Nightly Nightmares my whole life

Hello,
I've been searching on this site and sites like this for some help with my nightmares. And finally decided to seek out the specific help I am after. Here's a little backstory of my dreams: at the age of 4, I started to have night terrors where I would wake up thinking I seen little red dots. I only vaguely remember this but my parents took me to a therapist to try and get to the bottom of it. At this point, nothing traumatic had ever happened to me so my family was stumped. The therapist thought I was seeing red dots from 7up cans or how photographs used to give everyone red dots in their eyes, and turning that into something scary. I have a psychology degree, and his analysis was and is ridiculous. Interesting correlation but the nightmares/night terrors kept up throughout my childhood, into my adolescence. The content changing a bit.
I was always tired in school because I felt like I was active in my sleep. The same way I feel now. I never felt/feel rested. Yet, it was and is now, very easy for me to fall asleep. I don't dread sleep. In fact, I love it; getting sometimes 12 solid hours.
Nightmares are a part of my life. I don't know if I can remember ever having a good dream. And that's the thing- I would remember. I remember all these dreams like they are memories. I often say that my dreams feel like memories. When I am in them, they are so intense, I can't lucid dream. I've been trying for over 5 years nightly.
Here's some other things I've tried: gemstones, meditation, herbs, yoga, Holy water, affirmations, sage, dream journal, viewed them from every psychological standpoint, changed diet and lifestyle over all, worked through my past issues as an adult and childhood issues. I am at a loss for what else to do. I am sure I am forgetting a few things in all these years of searching for a solution but I feel like I have tried everything there is.
My nightmares are about murder, death, safety, protecting myself, losing the ones I care about, trying to protect others, natural disasters, in detailed houses and places I've never been, fire and I always feel scared, unsure. Still, I push through these dreams like they are a secondary reality. They are. They have become so commonplace, I can't tell that they are happening, as they are happening. I cannot tell it's a dream.
I meditate, have had astral projection just a few times and can easily access a place of calm in my mind; no success with lucid dreaming. I know this is super long. I tried to include all the details. Can anyone please help me with this? :)

Have you tried using dreamsigns and reality checks? If you haven't yet, start recognizing things that appear regularly in your nightmares, and whenever you see them in real life, do a reality check. There are helpful articles on here to help you find the reality check that works for you. When you do a reality check and realize its a dream, you can either wake up or take complete control. I hear waking up from the nightmare by self-induction has stopped their nightmares. In a case as serious as this, you'd best contact wise members of this forum like Sageous for advice. Good luck.

Hello there and welcome to DV! :)

I can partially relate to some of your experiences. As a child, I used to have a lot of disturbing dreams, including night frights, etc. Then as I grew up some of these decreased in frequency but then I would still get unpleasant scenarios like being chased, facing monsters or upsetting emotional situations. During some of these experiences, I would naturally become lucid and try to handle the issue with some success. However, it wasn't until I got a real determination to stop those from happening that real changes began to take hold. I worked a lot with autosuggestion, that I will not be afraid upon facing disturbing situations or adversaries. This was combined with increased induction of lucid dreams where I would do all sorts of things. While not necessarily trying to overcome issues with agressive DCs, I unevitably faced those issues in lucid dreams and learned how to handle them better.

The change was gradual but after a lot of ld practice and work on my side, the occurence of such dreams has reduced significantly. So, I know it is possible. It is important to be commited to solving your problems and with some practice, I am sure you will learn to feel more comfortable so that unpleasant dreams will decrease and the ones that happen you will learn to recognize and control. The experiences you gather will start working in your favor at some point.

Another thing I would recommend to keep in my mind - anything you are exposed to can appear in your dreams. For instance, this would imply mindfulness practices and self control during the day when facing any emotional or challenging situations. In addition, do not underestimate the effect that entertainment - movies, games can have on the mind - scary movies will more likely contribute to creepy dreams. So, choose your "inputs" carefully. Again, this something I have noticed myself so I am being careful what I watch or play. If I were to play a game like Skyrim, then I would repeat a mantra to myself just in case the adversaries manifest in dreams (and they do!). I don't always get lucid but the dream itself feels more like a fun game than a scary event.

By the way, the red dots you were seeing, I think it's actually absolutely normal type of hypnagogic images/shapes that you can get especially when awoken from deep sleep. Some people tend to be more distressed after being woken up from deep sleep - either a sudden wake or by somebody else.

Hope that helps!