First post here so please forgive if this topic has been covered, but how can you not know you are dreaming? I mean other than a nightmare that you force yourself out of because you are frightened (obviously not lucid here) or you force the dream or nightmare to change to a better story, don't you almost always know that you are dreaming?

I generally have very vivid, colorful and detailed dreams but almost always feel that I'm detached, watching the dream like on movie screen while I'm also participating in the plot. My husband also dreams very vividly and we often have similar dreams containing the same themes. Not exacttly the same dream but similar. Every morning we tell each other our dreams and sometimes in the night when we wake up, usually about 3 am.

There might be a place (a town, building, scenery) that I've dreamed about before and I will recognize it... "Oh, this place again" and then I compare it to the last time I dreamed about it while the dream is going on. Maybe the kitchen has changed a bit from the last time or the town has a new building or store front. Quite often I will recognize that the place or building is similar to one that I know in real life but just a bit different. Occaisonally I will dream about a new place (dream landscapes is what I call them) and later on in waking life or in the future come upon the location. I dreampt for years about a house on the edge of a riverbank and after we built our home, I realized that that WAS the place. Now I don't dream about that house anymore.

Often something will be happening in a dream, like I'm taking care of a child and I'm at the same time wondering...."What does this mean to me that I have this child that of course I don't have in real life? Why am I doing these things in this current dream."

Is this lucid dreaming?