am terrified awake too).

I would also try to hit and it would be like trying to fight back under water. I assumed both were from sleep paralysis but after learning to box, going to therapy I can now actually hit in my dreams. I have way fewer bad dreams as long as I write and talk in therapy enough. So I haven't found out if I can scream in my dreams now.

 

[Kintsugi]

I was voiceless, which happens when I am terrified awake too

Me too. : (

I would also try to hit and it would be like trying to fight back under water.

Yes! Yes. I am afraid to fight back if someone tries to hurt me, because I am so scared that, as in my dreams, my fists will just fall like fluffy pillows against them.

 

[LawPhotos]

Wow! I never thought about it before but in my nightmares I often am trying repeatedly with everything I have within me to scream and it just comes out as a little airy nothing. I don't know if I am actually doing it in my sleep.
If it isn't the lip-synching scream then I am often so incredulous and disbelieving of what is happening to me that I can't speak or react at all. Like I am stunned into silence watching my mother cut me (much more graphic but we'll leave it out)--a recurring one for me--I am just so shocked in my nightmare that I can't speak. I am in disbelief that she has finally killed me after all this time. It's like the guy in the movies who gets shot or whatever and is just so stunned that he just staggers a bit and collapses without really reacting.
I seriously believed as a child that my mother would go too far one day and kill me. I knew that there would come a day when it would happen. I guess I am just finishing myself off.

 

[Sethe]

I have screamed in dreams. I woke up 'screaming' once, but it was kind of like a cross between a whisper and a moan.

 

[freakofnurture]

... my fists will just fall like fluffy pillows against them.

and

I woke up 'screaming' once, but it was kind of like a cross between a whisper and a moan.

I wonder if it has to do with sleep paralysis and the brain being too aware of how your body actually feels while your consciousness is experiencing a dream.

You know, I often sleep with my eyes open and sometimes what my eyes see is incorporated into the dream my consciousness is having. I think those dreams where you can't really use your arms and legs because they're so heavy and limp (I experience this quite regularly in neutral dreams, too) might be just the same phenomenon, just not with visuals but with the feedback from your paralysed muscles. The chest and throat muscles that you'd need to activate for a scream are just as out of reach for your voluntary orders to move as is the rest of your body.

 

[hazen]

Yes! Yes. I am afraid to fight back if someone tries to hurt me, because I am so scared that, as in my dreams, my fists will just fall like fluffy pillows against them.

This happens to me as well and has always been a recurring theme of my dreams. My punches slow down to a crawl as if underwater, and any time I have had a gun I can't pull the trigger no matter how hard I try.

And yes freakofnuture I have heard the same thing about sleep paralysis... you literally just CAN'T do some things when asleep and your brain isn't able to move your body. But I don't remember if that applies to your whole body while sleeping, and of course there are people that sleepwalk and what not... is it only in certain stages of sleep that the paralysis occurs?

 

[freakofnurture]

But I don't remember if that applies to your whole body while sleeping, and of course there are people that sleepwalk and what not... is it only in certain stages of sleep that the paralysis occurs?

It's only during REM sleep, when dreams occur. Only your eyes move then. Sleep paralysis is necessary to keep you from acting out all the movements in your dreams (most of the brain can't tell the difference between reality, dream and imagination).

Sleep walkers lack paralysis. That's why they walk around sometimes during REM sleep; they can even appear to be awake and lucid, in extreme cases they can complete tasks, etc. and later not remember (in general you only remember dreams during which you wake up).

 

[Sethe]

andI wonder if it has to do with sleep paralysis and the brain being too aware of how your body actually feels while your consciousness is experiencing a dream.

You know, I often sleep with my eyes open and sometimes what my eyes see is incorporated into the dream my consciousness is having.

I incorporate outside sounds into my dreams. I guess part of me is always listening- alert. It's getting to the point that I know what happened outside of me when I wake up.

 

[Sethe]

I once had to be sedated because I was cursing, hitting, kicking and screaming in my sleep. I even hit my partner without realizing it.

I used to kick my ex in my sleep a lot. He'd get angry about it, but then again he was angry and sulky about everything I did because I didn't do it 'right.' I do get a giggle that I used to kick him. He deserved it so much.

For the record, I do not kick my current bf in my sleep or at all (not that I ever physically hurt my ex despite what he did to me). Maybe my body was expressing itself in the safest way it knew how? I don't know.

 

[Kintsugi]

Sleep walkers lack paralysis. That's why they walk around sometimes during REM sleep; they can even appear to be awake and lucid, in extreme cases they can complete tasks, etc. and later not remember (in general you only remember dreams during which you wake up).

I used to sleepwalk a lot as a child. Someone told me that this was common for PTSD in children along with night terrors, which I also had and often didn't remember anything from. My sister would tell me in the morning (when I was maybe 6) that she heard me screaming and ran to my room, and I would sit up and say a couple of words, and then I would be back to sleep without a beat in between.

Sleepwalking was more extreme. I apparently once tried to leave the house. I walked downstairs and upstairs. Never remembered a thing.

 

[jasmin]

I think I used to sleep walk and/or have night terrors as a kid.. but there were no witnesses and my recollections of the period are hazy and jumbled so I can;t say for sure.

I used to have horrible nightmares in my teens where I was running from something but I couldn't operate my legs so I would always get caught.. haven't had nightmares like that in a long while though. Now my nightmares are more sensory based, like normally I wouldn't be scared by it but certain sounds smells and feelings make it particularly terrifying. Then I have brutal violent dreams that don't scare me at all.

I have woken up crying or screaming numerous times though but not that often.. sometimes as a whisper or a whine and sometimes a full blown wailing scream...Though I can never remember why.
The other night when a stolen car crashed through our yard and stalled in front of my bedroom window, I heard the loud crashing sound while I was in dream state and yelled out 'Holy f*cking christ, shit f*ck f*ck' I don't know what I thought had happened but it was something REALLY bad like a huge catastrophic accident of epic proportions.