Thread: Intense and vivid Nightmare or night terror?

I rarely have what I would call nightmares. Most of my dreams I would label 'exciting' but not necessarily nightmares. But when I do, they tend to be very unsettling. This one was probably the worse. At first I thought it might be what's called a night terror, but what I read about those, they aren't usually vivid dreams, and this was a very vivid dream. I had it a while ago, so some of the details are a little fuzzy now, but here is what I remember of it. Just wondering if anyone else has any thoughts or interpretations of it.

I was in the ocean and it was night time so the water was all black and I couldn't see far, I had been on a ship, but somehow wound up in the water, I can't really remember how, I either fell or the boat sank.. but while I was in the water there were these two figures in there with me, they had what looked like oily black skin (actual solid jet black, like oil, and kind of glossy like you would expect on something wet and rubbery) and no faces. They were humanoid, with arms, legs, and a head and what not, but no distinguishable faces, kind of like if you stretched something over someone's face, so you can see the bone structure, the nose, and what not, but no actual nostrils, mouth, or eyes.

Well these two figures were trying to kill me and were amazingly strong, one was under the water trying to pull me under, the other was at the surface with me and it was grabbing at me and I was trying to fend if off. At one point one of them had me from behind, and was crushing me, the pain was so intense and real and I was beyond terrified. I had this distinct moment of panic, that something very very bad was about to happen, and a burning all down my spine, I could feel it being crushed, and I knew that if I didn't get away right then, I was going to die. I have no doubt that this is the feeling that goes through someone who is about to die, it was that powerful of an emotion and for that split second I fully believed it. And this feeling of terror and survival was so strong, that my mind was apparently actually convinced I was in real danger, because in that moment of intense panic I jolted awake out of the dream so suddenly that I sat up and for a second I wasn't fully awake, so even though I was sitting up and my eyes were open I could still see phantom images in the bed with me of the figures in the water.

After I woke fully I was pretty unsettled and panicky, I tried to go back to sleep, but as I drifted off the dream started up again and I snapped back awake before the figures could reach me. It was pretty terrifying because when I wasn't fully awake, I could see them crawling towards me in the bed while I was sitting there trying to clear my head. So I tried to stay awake a bit longer to get the dream off my mind so I might not dream the same thing, but as I dozed back off it started up and like before the moment I realized the dream was starting up it jolted me back awake, so I was like.. screw it and got up. I didn't want to go back to sleep I was so afraid of the dream.