Thread: Aware he's dreaming, can't wake up. Scary dreams.

For about a week now, my boyfriend has been having strange dreams that leave him unsettled-- or really, just one dream over the course of multiple nights, since each dream is just a continuation of the others. In these dreams, he's aware of everything but can't do anything about it. He can wake up and tell me everything that happened as if it were real. But lately, they've been getting stranger.
He dreamed that something was coming to get him (some sort of vampire creature) and in his dream his nose broke several times. When he woke up, his nose ached and his head hurt as though he'd been hit. Then last night, he was so afraid that it woke him up gasping for air and shivering. We've been getting 8+ hours of sleep but he's always tired because he doesn't rest well.
Is this something that's happened to someone else? Is there a way to stop it?