A Recipe for Nightmares: Anxiety and Avoidance Mixed with Sleep
- Rachael Elizabeth
- Mar 6
- 5 min read
Updated: Mar 12
Nightmares are a common part of our childhoods that usually subside as we reach adulthood. But if you’re like me, those nightmares may have taken ahold of you, well into your adult life.
I have always been pulled towards anything spooky. As a young girl, I had my head stuck in books about ghosts. Now, as an adult and creative writer, I choose to write about distressing subjects like true crime and the paranormal. I am currently writing a crime thriller, and living in a small, sleepy village in the Northwest of England makes the perfect background. Because I always surround myself with the macabre, it might seem obvious why I would frequently have nightmares - but there were also some overlooked issues, too.
A few years ago, I detailed my experiences living with a nightmare disorder, including sleep paralysis, in an ITM piece called “Am I Haunted” - at the time, I was still searching for explanations as to why or what was happening to me. This piece is a reflection on what has changed, what therapy has helped me uncover, and what I now understand about the relationship between stress, anxiety, grief, and the mind’s darkest corners.
Life Itself is a Nightmare
I have suffered from anxiety for as long as I can remember, and my avoidance in dealing with these issues (due to being an adult and expecting people to judge me for not “getting better”) made my disorder even worse.
Through therapy, I have learned that my nightmares are my brain’s way of saying, “hey, we aren’t done with this yet.” I live with anxiety that can be deeply intrusive; a missed phone call meant something terrible had happened, silence from someone meant I’d upset them - the present and future felt saturated with dread.
Recent incidents, such as losing my job, combined with struggling to find a new one, and a series of unstable roles beforehand, intensified this cycle; my day became filled with stress, and my nights crowded with nightmares. Therapy is what helped me recognise how tightly these two worlds were linked.
Never-Ending Nightmare Fuel
After my Grandad passed away in 2019, my sleep cycle became so disturbing that I developed a fear of falling asleep. It didn’t matter what I had watched or read beforehand; I was a huge fan of the US show Supernatural and was banned from watching it during this period. But it wasn’t as simple as just ‘not watching scary shows’ (one of my worst nightmares came after watching an episode of the Gilmore Girls, which if you know, isn't considered scary).
Grief is a universal human burden, and it became one of my greatest stressors after my Grandad's death. The unspoken pain of losing my best friend surfaced as relentless nightmares, leaving me exhausted and anxious. Even when my grief became easier to handle, I would still have nightmares about ghosts, death, being attacked or chased by sharks and other weird creatures. And whilst everyone will have these types of dreams every so often, for me, it was almost every single night.
It became apparent that the one thing that linked all my parasomnias was stress, but also my inability to ask for help.
What Has Worked For Me
One way to take back control is to write down your nightmare once you wake up, but as a new, positive version, and you rehearse this version during the day. This is a type of cognitive behavioural therapy called Nightmare Rescripting or Imagery Rehearsal Therapy. It is a way to help the brain learn a new way to deal with nightmares and help reduce their intensity and frequency. Although I have never tried this therapy in a professional setting, I would do it at home, either as soon as I woke up from the nightmare or before I went to sleep at night, and eventually, it started to help.
Lucid Dreaming Therapy is a type of therapy centred on the practice of lucid dreaming, which is when someone becomes aware that they are dreaming and can take control of their dream. Taking control allows you to change the trajectory of the dream. There are various techniques used to do this, like repeating the words “when I begin dreaming, I will remember that I’m dreaming” before you go to sleep, or writing down your dreams after you wake up, as it can help you notice ‘dream signs’.
Dream signs can be a specific person, a certain object, or walking into a familiar room - for me, it was the appearance of my Grandad. Each night before I went to sleep, I would remind myself of this, and eventually I began to pick up on this during my dream; I would point out my Grandad, and I would shout "leave me alone" at the entity I could feel him morphing into, and the nightmare would eventually cease, or I would wake up.
While there are many techniques to try and subdue nightmares, a common underlying cause is stress, so starting a journey with a counsellor or therapist can be very beneficial - and this is what has helped me the most. Talking openly has been the best way for me to deal with debilitating emotions, and if you’re struggling, you should try it too; talking to your friends and family about your feelings or what is on your mind can help alleviate pent-up emotions.
Part of the reason our minds can feel like breeding grounds for worry comes down to how the brain is wired - psychologists call this negativity bias. It is an evolutionary survival mechanism that once helped our ancestors stay alive by prioritising potential threats. Today, the same wiring still reacts to emotional pain, and this "emotional alarm system” triggers the stress hormone cortisol, which makes the brain more sensitive to negativity.
This understanding, which I learned through therapy, highlights why talking about our emotions can be so powerful. By expressing ourselves out loud, we can break the loop by giving shape to overwhelming thoughts, and we can help our brains learn that emotional experiences aren’t threats to our survival but experiences we can process and move through.
My Nightmares Today
Night after night, my subconscious would drag up everything I had been pushing down whilst awake - even now, my nightmares span everything from loss to violence. But therapy has shown me that my nightmares aren’t the enemy; avoidance is.
Seven years after the passing of my Grandad, I can think and talk about him without being plagued by nightmares. Today, I am still navigating stress due to job loss, and trying to secure a new one, and whilst therapy hasn’t cured my nightmares overnight, it has given me the knowledge that I don’t need to be fearless, just honest.
Stress is unavoidable, and nightmares are not punishment; they are messages. And while they may still visit me, I no longer meet them with the same fear - now, I listen, and more often than not, that makes all the difference.
This article has been sponsored by the Psychiatry Research Trust, who are dedicated to supporting young scientists in their groundbreaking research efforts within the field of mental health. If you wish to support their work, please consider donating.
