Feeling pain while dreaming

I normally experience this about half a dozen times a year... while in a dream, (just any average dream..nothing unusual is happening in it) the dream is playing out as any non eventful dream would...and then I suddenly feel terrifying pain in my abdomen.

The pain is so bad that it wakes me up. It feels like many hands are groping at my insides, pulling and tugging roughly at them. I normally wake up pretty quickly, but still experience the pain for a short while once I am awake. The pain recedes over a couple of minutes once I've woken up.

I used to think there was something medically wrong with me, but I never experience the same pain while awake during the day, except for once, twenty four years ago...I was given a caesarean section under epidural (not a general anaesthetic). The epidural didn't work and I experienced alot of pain, I was seeing stars, hearing ringing in the ears and nearly passing out, but this pain is almost the same as what I am experiencing in the above dreams.

I've often wandered if this could be negative energies preying on my vulnerable state while dreaming.

I feel like it is probably something medically wrong that only happens while you are laying down. Since most people only lay down for short amounts each day except for sleep, so it makes sense that something caused by laying down only happens while you are sleeping.