need help! girlfriend in trouble =(

[mx125sx]

Hi all, Kind of a dramatic first post but I have a problem. My ex girlfriend ( turns out i still love her) was in a car crash two days ago. She is 16. Her boyfriend was in the passenger seat while they made a left turn on a divided highway. The oncoming traffic was stopped but one person decided to go. I think it was a chance made by the person that hit them to score with insurance Regardless, she heard her boyfriend yell " Oh shit!!" as the car came at them. She looked to the right to find him lunging for her to protect her as the car struck them. No one was hurt thankfully, altho she was covered in shattered glass. The image is burned into my mind. But she has it worse as anyone could imagine. She dreams about the crash every night and thinks about it during the day. So, I come to you all looking for assistance. I need to stop her dream of the crash. It's killing me knowing she is in pain like this. Thats problem number one... Problem number two issss I would LOVE to start to get into lucid dreaming, but have no idea how. So I'm going to search around here for guides, but if anyone has any quick tips I would greatly appreciate them. Thanks everyone - Evan

[kichu]

Hmm...interesting. Not sure what to make of that. First thing that popped into my head - are you sure she needs to stop dreaming about it right now? Maybe she needs to go through this and sort of work things out, kinda sweat through it a little. Yes it's unpleasant, but I think a lot of people here will agree that you definitely figure things out in dreams. And maybe getting her into LDing would be a good distraction, something else for her brain to focus on. And then if she does experience LDing, perhaps she can deal with this issue in LDs. Or partly deal with it there anyway. I dunno.

[Oneironaut Zero]

First off, welcome to Dream Views. Too bad you have to join us under such rough circumstances. With your second question, you'll find a lot of information around here, just browse around. Starting a Dream Journal would probably be your most important first step, and make sure you keep up with it and make it a point to write in it every morning possible, no matter how little you remember. There are great tutorial sections around here, and if you have any specific questions, feel free to use the search option, start a thread on it, or PM one of the Dream Guides (those of us with Green stars). As far as your first: You can probably expect for her to have dreams about the incident (or dreams that are somehow related) for quite some time. It's hard to get such a traumatic experience out of our subconscious, if we can get them out at all. The very best thing (in my opinion) that you can do for her, if you have that kind of relationship with her, is to try to advise to her that the dreams will only carry as much power as she gives them. As long as it's something that she thinks about all day, then they are going to show up, more or less, at night. If it's something that holds a lot of weight with her, mentally, then she's always going to be that much more liable to dream about it. The best thing she can do is become comfortable with the mindset that it's over, no one got hurt, and that many people go through ordeals such as this. The sooner she becomes comfortable with what happened, the sooner the nightmares should stop plaguing her. That's really the only advice that I can offer. Hope it helps.

[mx125sx]

Thanks for the fast replies! Greatly appreciated. I sent her the link to this thread, so she is reading now. I'll do my best to keep her stable. Thank you again

[Oneironaut Zero]

Anytime.

[kichu]

[stargazerlili]

hey guys! well, i'm evan'sex girlfriend.. (thanks by the way evan!) thanks for the replys and maybe you all can help me out.. i dont know how to bring myself to realize the truth of it all.. when i dream the crash, we are all hurt.. there's blood everywhere and i'm so scared.... i'm scared of sleeping.. i don't wanna see the blood. ihavent slept since the crash.. im afraid i'm gonna crash down.. i can't blink, i see the crash again... help me out please.. how do i calm myself down?

[Oneironaut Zero]

Hi, Lili. Welcome to DV. Well, it might seem a little cold but, as I said before, there's not much better advice I (personally) can give you than that you're going to have to find your peace with what happened, and accept the fact that what goes into your subconscious isn't always that easy to get rid of. The best you could do is deflate the power from it, and it should stop bothering you so often, or have such a strong affect. The truth is that you have to sleep. You have to dream, and you have to take the chance that, sometimes, that particular dream might come back to you. The catch is that, by telling yourself how much you don't want the dream to come back to you, you are guaranteeing that it's going to come back to you more often. You are giving it power by constantly thinking about it. It's a lot like playing a game or doing a task that you know, when you're by yourself, you're excellent at. But, when someone comes along and wants to challenge you, you start getting anxious. You start thinking "what if I lose? What if this person beats me?" etc. etc. And then, what happens? You lose a contest that, were you on your own, you would have done much better at. Basically you're psyching yourself into failure. The very best you can do is to just try not to think about it. It's a lot easier said than done, though. I know. But that's how things are, when they are stuck in your head. The hardest thing in the world (if possible at all) is to force them out. You have to learn to accept them. To cope with them. Then, your mind will stop thinking of them as important, or crucial, and it will gradually move on to something else. In the meantime, try to use that dream as a dream sign. My most frequent way of having a lucid dream was because of nightmares. Try to focus your mind on that the next time you witness that dream, you will know it's a dream, and you will tell yourself that "it's only a dream. It isn't real[/i]. I've gone through this before, and we all made it out alright. What I'm seeing is not really happening." Using that, you are taking some of the power away from it, and you might actually be able to change the dream scenario around, or make it go away.

[stargazerlili]

Any suggestions on how to stop thinking about it? I'll try anything. Anything at all.

[Oneironaut Zero]

Any suggestions on how to stop thinking about it? I'll try anything. Anything at all. Find something to occupy your time with. An activity, a hobby, a good book, a good website, whatever. It's not going to work if you keep one foot on the subject, though. You have to just find something else to grab your attention, and set the intention to stop thinking about the incident. If you find yourself thinking about it again, don't freak out about it, just calmly redirect your attention to something else, and let it slip into the back of your mind.

[stargazerlili]

Thank you so much.. I really think you are helping me out loads. Maybe I can pick your brain a little more?? My boyfriend keeps telling me to stop talking about it. I kind of don't think I should stop and neither does Evan... opinion??? and by the way, thanks for the welcome!

[Oneironaut Zero]

Haha. You're welcome. And yeah, talking about it is just keeping it in your conscious mind(instead of filing it away in your subconscious). Really, it's not talking about it that's the problem. It's how much talking about it affects you. Once you're more comfortable with it, and it doesn't have such an impact on you, you could talk about it all you want, without having such intense nightmares about it. But, since it's a recent occurence, just try to keep your mind off of it. That means don't bring it up. Just treat it like "hey, ok, it happened, it's over. No need to keep bringing it up and going over it over and over in my mind. Time to move on to something else." If it creeps back into your mind, change the subject. Do something else. Think about something else. Don't fight it like "OMG I'M THINKING ABOUT IT AGAIN!!!" Just say "huh...ok, I've been over this. It's over, moving on..." and move on to something else. Sooner or later, you should be able to even bring it up in conversation, and not even think twice about it, but right now, since it's fresh in your mind, it's best to take some of the importance out of it.

[stargazerlili]

okay.. sounds easy enough.. I shall attempt it.. THANK YOU! =D

[Oneironaut Zero]

You're welcome. Hope it helps.

[stargazerlili]

you and me both! =)

[mx125sx]

oneironaut, I really appreciate what you're doing for the both of us here as to my second question: I looked into Lucid Aids and i found some MP3's. I listened to one about half an hour ago, and about half way through i literally felt like i was high.. just in a different mind state. It's amazing.

[Original Poster]

She has post traumatic stress syndrome. I spent several months living in a dormitory that I was banned from, facing felony charges if I got caught. Being seen by hall staff, and then running and pulling little ninja moves took a massive toll on my psyche. I dreamed about being pursued by authority figures nearly every night. Eventually I stopped, but it was a bitch to get through. What helped me was meditation, the people that loved me, and time.

[stargazerlili]

She has post traumatic stress syndrome. I spent several months living in a dormitory that I was banned from, facing felony charges if I got caught. Being seen by hall staff, and then running and pulling little ninja moves took a massive toll on my psyche. I dreamed about being pursued by authority figures nearly every night. Eventually I stopped, but it was a bitch to get through. What helped me was meditation, the people that loved me, and time. wow, is it really that obvious? i was diagnosed with PTSD 2 yearsago for I have lived an extremely traumatizing life.. I'm really bad with time.. you really think it helps?