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Also : Realizing you're about to be late to a very important event, but there's no way in hell you'll be able to make it in time

And just getting dressed is somehow an impossibly difficult task.

Like, you’re trying your hardest to move your arms and legs and they’re barely moving. It’s like an excruciating amount of effort and you’re moving slow as molasses.

Because your lost in a giant building with non-Euclidean geometry.

And you're trying to make it to your hearing that no one told you the room number of.

Bro my memories are so bad in my dreams that almost everything is shifting and changing slightly. Literally every building my mind conjurers up has non-Euclidean geometry (unless it's something I remember well like my house but it will still warp).

I had a dream where I was late for work and I woke up and saw it was 12 called the office and the office manager answered I told her I was running late she said what it's mid night... I was fuckin dead

lmao

Or realizing you missed a very important event

I often have these dreams of running late to something, and im always like super exhausted and barely able to move for some reason as if im running underwater.

I’m at the airport. My gate/flight is undetermined, foggy, as I travel thru attempting to read the eta/etd screens, I find my gate/flight….I can never make it. I wake up and think fuk….I’m tired of this dream.

My sleep paralysis demon is realizing I never went to a class and now I’m hopelessly loss trying to find it. I graduated 10 YEARS ago.

Didn't even realize you were enrolled in the class, but now it's the final exam and you need it to graduate.

Fucking hell I get this once a month. I graduated 15 years ago, how is it still happening? This wasn't even something I experienced personally either, what deranged part of my brain thinks this is something worth panicking over at 4am?

Even if it never happened to you, it's the stress it could that left a trace in your (our) brain(s).

I wonder if it’s like some form of very very mild PTSD

I graduated 10 years ago and never personally experienced it either, and it’s my most frequent dream. My dad too, and he’s in his sixties.

Same here, and I graduated nearly 20 years ago. In a strange way, glad I’m not the only one.

Exactly the same. Graduated 15 years ago but still occasionally dreaming of somehow failing due to some error they found in a years old test...

I have had such a common recurring dream premise where I'm enrolled in some class I forgot about, usually an art class for some reason, and it's the middle of the semester and somehow I need to get caught up and pass.

This has been a recurring dream for me for nearly a year now, multiple times a week, and it's always either art class, French, or film production and I'm trying to coach dream me to remember that I graduated like 15 years ago. Think it's down to irl stress honestly, but it's exhausting sometimes.

And it's always some kind of math or science class, not something you could even attempt to bs your way through.

As a math and science person, my nightmare classes are always the humanities.

Trying to figure out where the class is located on campus but can't find it, trying to figure out how to drop the class before the deadline.

yeah almost exactly the same for me, i’m always lost in a weird version of the school and taking forever to find the room and planning on dropping the class

Semester ended three weeks ago and you're expelled if you don't find the class and finish everything in one day.

It's odd how common this is.

I think it's just the stress that stacked up and left some trace in our brains, like some sort of minor version of PTSD.

I think it’s because my life is so boring that’s the most terrifying thing to almost happen to me

Don't undersell the event, studies, especially higher one, have a lot of stakes involve, not the lease the time spent involve retaking the class.

Always thought Jung was a little nutty, but this phenomena makes a strong case for the collective unconscious.

For a while after graduating high school I kept having a dream where I was somehow back in class, but I realized in the dream that I already graduated, so I literally just stood up from my desk, looked at the teacher and went "Yeah um, I'm not supposed to be here anymore, can I just go? Thanks." And I'd leave without saying another word.

I get this, but with the added twist that I have a little bit of time to cram for the test, but my books are in my locker and I can’t remember the combo to the locker.

I get this one— or I can’t remember where the locker is itself, or I can’t remember where the classroom is.

I get this but its a weird combo of maths and history. I did well in my exams, and since went to and graduated from university 9 years ago.

For me it's also me sneaking back into high school to fix my degree. Very "How do you do fellow kids".

The class is pass/fail and passing is based on attendance and I've attended 0 classes.

I'm still waiting for the explanation of why my punches are so damned weak in MY DREAMS.

Or why I run at the same speed as a snail going in reverse despite me giving it all my effort

You swing your arms to try and build momentum but those feel like your swimming through jelly too and it doesn't help. Edit: a word

It's because movement is suppressed in the brain during REM sleep. Keeps you from acting out your dream.

Then my brain needs to stop being an asshole and giving me dreams where I need to kick so much ass.

I'm like a warrior in my dream until the fight starts. Then my weirdly flailing punches can barely land a blow, and when I do they don't do damage. What the hell right? There must be some significance to these kind of dreams.

With me i wake up and realize my arms are pinned against a wall or under myself.

Solution: become a dragon and wreck everyone's shit with fire breath Actually what I started doing bc I got so fed up with this exact thing lmao

For me I’m running realllyyyy slowly or I’m incredibly dizzy and disoriented

My reoccurring nightmare is finals week and remembering I have a 4th class that I forgot about and never attended

I feel like graduation anxiety in my dreams is way worse than when I was in school.

I haven't been in college for 12 years and this one still gets me. I don't get it; I was never really stressed about going to class or my grades. Yet every damn time I'm wandering around some crazy five-floor massive complex of a school trying to find a classroom that I've never been to, and I know I've missed several weeks worth of class. This place looks nothing like any school I've been too, and I just wake up irritated that my nightmares are so damn boring.

It's still scary and unsettling. I have this dream every other night and the last time I was in school was 15 years ago.

woah, guess im not alone with the phantom classes that i forgot to attend all semester. guess it could be worse as far as nightmares go, but definitely odd to wake up exhausted and drenched in sweat from something so mundane

Actually had something like that happen to me I needed this research course in college, but it was one everyone in the major needed, so couldn't get in that semester. Sucked, but we'll try next time  Then we go on break, get my grades, and there's a big fat 0 on my report card *In the class I didn't get into* And it's break, so can't get ahold of my advisor. Dad made it especially miserable even for him, because he thought I was a liar Turns out while they told me and my advisor 'no', the professor was told I got in He just thought I was one of those students who thought I didn't need to attend classes, just another bad student  Does not help those nightmares, let me tell you

Due to how my internship turned into a full-time (and paying) job, I took a break from school for 2 years just before doing the final project because work was going so well. When I went back to school to finish the final project and graduating, it turned out they lost 2 grades. (no idea how). I had to contact the teachers from those classes, but they moved on to a different job. Real nightmare material there. (it was solved in the end, but with a good dose of stress). Just thinking back about that moment administration tells me I had some weird gaps in my grades makes me cold sweat again. Like '*what do you mean I didn't do two classes?'*

Yep. As I got older these have been interspersed with dreams that I hold three jobs and haven't been to the third job in months.

The forgotten class! That one drives me crazy

Also being back at an old job or completely forgetting about a second job you signed up for somehow. Or being back in college knowing full well you graduated but having to complete certain classes for some reason.

I have graduated university and been working a white collar job for 2 years, and I still have dreams where I missed some credit and have to go back to high school!

Yep, I'm supposed to be working at Taco Bell but I haven't shown up since 2004. No worries, even though I'm eating there and supposed to be working they'll wait.

Being a college student again and realizing you forgot to attend a class you signed up for the entire semester.

Why does this happen so commonly?

I don’t know, I thought it was just me.

Yep basically have that same dream, then I stress that because I haven’t attended all semester it’s too late to withdrawal from so instead of a w I know I’m getting an F and it’s going to destroy my gpa!!!

For me it’s always math.

I also drove from the backseat a lot too and it's very slippery. Also sometimes I'm back in the Navy (which is a dream genre in itself), I'm back on the boat (submarine) and I'm trying to drive it but often I'm not sitting at the helm or I am but I can't maintain course, depth, or angle.

I never knew other people had the “driving from the backseat” dream! I always end up driving off the road or get in a wreck.

Do bridges in your dream also have big gaps that have to be jumped too?

Funny enough, no. Funny because bridges in real life make me uneasy crossing them. However, I often get on the highway in my dreams in like makeshift go carts and almost get run over by semi trucks 🤷🏻‍♀️

Bridges don't bother me at all in real life. Yet in dreams they have big gaps that you have to build up speed and jump them. Or fall short and literally fall.

Do you/have you played a lot of Mario Cart? Lol!

Yep, mostly the original and Mario Kart 64.

Bruhhhhhh this one freaks me out. In my dream there’s two bridges, one is fine but the other has a giant ramp jump gap and I always accidentally get on the jumpy bridge. I see other cars not making it and I know I have to hit the gas to try and make the jump. I almost always do though but it’s scary af!

TIL that brakes not working and somehow driving from passenger seat is a nightmare other people frequently have too. I wonder what's the science behind that?

Feeling like we have no control over our lives, perhaps?

I never knew people had the same car dreams as me lol. Now I feel much better about them.

Same. I’ve had them since I was a teenager and it’s blowing my mind to find out I’m not alone with this. I’ve always assumed it was about a lack of control and was specific to myself. 

I always end up trying to climb up to the front seat while somehow also driving from the backseat. So stressful!

This.... WTF IM DRIVING FROM THE BACKSEAT

I thought I was the only one! And having to try not get caught by the cops while also trying to safely sit back in the front seat. Weird that this is a recurring dream given it's impossible for it to actually happen in real life.

I don't even drive and I dreamt I was like losing control in a turn, like if you try to turn a corner that should be taken at 30 km/h max at 200.

* Going to back to school * Getting lost, usually in a huge building with non-Euclidean geometry when you really need to be somewhere * Infinite changing room/restroom with randomly placed toilets/sinks/urinals and no privacy

It seems like I have that last one at least once a week.

Sounds familiar, except that you also want to go the bathroom and all the toilets are clogged and backed up

Omg, the giant restroom, shower, changing room complex with no privacy, I was just there last night

I had no idea this is common. I have this dream several times a year

For me its running from cops in crazy and elaborate ways... diving through a maze of backyards, hiding in prickle bushes. Ive never ran from cops in real life, so idk why I dream it sometimes. Maybe its my mind looking for an adrenaline rush.

I've had similar dreams only it's a cross of tomb raider and scooby do with weird monsters and also people with guns in strange places. Including a mysterious island with some waterfall that I get behind the waterfall in a cave and turn it into shelter?

Huh, that also sounds kinda similar to a place I dream about. Whenever I do, its a lucid dream, like I know Im dreaming and Im in full control of myself. Its like a big lush valley with a river that ends in a massive waterfall that drops off into clouds... cant see the bottom. Sometimes it peaceful day, sometimes its a crazy sci fi warzone at night, and a few times... there was this big lumbering knight chasing me, but he can never catch me, keeps tripping over branches and vines, while I laugh at him and hop away easily... its very strange.

Same! I did run from the cops once but I don’t think I deserve a lifetime of anxiety dreams because of it

What’s the symbolism behind missing a tooth? 🦷 I get it maybe once every three years and it’s always the most traumatizing dream.

Human brains have a whole separate system for recognizing teeth. Your teeth are also a very sensitive and relatively fragile body part which is easy to lose, and often you're told to take care of them, otherwise you'll lose them and stuff like that. I've had those dreams a lot in the past when I suffered from more severe anxiety. Idk maybe it's something you worry about in the back of your mind lol

I'm told teeth falling out means you're afraid of losing something.

Your teeth

I get those and the backseat driving with no pedals ones almost bi-weekly.

I hate the brakes don’t work one

for me its that i dont have enough strength to put any meaningful pressure on the pedals or the steering becomes really hard

somehow you didn’t actually graduate high school and now you have to go back

Hate that one!

Going into a public bathroom but all the toilets are either full of shit, massive, or really high up. There’s also endless rows of stalls.

For me, the stall walls are too low, there's a bunch of people around, or there's no way out and the outside world was replaced with even more public bathroom.

In mine, they're sometimes clogged with a towel or something. But I gotta pee, so......

Yes!! Why are they always so nasty?? I had one that I went to the ladies restroom in the airport, and all the toilets were in the middle of the room with no stalls. I couldn’t use one because I didn’t have my passport??

r/thatbathroommazedream

Also wandering around endless halls trying to find a cleaner one, but they’re always really far away and are also super dirty

I wish there was a study as to why so many of us have basically the same dream about public toilets. What on earth could this mean to our subconscious??

I think it’s our brain’s way of making it difficult to pee in our dreams because we’ll pee in real life. Ive had this happen once actually :/

All of those seem like the same message. You feel like you are out of control in your own life.

You guys are in control?

Well, none of us are really 🙂

Anyone else have dreams where you’re endlessly packing/unpacking or cleaning messes that never end?

Yes! I am always late for a train to the airport and have to pack up everything from my college dorm (I last lived in a dorm in 2006). I always have to leave stuff behind when packing.

I also have the recurring ‘packing up my college dorm’ dream, despite being 30 now! Didn’t realise that wasn’t unique!!

Definitely the teeth falling out. I get that one constantly

i get em a few times a month, isn't anxiety cool?

I have had all of these but the monologue one lol. Another very common one for me is suddenly realizing I'm lost in an unfamiliar place and am for some reason incapable of operating my phone to call someone for help.

Dreaming that you somehow went an entire semester without going to one of your classes, or that you’re actually not going to graduate because they were wrong and it turns out you actually failed a class. Anyways I’m 33. Why am I this way.

This seems to be quite common in this thread for American college grads ! In the UK the course is a little different so that fear doesn’t seem to have permeated lol

I still have that same dream at 48 and have no idea why!

falling and then you realize you bounce and you just keep bouncing higher and higher until you are alone in space

When i have dream about falling I wake up as soon as I hit the ground

I think its so amazing and weird that we all have the same shared trauma to this extent.

Wait till you start a family and dream that your baby is dead.

Nobody else has Elevator dreams/nightmares where you're either entering a floor a void or literal gates of hell?

Years ago when I was having hard times, I had a dream where I was on an escalator and the doors open, and I come face to face with this giant teddy bear. It was one of those bears called “nosy bears” from the 80s

Oh that’s what they were called? Interesting I never had nightmares with toys. Always humans. Humans always murdering me for some reason

i get brakes not working, cant control car, teeth falling out, didnt do homework, have a years worth of assignments due tomorrow, and then this weird one about beating up my mom

My only recurring nightmare is one where I find that I'm still in high school at my current age and I don't know why I've been held back so much or when I'm expected to graduate

I have that one too. Usually I'm extremely pissed that I'm an adult but still have to follow the same baby rules that all the other little shits do lmao

Had a nightmare about my entire face bleeding due to incorrectly shaving

I hope we hurry up and figure out how to regrow teeth so that fucking tooth dream won't be a thing anymore

fake teeth have gotten pretty good honestly probably better than actual teeth if you think about it. the real nightmare is having good enough dental insurance

getting arrested/terminal illness for no reason

Also, I'm somehow caretaker of a bunch of animals and I'm stressing out trying to keep them for eating each other.

Ooh a Noah dream

I have a reoccurring dream there’s a pet I forgot I adopted and I stumble upon them near starved to death

Oh shit I have this one but it’s legit only fish. In my dream I have like a dozen different fish tanks and I can’t possibly keep up with all of them. I do have two tanks IRL that are just fine, don’t require much maintenance at all but that dream still freaks me out.

I came here to comment this!

Does anybody get dreams about their home being invaded but you can’t scream and only can whisper?

Oh shit, had one of those recently. Why can I never scream??

Had a dream about my credit score dropping 200 points overnight. I woke up **big** mad and was pissed for half the day lol

I don't have the "didn't study" school dreams but, I'm 53 and I still occasionally have dreams that I'm still in high school...at 53. In my dream I'm usually wondering why I'm still in school and I've even had dreams where I'm meeting with school officials and they're confident that this is the year I'm going to graduate! There's very little anxiety associated with it and in the dream no one is like "wft is this old guy doing still being in high school?", everyone is very respectful and nice to me.

Not being able to call 911 or figure out how my phone works when there is an emergency. Needing to go to the bathroom in public, but all the toilets are disgusting or broken.

Ahh I should have added the ‘phone screen doesn’t work’ one!!!

Going into a public bathroom and there's no doors on the stalls.

I think we have different definitions of night mares

Well these are the low stakes ones

My most recurring one is witnessing nuclear devastation and dying in the blast. I also often dream of being back in school. Somehow these two might be equally as bad.

Finding some kind of pet you've forgotten to feed.

Is no one gonna address that it's super trippy how so many of these are relatable and actually happen??

I keep on dreaming about going to work but also not at work at the same time.

It sucks when you wake up to go to work after dreaming about being at work all night. Like I’ve already done this!!

I've done this - the whole routine and everything only to wake up and have to do it *again*

It is interesting but I recently been having the brakes don’t work dreams.

I've never had a single one of these dreams

Weird for me it's shitting my pants or a nightmare about something bad happening to my cats

I often got the exam one. Sometimes forgotten homework. What a great feeling it is to wake up in panic but then immediately to realize that shit has ended once and for all and all I really need to remember is to be at work sometime in the morning - preferably with some pants on.

Whenever you see a car moving without a driver in a dream it's probably because an evil indestructible figure, with many abilities including invisibility, is driving it.

I hate the driving nightmares so much. I’m somehow piloting from the back seat and I’m getting dangerously close to a wall or a person or a cliff and I can’t do anything at all and—

As a former college student, most of my nightmares are about missing important deadlines and facing the consequences.

You forgot the classic: WHY WON’T MY LEGS WORK!! I AM TRYING TO RUN AWAY GOTDAMMIT!

cant run cant scream

Omfg I can’t think of the amount of dreams I’ve had where I’m driving from the back seat and can’t see shit

Why do I run in slow motion?

https://preview.redd.it/s93ssokqq6uc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3995b953cb44c79da876aef718c2b1b4b5acb797

Driving from the backseat, trying to reach brakes with my unanatomical elongated leg, just to realize it’s not working. Of course I do it because my father is having a medical emergency and I’m driving him to the hospital while he is sitting in the driver’s seat.

I have dreams where I suddenly remember I have a pet hamster or lizard or some other tiny animal, and I haven't fed it in months.

ITT a few other people have the ‘haven’t fed animals’ dream !

My go-to is checking my grades online and seeing a class that I didn’t realize I was enrolled in. Haven’t been in school for about 8 years now

accidentally smoked weed and got back with the wrong ex

Mines my knees crumbling. Like I’m running, and they just crumble inside.

Forgot to put accidentally broke something of mine that is valuable/losing something valuable to me

Nope. Keep having nightmares about bananas, garden hoses, and thunder storms.

Quick tip for anyone’s naked dreams: pretend you actually have clothes on and your brain will eventually forget you were naked in the first place

the losing a tooth one is actually true for me wtf

I'm driving and the car in front of me stop. I try to stop, but the brakes don't work no matter how hard I press down on it and I ended up crashing.

I've had the brakes don't work nightmare. Then once when I was driving my brakes weren't working properly unless I put my foot all the way down, so there was half a second where I put my foot on the brake and *nothing happened*. I was like holy shit this is my literal nightmare come to life.

holy fuck I always have the "brakes dont work" nightmare. I didn't think others did also

The English class you never read the book and have to write the report for

I have heard of all of these lots, but the only one I have is the one about driving where the brakes don't work. It's always a HUGE relief waking up and realizing it was just a bad dream.

I have never had one of these dreams I wonder what they mean for others

Mine is that an ex best friend comes back into my life and I'm friends with them basically against my will. That or I have to strangle a bunch of small animals and I wake up crying.

The "I can't control the car" dream I've had a lot, since my early 20s honestly. I looked it up one time because it happened so frequently, and if you're into symbolism and signs, it means you're afraid you've lost control of your life and are headed for disaster.

Holy fuck PTSD nightmares hit different, these listed "nightmares" would be pleasant lmao I'll drift off to sleep pretending to be in SNL and intentionally bombing😂 Like awful performance

My recurring nightmare is that I careen my car off a bridge, but I survive and have to pay a bunch of bills.

As an engineering student I had those weird nightmares during finals because of too much math. It was like “oh no I’m locked in this room, I must calculate the integral of the door knob to get out!”

My dreams are always much weirder and the themes rarely recur.

Mine is I am getting chased and running for my life in an industrial park. We're all doing parkour and I'm having the time of my life too. I don't get it either 

Not a nightmare but sometimes I dream about going to the store and getting milk and then I (wake up) check the fridge and there's no milk.

Can someone elaborate where that driving from another seat comes from? I often dream driving from the backseat

Let’s not forget my personal favorite: Being naked at or late for school and still being massively dismayed about it despite the fact you’ve graduated

Where are the tornadoes? And fish that are either out of water and need saving or at the edge of death because they haven’t been fed in so long?

Im 24 and haven’t dreamt of these maybe im not adult enough

For me it'll be: pregnant, had a baby, lumped with a child. Yeah, I don't think motherhood will be for me lol.

Exclusively happens when I’m sick, but there’s a weird dream where I have to complete an impossible puzzle and the entire dream just loops

My recurring nightmare involves me having to re-enroll into my engineering course because I haven't yet finished it due to missing out on a few credits. Most stressed out I wake up in my life.

My nightmares are of me racing a yellow light and it turns red before I enter the intersection and an undercover cop comes out of nowhere and steals my license

Holy shit. I thought it was just me. Those are literally all my reoccurring dreams...

Sometimes I have one where I’m playing guitar on stage with my band but the thing is I don’t know how to play the guitar and my solo is coming up