I don’t dream. By that I mean like 2-4 a year, but when I do they are weird. The most I’ve ever had was when I had a repeating dream like 3 nights in a row. Last night was one of the nights when I did dream.
So me and my dad went to a car dealership and bought a motorcycle and a cybertruck. We like to buy used cars and drive them till death to save the ‘new’ tax. We also wouldn’t buy a motorcycle so this started off extremely strange. Anyways, I started driving the cybertruck home (it was nighttime) and I guess fell asleep at the wheel because I woke up while driving.
I am 17 and have only been driving for ~1.5 years so driving is still very scary for me, falling asleep at the wheel was extra terrifying. Some more background, my first car (a green 2016 Kia soul 💚) has recently had the ABS and anti-slip thing warning lights turn on and off randomly, always together. My oil change is in like a week and the break fluid is probably low and nothing feels different so I was told to keep driving to school/work with it till I can get an oil change.
Back to the dream, while I was freaking out nearly crying because I fell asleep, the car somehow turned into me driving the motorcycle and going 15 over the limit at 75mph. The road I was on was going to turn into a city soon so I started slowing down, but my brakes didn’t work (flashback to my IRL warning light). I started freaking out trying all sorts of stuff to slow down like wiggling back and forth on the road or pulling the emergency break (idk if motorcycles even HAVE e-brakes) but nothing was really working. I don’t remember how but somehow I managed to get it down to 15mph and bailed off in some empty lot in the city.
At this point I realized it was a dream and I was like explaining it to my family the next day and laughing about it. THEN I ACTUALLY WOKE UP.
I fell asleep IN A DREAM… IN A DREAM!? It was actually so weird. There was more that smoothed it out where I wasn’t just jumping from thing to thing but when I wake up my mind starts writing over the memory of the dream like a VHS tape, Is this what it’s like for people who normally dream or am I just different?
Waking up in a dream is something that happened to me a few times. First time when I must’ve been about 7. I just remembered standing up and exiting the room to go get breakfast, then actually waking up. Realistic and all. This dream was probably inspired by some smell of breakfast that I smelled while asleep. Nothing scary there, but I was startled enough that I still remember it.
Then around 14-15, I started experiencing sleep paralysis and nightmares for a while, and then I had similar experiences, but scary this time.
Once I had a sleep paralysis episode wherein I saw a black cat-monkey-goat creature sitting on a chair in my room. Then it jumped at me and I woke up. Or did I? There was a whole moment about me talking to it in my family, I thought it wasn’t the first time it happened and I was afraid to go to sleep the same night because it might happen again. But then I actually woke up. The whole thing about me not wanting to go back to sleep had also been a part of the dream. Also, I then only remembered seen the creature once even though within the dream I remered having seen it several nights, so it’s a dream of which the narrative spanned several days.
Another time, it was more regular sleep paralysis, no hallucinations, but I felt very uncomfortable and was eager to wake up and there was some annoying noise, like a tinnitus. Then it stopped and I could move, so I stood up and opened the door… Then I heard the noise again, stronger, painful even, and I was back in my bed, paralyzed again.
Just to say you do dream, you are just not remembering them most of the time.
I thought I didn’t dream but found that if I’m interrupted during sleep then I am aware of the dream I had. You can also apparently train yourself to remember your dreams with a dream journal and alarms, although I haven’t gone too far with that myself. But it intrigues me as it’s a route to lucid dreaming.
What you’re describing of being sort of aware you’re in a dream is a step towards lucid dreaming where you are basically “awake” and in control of your dreams.
As for your dreams within dreams. I have had that - mainly as waking up and getting out of bed, then waking up again still in bed and getting up, then again. It’s trippy when it happens.
A false awakening isn’t rare, especially with lucid dreamers, but it’s certainly a bizzare experience nonetheless.
My most vivid lucid dream was a false awakening loop. I just couldn’t leave the dream. In hindsight I should’ve just enjoyed it, instead of trying to die :D
you might want to tldr your final question up top, could get more answers that way.
I don’t ever remember waking up in a dream and then waking up in real life, but it’s such a common trope in books and TV that I’m also curious how often people falsely wake up or go to bed in dreams.
it can’t be very uncommon.