Lockdown is leading to weird coronavirus dreams due to pandemic stress and sleep pattern changes, say experts
The new coronavirus has infiltrated every aspect of human life, including what you see in your dreams. Recently, a California resident described a strange and haunting dream.
In the dream, the person vividly recalls using pliers to pull the teeth out of the mouth. "People were wincing and trying to get me to stop. It just would be so much easier I kept thinking, without them. I even laid them out [the teeth] so they would look nice," the person added.
The California resident is not alone. Many are having whacked out dreams, according to I Dream of COVID, a blogging site that is putting together a record of people's experiences.
Such dreams have been on the rise since the pandemic forced people to stay indoors. Furthermore, there is a spike in the number of people turning to Google for answers on "coronavirus dreams" or "COVID-19 dreams".
Similarly, people are sharing their #pandemicdreams on Twitter. One user tweeted her experience, saying: "I had a dream an old lady attacked me for trying to buy a bottle of hand sanitizer made for babies (there were other bottles)."
Is the coronavirus stress to blame for this?
According to Mary-Ellen Lynall, a neuroscientist at the University of Cambridge, coronavirus is increasing stress among people. "Coronavirus is causing financial hardship, loss of our normal roles, and, for some, loss of loved ones," she wrote for The Guardian.
Making things worse, wrote Lynall, is the additional stress of people cutting themselves off from the world. In other words, the pandemic has forced people to adopt social distancing, which could trigger anxiety and depression.
Stress could result in disrupted or altered sleep. Another researcher studying sleep problems, Megan Crawford from the Strathclyde Sleep Research Unit, told Wired, stress could lead to vivid dreams, allowing more people to recall them.
"It is a normal response to not sleep in a situation of stress. It's part of a fight or flight response, as we become anxious and our bodily functions can ramp up to fight or [flee]," she said.
A lot about why we dream is a mystery. But scientists know that people tend to have intense dreams 90 minutes after they fall asleep. This phase is called REM sleep or Rapid Eye Movement sleep, which occurs in intervals during the night and is characterized by rapid eye movements.
"So the fantastical dreams people are reporting are most likely to be quite REM-based," Ellis said. Besides, dreams reflect our thoughts and emotional being.
"If we feel some degree of stress about the pandemic, or about work or family, then it's normal for those types of themes to appear in our dream content," Dylan Selterman, who runs the University of Maryland's DREAM Lab, told Vox.
During these times, experts recommend maintaining a good night's sleep. It can go a long way in helping prevent other serious problems such as anxiety and depression.
Turning off from screens two to four hours before bed; turning off the news for a little while before bed can also help cut back on the anxiety that may present as stressful dreams, Dr Meir Kryger, professor of pulmonary medicine and clinical professor of nursing at Yale School of Medicine, told CNN.