Many people face cases of repeating the same dream continuously without a significant change in its story or outcome, and this repetition can be a disturbing and confusing problem for some, especially if the nature of these dreams is disturbing or frightening, according to medical and psychological experts.
Sleep medicine and psychology specialists link the constant recurrence of the same dreams to various factors, including anxiety and tension resulting from various life pressures, in addition to experiencing an emotional event such as the loss of relatives or the end of a romantic relationship, in addition to stereotypical dreams that can be related to desires, thoughts and personal fears, reports Al-Rai daily.
Deirdre Barrett, Lecturer in Psychology at the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, says that “our dreams usually do not recur,” noting that “the recurrence of dreams is more common in childhood, but it can continue into adulthood.”
And the expert adds to CNN, that recurring dreams may be the same every time, or they may be about different topics, but with the same scenario or fears, and she explains that “they do not always occur in succession, but can appear several times a month or with a difference.”
Clinical psychologist Nirit Sofer Dodik, a senior lecturer in the Department of Psychology at Ben-Gurion University, highlights “the difficulty in assessing the prevalence of recurrent dreams, since they do not occur regularly for most people.”
For his part, sleep medicine specialist Alex Demetriou explains that “anything that is repeated deserves investigation behind its causes and background,” noting that he tends to consider that dreams “carry some messages, and therefore knowledge of this message remains a helpful factor in dismantling the causes of dream recurrence.”
While the “message” in some recurring dreams is clear and direct, according to experts such as “a dream of being late for school or work, evidence of tension due to the issues of time and commitment,” other dreams require the person to do some self-searching to discover their implications.