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Monday Mini: A Nightmare on SMNTY Street · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha. I don't go to stuff.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: I never told your production of high Radio. So today's
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: topic is a bit of a selfish one, a bit
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: of me search, as it's called. But before we really
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: dive into it, I wanted to ask, Samantha, are you
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: someone who dreams frequently, who has really vivid dreams? What's
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: your dream experience? So? I know I dream, and but
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: I don't always remember my dream. I think I've told
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: you my sleep habit is really kind of odd. And
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I didn't realize it was odd until people were like, oh,
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: that's not normal, including the night terrors type of thing
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: in which I am suspended and I can't wake up,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: but I'm awake but I'm not. And I didn't realize
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: how little of the population actually experienced that. When I
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: was talking to someone about it and they're look at
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: me like what, I realized, Oh that's not normal, and
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: so I kind of went through a whole thing of
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: trying to sleep paralysis. That's what it is. When I
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: was trying to figure that out because I don't have
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: sleep tairs, sleep paralysis is what it is. That I
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: was like, oh, so this is not an occurrence for everyone,
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: and I would have it when I was most stressed,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: which made sense, and especially if I was napping, like
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: it was the prime time of me having a panic attack,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: that I could not wake myself up even though I
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: am begging myself to open my eyes. But with that,
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: as you and I discussed, because you are more of
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: the dreamer, you will have always remembered your dream, which
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: is fascinating to me, and then we're gonna talk about it.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: But for me, it's because I do the sleep and
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: I don't fall all the way to the rim sleep
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: or someone has woken me up in the middle of that,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: and so therefore I remember that vividly, and or I'm
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: stressed dreaming, which happens a lot. Yeah, so you don't
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: remember most of your dreams, would you say you feel
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: like you dream like every night or a lot. So
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: typically I know there's something they're lingering. Does that make sense. Yeah,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: I've had some really weird dreams that includes and I
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: know everybody who who analyzed dreams, they're going to say, oh,
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: this is this because I've dreamt about my teeth falling out. Okay,
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: but then I'm also this one recurring dream of the
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: fact that my contacts are giant contact that I'm trying
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: to shove into my eyes. I dream that often, Like
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: it's the weirdest. Is like abnormally large contacts that I'm
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: trying to put into my eyes and I know if
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: I could just start getting it in, it'll fit in.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: But I'm trying to how to put it in. But
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: that occurs a lot. That's it. That's a new one
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: for me because I feel like of you know, friends
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: of mine or family members, I know they're recurring dreams.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: We talked about them. It's almost always something like being
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: late for something, realizing you were signed up for a
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: class that you didn't know and it's the day of
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: the final it's a big one, or you can't find
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: your car. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Oh that one still haunts me. Actually,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: I just had one recently and I was like, I'm
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: not even freaking class anymore, right, why are you still
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: bothering me with so? I yes, I am someone who
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: probably dreams every night. It's very rare that I don't dream,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: and they are vivid and long, and I love them
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: almost always. I do have scary dreams that I hate.
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: I have experienced sleep paralysis and that is terrifying, right,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: But I just I like, the other day I had
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: the most wonderful Star Wars dream, and I am somebody
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: who can wake up and fall asleep again back in
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: the dream. I have never talked to anyone who has
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: done this, so maybe I'm the odd one out on
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: this one. But you were the first person to tell
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: me that you can go back to your dream, and
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: I'm like, what you. Only times I've ever done that
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: is a reoccurring dream of the same nightmare. I do
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: nightmares like that, but it's but it's not like it's
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: a continuation. It restarts into a new version for me.
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: But for you to say you can go back to
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: your dreams fascinating because I wish I could do that. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it's really cool. I mean it's it's heartbreaking when you well,
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: when I can't do it, because I'm like, no, I
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: gotta get back in and I think if I try
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: too hard, it doesn't work. You have to just let
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: yourself relax. And that's why one of my favorite times
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: day is like the dusky twilight periwinkle light before the
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: sun rises. If I wake up then and I had
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: a good dream, I can get back into the dream
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: if I can fall asleep. Yeah, And I've also I
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: have a very embarrassing story where back when I was
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: working for Stuff to Blow Your Mind as the editor,
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: which is another podcast on our network if you don't know,
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: I had some wine one night and I was talking
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: about how cool they did an episode on dreams and
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: how cool it was, and I was curious if anyone
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: experienced this phenomena I experienced, and I wrote in about it,
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: and I put in a fake name, but unfortunately, unfortunately
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: for me, my real name was underneath in the automatic
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: sign and they contacted me and we're like, is this you?
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: And I had to have a moment of how could
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: I lie to get out of this? And then I
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: realized I couldn't had to admit it, and then they
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: read it on air. I think in part that as punishment,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: but as a bit of well, you emailed us, and
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: we're going to answer your question for sure. Yeah. What
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: I was writing about is I used to have this
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: recurring dream that was like you were watching a TV
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: show every week, like it would pick up and it
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: would build, and it did this for years and it
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: was amazing, like I would be So I've got to
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: know what happens next, And my friends would be like,
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: it's your brain, you know what happens next. No, I
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: didn't know. It was so surprising all the time. I
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: wrote it in a book, and if we ever get
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: to it in our fiction segment, I will point it out.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: But it is one of my favorite ideas I've ever had.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: But it was from a it was from a dream,
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: and it was also I can also lucid dream, but
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: that's much more difficult for me to do. All of
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: this to say, I have just been curious about dreams
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: lately because as Samantha and I we're discussing earlier and
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: we're going to talk about a bit in this podcast,
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: my dreams during the pandemic have really turned up a
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: not like and how bizarre they are and how vivid
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: they feel, and also how long feels like. Sometimes I
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: wake up and I've only been asleep for an hour,
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: and it feels like I've lived an entire year in
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: my life or something, and I know it can't be
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: that long in my brain, but somehow my brain is
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: able to communicate a very long amount of time, which
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: is amazing. So I was just I wanted to look
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: into is this something only I am experiencing what is this?
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: And I will say I have been interested in dreams
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: for a while because I do experience them the way
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: that I do, and so I've I've looked into why
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: they happen, what our brain is doing, and I will
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: say the consensus is generally uh um. Scientists think it's
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: either currently a way of your brain of sort of
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: like sorting through men maris and what to store and
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: clearing out what not to store, while also like working
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: through especially if you've got a problem or um an
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: emotion you're trying to deal with, which is actually one
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: of the reasons I don't like to procrastinate, because I
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: like to give my brain that time to sit on
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: it and maybe come up with a new solution. Or interestingly,
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  Speaker 1: I was reading today they think it might be back
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: with our ancestors where there's no like when it was dark,
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: it was dark, and that's it. That it was a
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: way of keeping your visual cortex from getting like usurped
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: by other senses at night. Yeah, just basically keeping it
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: active and making sure that it's it was ready to go.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: I guess I'm simplifying it a lot, obviously, but I
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: just think that's really interesting that we still aren't sure,
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  Speaker 1: And when you think about it, it's such a fascinating
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: aspect of being a person of that your brain is like, tonight,
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: we're going to dream that your droid was kidnapped, which
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: is a dream I had. I told Samantha, I helped
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: you find it though, right, yeah, you were involved. We
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: were talking about the last of Us, and I was
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: so happy. And then my druid got kidnapped and you
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: helped me um, which is wonderful and necessarily kidnapped, was stolen,
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: but okay, and it was kidnapped. And this actually inspired
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: me to write my name on it and its name
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: on it, as if this is going to help at all.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: But that's a you know, an instance of a dream
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: influencing real life outcome. And I have I started keeping
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: a dream journal just because I do have a lot
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: of ideas and just like, what was this? What was
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: my brain trying to do with all of this? So,
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: studies on gender differences in sleep have found that women
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: generally get poorer quality sleep and are more likely to
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: suffer from insomnia. UM. They're also more likely to recall
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: their dreams compared to men. UM and they also were
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: having more nightmares. Study after study has been done on
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: gender differences when it comes to dreaming. One found quote
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: the results confirm earlier findings that men dream more often
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: about men physical aggression and sexuality than women. Women's dreams,
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: on the other hand, contained an equal proportion of male
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: and female characters more aggression turned inwardly in themes of depression.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: You can see that. Yeah, there's a lot of my
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: dreams are having to do with something that I have
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: done wrong. Yeah. Yeah, and I know I'm not sure
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: if this is true anymore, but I remember, probably over
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: ten years ago, there was a survey that found that
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: women the most recurring dream women had was running from
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: someone who meant to part them. Yeah. I've had a
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: lot of dreams of like murderers coming at me and
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: I can't run, but I'm trying to fly, but I
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: can't do that either. I'm just grounded in sand. Oh No,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: that's bad. That sounds terrible. That sounds terrible. One vivid
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: dream of them like there was a murderer in the house,
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: and then there're snipers coming after the murderer, but they're
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: coming after all of us because they're like just getting
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: rid of all of them. Oh jeez. I frequently have
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: one that there's that I'm awake and there's somebody in
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: the room and I it's just like I feel like
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: I can't move or I'm too afraid to us and
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: you're trying to wake up. Yeah. Sometimes I'm not paralyzed
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: so much as just like I think in a weird
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: like I'm not sure that I'm awake or not. I
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: don't know, it's hard to describe. I definitely experienced sleep paralysis,
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: so and it is very scary. Multiple studies have found
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: that women's dreams have been more negatively impacted than men's
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: during the pandemic. Harvard study found that women overall expressed
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: lower rates of positive emotions and higher levels of stress, anxiety, anger,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: and sadness compared to pre pandemic dreams. Um there was
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: a si l're trimmed among men, but it was much
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: less pronounced. And given what all we've talked about about
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: the disproportionate impact that COVID has had in several ways
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: on women, this makes sense to me. I mean, if
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: we're talking about the fact that it is partly because
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: of the anxiety and stress that we have these types
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: of dreams. We know that women have been more affected
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: when on this level during the pandemic. Yes, and if
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: that was already sort of the case before the pandemic,
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: it just it makes sense to me for sure that
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: it would get more pronounced. And it is definitely something
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: I've noticed. I've had a lot of pandemic dreams and
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: fears around pandemics and people getting sick or or even
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: myself getting sick, So that's definitely been a theme. But also, yeah,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: just I don't know why. Maybe I'm paying more attention.
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: Maybe it's because I'm not as scheduled or regimented as
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: i was before because I'm staying inside. Uh, my dreams
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: feel they've they've really really stopped. Yeah, I mean, I
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: definitely am with you. I've told you We've had some weird,
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: weird dreams to the point that I'm like, what's going on?
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: And I'm not superstitious necessarily, and I'm not necessarily alternative
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: like worldly type of things, but some of these I'm thinking, Okay,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: I need to dig into this a little more because
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: I think this is my psyche telling me to get
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: it together. Mm hmm. Yeah, yeah, I mean it's it's
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: been interesting hearing hearing some of your dreams and the
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: themes that are popping up in them. Times I had
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: to wake up from like desperately trying to wake up
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: from these dreams because it's so traumatic that I am
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: affected for two days by it. Yeah, dreams can and
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: can do that. After my dad daed, my mom will
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: just have these horrible nightmares and it lasted for quite
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: a long time. And she I was also curious if
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: dreaming is genetic in anyway, because she has very she
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: has a lot of dreams and very vivid. We were
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: discussing before how in some people's minds this faux paw
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: are like not interesting to talk about dreams. My mom
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: and I will all discuss and fascinated by other people's dreams.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: And because I think there is a level of whether
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: it's your stress, whether it's like what you're going through,
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: whether it's something that's just out of nowhere, like what
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: I constantly dream about my past employments. And there's one
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: specific past employment that I cannot stop dreaming about, and
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: I can't figure out why, because I should have more
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: nightmares about my de facts job, but I don't. Yeah,
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: stuff like that is interesting. It's like, why are you again, brain?
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: Why are you hung up on this thing that I'm like,
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: I have not talked to any of those people in years,
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: like in years almost to the with this coming to decade,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: and I'm going, why is that in my brain still
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: as if I still worked there, Right, Yeah, it would
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: be so interesting to find out more about that mine.
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: I have a real anxiety around forgetting things. That's also
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: another reason I don't like procrastinating. So I feel like
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: a lot of the things I dream about, like I
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: think I dreamt about the droid getting kidnapped, which I
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: did dream about it more than once, was because I
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: was afraid I was going to forget it at somebody
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: else's place, and it was just an anxiety that I had,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: And so now my brain is unable to let go
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: of that anxiety. Right. So that's the same thing of
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: like trying to go to sleep but you're scared and
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: you wake yourself up like four ahead hours ahead of
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: the time that you're trying to wake up. So whether
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: you're afraid that you're about to miss an exam and
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: a flight or something, so you wake yourself up extra
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: early thinking you've actually missed it, which I've dreamed that
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: all lot. But I have this weird thing where as
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: a child, because my reality and my fantasy were mixing
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: up with the fact that I didn't know my childhood
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: as an orphaned child, literally living in an orphanage, not
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: knowing the first seven years history of my life, I
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: mixed dream in reality and I could not figure out
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: for the longest time what was real and what wasn't.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: And I still to this day cannot completely tell you
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: other than coming down to an analyze this could not
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: have happened. I could have not seen it from this
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: point of view, but swore as a kid that it
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: did because that's all I had. And I still know
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: those dreams to the things. I can picture it and
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: describe to you those dreams that I had at seven
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: eight years old of my past trauma. But it's such
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: a weird concept because I'm like, at that point in time,
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: I believed it because I didn't have anything to tell
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: me otherwise, right, Yeah, And that's something we've talked about,
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: I think briefly in her Trauma mini series. But that
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: is a way like I also had trauma dreams to
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: the point where I couldn't tell what had happened had
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: happened because I was dreaming this so much and I
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: was like, well, is that is that how it happened?
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: Or did it? Because that's not what I remember? Um
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: but it would just blur. It would get really confusing.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: So yeah, that's another aspect too. And we know, as
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: we discussed in that many series, that women do experience
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: trauma at higher levels. UM. So that also makes sense
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: in terms of what we're talking about here of women
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: having less good sleep and more nightmares, so many things,
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: so many things. Well, listeners, if you have any thoughts
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: about dreams, any dreams you'd like to share, we would
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: love to hear about them. You can email us a
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: stuff Idia mom Stuff at iHeart media dot com. You
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: can find us on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast or
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: on Instagram and stuff I Never Told You. Thanks. It's
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: always to our superproducer Christina always part of the good
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: dream she is, yes, and thanks to you for listening.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: Step I Never Told you his production of I Heart
• 17:56
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