A friend told

me recently about a recurring dream that has been with her for decades.

It began in adulthood, but in it she is a young child. She is on a playground

at school. She is swinging and only has on a blouse. She can't stop swinging

and come down because people will see she only is wearing a blouse.

Our conversation

prompted me to recall a dream I had for many years though it has probably

not recurred now for more than a decade. I was always at school and usually

at the lunch table or at a desk in a classroom and I'm not wearing shoes.

In my dream, I can't leave the desk or table because my classmates will

see that I have no shoes.

I have had

a dozen or so theories about why my dream kept recurring. Now that I realize

I have not had the dream in about ten years, I suspect I am finally content

with who I am and I no longer feel unfinished or not properly educated.

Just a theory ...

This conversation

prompted me to do some Internet research on dreams. Was I ever surprised

at the content available on dreaming!

I found a Web

site for The Association for the Study of Dreams, a nonprofit, international,

multidisciplinary organization dedicated to the pure and applied investigation

of dreams and dreaming. They promote an awareness and appreciation of

dreams in both professional and public arenas; to encourage research into

the nature, function, and significance of dreaming; to advance the application

of the study of dreams; and to provide a forum for the eclectic and interdisciplinary

exchange of ideas and information. Their 2003 annual convention is coming

up this month.

I surfed on

and discovered a paper by G. William Domhoff, University of California

at Santa Cruz, entitled "The Repetition Principle in Dreams: Is It

a Possible Clue to a Function of Dreams?"

Ordinarily,

I hesitate to quote anybody or write about anything coming out of California

(yep, this Southern girl is somewhat prejudiced) but I was impressed with

his paper.

Domhoff says

traumatic dreams are legitimate, "real" dreams that occur in

all stages of sleep, including REM, and they are experienced as dreamlike

problems that have overwhelmed the person. Third, to the degree that the

experience is gradually assimilated, to that degree the dreams decrease

in frequency and become altered in content. Fourth, the way in which the

experience sometimes reappears when new problems arise suggests that the

old traumas have become metaphors for new stressful situations.

He continues,

"Traumatic dreams, then, reflect a preoccupation with problems we

have not resolved. This is a possible starting point for understanding

the nature of dream content. However, such dreams can hardly be called

'functional' in that they are so disturbing to the dreamers. Most posttraumatic

stress disorder patients say they would prefer not to have them. They

think that these dreams set them back. Indeed, it may be that such dreams

serve to perpetuate the condition by reminding the person of the terrible

experience."

Before making

too much of one type of dream, Domhoff suggests looking at the closest

relative of traumatic dreams, the recurrent dream, to see what conclusions

can be drawn from studying it. He concludes that most recurrent dreams

are very similar to the dreams of posttraumatic stress disorder and writes,

"More exactly, they are watered-down versions of such dreams. They

have their origins in some sort of stressful situation, usually in childhood

or adolescence, they are repeated, and they are mostly unpleasant. They

differ from the dreams of those diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder

in that they usually do not contain elements or memories from the stressful

situation. Instead, they seem to be more metaphoric in content, with wild

animals, monsters, scary strangers, or natural disasters chasing, attacking,

or entrapping the dreamer."

The site (www.dreamresearch.net

or https://psych.ucsc.edu/dreams/) offered a commendable FAQ section, worth

checking out if the subject interests you. Also FYI, Amazon.com offers

173 titles on dreams and dreaming. I also checked out my own book shelves

while doing this column and found seven dream titles. I was reminded that

this subject has always interested me!

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