Dream 639 (Multi-level Dream-within-a-Dream)

'Dream-within-a-Dream'

Date: 26 May 2016

Time: 13:00 - 17:00 (I woke up from this dream due to a my alarm clock, I had a telephone conversation with DL - I then fell back asleep until approximately 21:00, waking up naturally)

Type of dream: Vivid dream - dream-within-a-dream
Dream recall: Strong recall - some loss of recall due to falling back asleep after a brief wakening following parts of this dream

Scene 1: A Domestic Interior (Location Unknown) - Day

I was in a room which appeared to be similar to my bedroom in my former childhood home in Pine Grove, Sheringham - but with a double bed positioned under the window, as it had been in a previous dream. DL was sitting at the top of the bed and telling me that we could leave when he had finished playing a game. He was holding a silver laptop and showed me an online fruit machine game, which you could earn real money with if you won. DL said that his target was to win £40 so that we could but some weed. I thought that we might be going somewhere, as I was anticipating that we had to leave soon, and DL was taking time. After waiting for another period of time, some of it spent watching DL play, and tell me what buttons he was going to press (the laptop was seen to be a touch-screen at this point, as this was how you press/held the buttons of the fruit machine down). He then said to me: 'I've got £32 now, so I'll be finished soon.

Sitting in a lounge, just to the side of some sofas (orange) on which some middle-aged female dream characters (unknown to me) were sitting, I was told by some of these females - in a patronising manner: 'You've been androided'. I saw silverness (in some form).

I cannot recall anything else about this dream - and woke from an alarm clock. 15 minute phone conversation with DL. I then fell asleep again.

Scene 2: A Domestic Interior (Location Unknown) - Day
I was looking at something on social media. My friend, BS had somehow become very famous. It seemed that he and KL had separated (but we were all our younger selves - BS and KL did not have children yet, plus there were more clues to this, later). He was searching for the ideal lipstick for his new partner, who was a blonde girl (a dream character) who was (in the dream) in his year at school, so slightly older than both KL and I. He had written a Facebook status, asking people on his friends list to help him with the lipstick search. I wrote a response, saying that I had just watched Grav3yardgirl's review of some chocolate-themes lipglosses on Youtube and could recommend them, since it seemed he was looking for a pink/brown nude-toned lipstick. 

I then realised that this entire scene - me seeing BS post on social media about the lipstick was a dream. It had not happened, but it was a recent dream. I then assumed that this dream of BS and the search for the lipstick must have happened in Scene 1 - the dream scene which happened prior to me waking up in real life and speaking to DL on the phone. 

I thought: 'I better write this down in my Dream Journal so that I can blog it...' but then realised that BS was famous, and had separated from KL - so therefore, even in my dream-within-a-dream, the facts which had led me to conclude the earlier events must have been a dream, because they were dreamsigns - i.e. events I know to be untrue in real waking life were actually present  and true in this part of the dream, and I was not prompted to reality check, so accepted them as reality! 

BS - I am not sure what he was famous for, exactly - was hosting an event locally, to promote something, or perhaps to speak to his fans. I decided to go to this event, and tell him in person about my dream of him. I thought that I should also describe the dream to him on Facebook - on the post about the lipstick search, which had apparently been part of  'the dream' - my whole motivation for communicating with BS at this point was to convey the 'dream' I had of him, but the facts of that 'dream' were the truth of this next-level dream, making the events of this dream sequence possible...(I know this is confusing!) 

Scene 3: A Shopping Centre (Location Unknown) - Time Unknown
I went to a shopping centre, where BS was doing his public appearance. BS was standing at a small display which had both a touchscreen monitor, showing the Facebook status about the lipsticks and also a poster of several lipsticks in pink/brown nude tones. I realised that I had neither replied to BS's Facebook thread about my dream of him, or recorded the dream on my Dream Journal. BS was surrounded by several dream characters who were his 'fans'. I approached him and said: 'I had a dream about you. The dream was the same as what is happening now, but I forgot to write it down in my Dream Journal'. I then looked at the screen (the Facebook status/conversation thread about the lipsticks) and scrolled through until I found my original message about the chocolate-themed lipglosses reviewed by Grav3yardgirl (which I had sent in 'the dream' - paragraph 1 of Scene 2). I pointed it out to BS and said: 'See this is the comment I wrote to you in the dream I had about you doing this'. BS seemed amused by this and said that he wanted me to be able to record it in my Dream Journal so that he could read it. I said: 'I could just record it on your Facebook conversation thread' and tried to access my own Facebook account on my mobile phone, so that I could reply to BS's Facebook status (I was aware that the Facebook screen being displayed on the monitor was logged into BS's account, so I could not comment directly using that screen). BS said: 'No, if you write about it on Facebook, it'll just be part of the dream, you need to write it in real life'. My mobile phone screen then got stuck, I could not scroll or exit the crashed Facebook screen. 

To my left, sitting on the floor, just behind BS's display were 2 female dream characters. One of them was slim with straight blonde hair to her shoulders. I am not sure what the other one looked like, but she had dark hair. The blonde girl said: 'What are you doing talking to BS?' in a jealous/accusational tone, which implied I had some kind of bad motive. I then realised that she was BS' new girlfriend - the person he had been trying to find the perfect shade of lipstick for. I said: 'I had a dream about the lipsticks, so I came to tell BS about it. In the dream I was helping him to find your lipstick...' The blonde girl seemed content at this explanation and said: 'Was your dream the same as this one?' to which I said: 'No, my phone screen froze' (meaning: my phone screen froze now (in this second-level dream, which I was not conscious of), but in the original 'dream' I was able to comment on Facebook). The girl summonsed me over to join her and her friend, indicating that she could help me with my phone. 

She started trying to scroll on my phone. Instead of the page moving up and down, it moved side-to-side. I noticed that on one page which she managed to scroll to the left onto (also a Facebook page), there was water on the screen, which appeared out of nowhere. I wondered what the water was (questioning if it was 'spit'), but the girl wiped it away with her hand and turned and laughed at her friend. I said: 'If you fix the phone, I will show you that I wrote about the lipsticks on my Facebook in my dream about this'. However, the girls did not seem interested, so I decided to leave. 

Before I left, I started to play a computer-based game - I am not sure if it was arcade or console, but it involved making selections of golden boxes on a screen and had the word 'Vegas' involved somewhere (either the name of the game, or within the game itself). I knew I was just wasting time between now and when I would be able to go somewhere else, as I 'didn't want to be early' (I am not sure what I was supposed to be doing).

Scene 4: A Commercial Kitchen, which was apparently in The Two Lifeboats Hotel, Sheringham (Day)
I then went to The Two Lifeboats Hotel, where my Mum used to be the manager and chef. She was working in the kitchen, as was KL and a number of other members of staff. The kitchen was much smaller and a different shape. The stainless steel counters were in an L-shape, and then there was a small recessed area with a large fridge and some crates/boxes stacked next to it. I approached KL and we went to the back of the kitchen, beside the fridge. It was apparent that KL and I were our teenaged selves again - around the age we would have been when we both worked for my Mum. I often used to think my Mum favoured other staff over me, treating me more harshly so that she wasn't accused of nepotism. This used to annoy me. 

I told KL about seeing BS after having the dream about him. The way I described it was as if I was telling her I had predicted all the events - including their relationship breakdown and his subsequent relationship with the blonde - in the earlier dream, which led me to going to meet BS and realising the dream was true. KL then started to explaining what went wrong in the relationship to me. She was upset and angry about it, blaming BS and saying (unrecalled) things about how he had ruined her life and how she hated his new girlfriend, who she confirmed was in the year above us at school. I said I did not remember her from school and KL said: 'She was friends with the parasol lot' (I do not know what this means, but in the dream I knew it meant a particular clique). 

I then saw JGH (my ex-boyfriend's younger sister, who would be a teenager now). She was carrying an ice cream tub containing something else, which she wanted to put in the fridge. KL and I were standing in her way, just in front of where the fridge door would open. KL said to me (whispering): 'It all went wrong when she started working here, because she flirts with everyone and gets her own way'. This surprised me, because it seemed out of character for JGH. I expressed either surprise or doubt (given I lived with JGH for a number of years when she was a child/young teenager and I was in a relationship with her older brother). KL said: 'She did it all under the umbrellas, so you didn't see'. I accepted this and walked over to my Mum, who was by the stainless steel counters, where there were also some deep fat fryers.

I said to my Mum 'Can I have some shifts?' to which my Mum said: 'No'. I said: 'What about in the morning?' but she told me she already had enough employees and couldn't employ me in the kitchen. I was annoyed by this. Suddenly the kitchen looked more like the kitchen my Mum used to work in in the pub across the road, The Crown. I noticed the change within the dream itself, and wondered how I had not realised that the kitchen was a composite of 2 different pub kitchens. My Mum said: 'You can have a job doing the hotel admin, part-time'. She emphasised the 'part-time' and I noticed this. I said: 'I can't do the maths' to which my Mum said: 'No, you'll just be writing the letters'. I was pleased by this job, but wondered why my Mum's friend, CC who was the hotel secretary was no longer doing this job. I saw a vision of a filing cabinet full of paperwork which needed to be worked through, because it had been ignored and stuffed into the filing cabinet. I realised that the part-time admin job would actually be quite challenging given the amount of unreplied correspondence. 

I asked my Mum if the admin job was 'minimum wage' and she said that it would be. 

Scene 5: Earlham Road, Norwich - Dusk
The scene then immediately changed to Earlham Road, Norwich, at dusk, I had just exited the university campus and was walking in the direction of the Tescos garage. I calculated in my head that if I did at least 20 hours a week at minimum wage in the admin job for my Mum, my weekly wage would be quite lucrative and I felt pleased with myself. 

There were some more events of this dream, which I have forgotten.

Scene 6: Location Unknown - Night
I then was outside - I know I was, because the background was the night's sky, with stars shining. There were a couple of dream characters (unseen, but male and known to be involved with fashion or media somehow). We were watching a 3-dimensional hologram of my head - no body - floating in mid-air. The hologram was about 5 times bigger than my actual head and was quite faint - you could see the starry sky through it slightly. The head was rotating, slowly, and I was able to see that I had a very crooked nose - it was hooked at the top. I wondered how my nose had become so crooked, as I knew it should be straight. One of the men - both of whom were reviewing my face, for a purpose unrecalled or unclear to me - said: 'It's a Persian hook'. He said his like he admired it and thought this was attractive, which confused me, as I thought my nose now looked very ugly. The other man agreed with him. I wished my nose looked like it should (in real life), even if this meant that no-one else found me attractive anymore, or preferred the 'Persian hook nose'.

I cannot recall anything else about this dream at present, but some memories may come back to me at a later stage.

Extra Information: None of note

Recurrent Dream Themes: 

• My former childhood home at Pine Grove, Sheringham as a dreamscene location - bedroom appearing different from real life, but similar to its altered appearance in an earlier dream
• Changed appearance

Dreamsigns: 

• We were in my former childhood home, with its appearance altered in the same way it had been in a previous recent dream
• The scheme to make money from an online fruit machine game to buy cannabis
• The events surrounding BS & KL - younger selves, different biographical events, unlikely dream actions
• The false memories of a 'dream' in the dream-within-a-dream situation, which should have prompted me to reality check, since my perception of dreams/reality were confused in such a complex manner here
• The events of Scenes 2 & 3 generally
• Rooms changed in appearance, which I was able to notice within the dream
• My appearance was changed

Day Residue: 

• The day before this dream I watched an episode of Peep Show (E52 - S09E04 'Mole-Mapping') - Super Hans tells Jeremy of a 'gastropub' where he goes to clean out the fruit machines as a form of income - scenes of him playing on the fruit machine
• I had been watching the CinemaSins videos on the Star Wars series (1977 - 2015) - partially to see Ewan McGregor play Obi-Wan Kenobi in the prequel trilogy - 1999 - 2005, without having to actually watch the movies in full. Strangely, given I don't really like many movies or going to the cinema (that's why I prefer to watch movie trailers or comedy reviews), I realised I had watched the first 6 Star Wars movies in the cinema - with SL. The original trilogy was remastered and then re-released in cinemas to create excitement for the release of the prequel trilogy. The Star Wars prequels were quite confusing to me at the time (I didn't appreciate the so-bad-they-are-good way of viewing them back then), so that is quite a feat of endurance for me to have actually seen the entire series in the cinema!
• BS is a massive Star Wars fan. He is local to my home town and used to work for my Mum at the Two Lifeboats Hotel in Sheringham, as did his girlfriend, KL, who was a popular and successful girl in my year at school. BS was slightly older than KL and I, and they had been dating since they were teenagers. They have subsequently married and had 2 children - so are the precise illustration of the 'childhood sweethearts' ideal
• The day before this dream, DL and I had been discussing how there were always a select number of very attractive girls during high school and what this is like from a female/male perspective - given I had opened the conversation by saying that I blossomed into my looks fairly late in life (20s) and am considered more objectively attractive now, as an adult, than I had been as a teenager - KL was attractive as a teenager (blonde haired, blue eyed, slim)
• Just before this dream I had watched a Grav3yardgirl video on Youtube, where she tested some  chocolate-themes lip glosses
• Just before this dream, I was reading Jay Z's lyrics on the remix version Fat Joe's new track 'All the Way Up' - which are a response to wife Beyonce's Lemonade (2016) - 'You know you made it when the fact your marriage made it is worth millions / Lemonade is a popular drink and it still is / Survival of the lit-est / N****s who really up vs. n****s up in your business'
• I am currently writing a poetry collection, Cherryade, which deals with my very chaotic romantic/sexual life and the impact my relationships with men have had on my subsequent relationships with men and my own sexual identity. This involves a lot of reflection on the past, right back to my teenage years. My sexual history is the opposite to both BS/KL and also Jay Z and Beyonce's enduring marriage. In one poem I write about someone's whose profile is 'like a crescent moon' (see below)
• Several days before this dream, I wrote a review of the way dreaming was depicted in Inception (2010) - a movie about multi-level dream-within-a-dream scenarios
• The day before this dream I had asked a Facebook friend how to use a certain app on my phone, stating that I was 'useless with technology'
• The day of this dream I had been reading the comments section of an online article on Buzzfeed about things which annoy kitchen staff working in commercial kitchens. I had also referred to working in a commercial kitchen in an earlier Facebook conversation regarding my cooking ability - referred to in the Day Residue section of a recent dream
• The day before this dream I had watched a Youtube video by Grav3yardgirl, titled as a 'Storytime' where she told the story of going to a seafood restaurant and being served fries with a piece of arrow-shaped metal on one, which she described as 'deadly'
• The day before this dream I watched an episode of Peep Show (E53 - S09E05 'Kid Cave') - Jeremy breaks into Super Hans' home to search through his filing cabinet to find proof that he co-wrote the lyrics to a track which he has not been credited on, despite it being popular on Youtube
• In my game on The Sims 3 I rotated my newly-aged-up teenage daughter sim so that I could take a screenshot of her from every angle
• I described myself (metaphorically) as a planet (and used language referring to orbits and rotations) in one of my poems, the day before I had this dream

Waking Reactions: 
This was one of the hardest dreams I have ever had to record! It was so multi-layered and fascinating, and - viewed retrospectively - so highly influenced by intertwined Day Residue. This was an extremely vivid and weird dream experience, and one which had the potential to be a lucid dream, had I taken any of the multiple opportunities to reality check!

Dream 412

'Victoria Wood's Boarding House & My Pro-Choice Protest!'

Dream date: 15 April 2015

I 'woke up' from a secondary dream while in my main dream (so a 'dream within a dream'). I tried really hard to remember my secondary dream, but it was completely confusing. All I could remember was that there was a big glacial wall of some kind - a huge, textured wall made of ice/snow. I cannot remember anything else. 

I was then in a dark hotel foyer with a young Asian female (dream character), a middle-aged white female doctor (dark hair, wearing glasses) and my mum. The Asian dream character was 9 weeks pregnant and hoping to arrange an abortion because she had been raped. However, the doctor was refusing to give permission for this, which was making me very angry, because it was clear the Asian female was desperate - she was crying and begging. The doctor said: 'You can only have an abortion if you prove to me that you have been consuming alcohol'. This outraged me, because I knew the Asian female was Muslim. I told the doctor that this was discrimination - the pregnant girl could not drink alcohol because of her religion, so to make it the condition for her abortion, she was putting pressure on her to go and drink the alcohol to secure the procedure out of desperation. Plus, the rule about alcohol was a form of unequal treatment. The doctor responded by saying the female was 'too far into the pregnancy' for an abortion, which I denied, because she was only 9 weeks pregnant, which is early. The doctor agreed to examine and assess the Asian female, which made her less anxious about her situation. 

I was then aware that it was New Years Eve, although I am not sure exactly where we were - it was an interior environment and quite dark. My friend, JD was visiting, but he was acting very strangely and I put this down to the fact that he has an autistic spectrum disorder. However, he was being very unreasonable towards me, screaming at me, making sexual gestures and trying to establish physical contact which I did not want. My stepdad was present at one point and he was defending JD - and told me to go out and enjoy myself and forget what was happening. I went to the The Crown pub, in Sheringham (which looks as it does in real-life). I joined a party there, but only for a short time as it was soon time to leave. I had to walk home in the early hours of the morning in the dark.

I then found myself in a strange boarding-house which was owned by Victoria Wood. I guess it was very similar to the premise of the TV show Rising Damp (1974 - 1978). This was a very institutional looking building, with white gloss-painted doors leading to each living-quarter. The decor was shabby and old-fashioned and the lighting was poor. It did feel familiar, however and was reminiscent of 1970s style furnishing. Many different families and individuals lived in the boarding house, and all seemed to know each other - I seemed to know them as well, although I am not sure if I lived there or not. I seemed to spend a large amount of time in one particular room which was also inhabited by a middle-aged man and woman. You had to climb three steps to get to this room from one of the main corridors. At some point, I went into the bathroom with a young female dream character. It turned out that this was her family's bathroom and her mum entered - surprised to see me in there.

I must have woken up, because - in real-life - I heard my cleaner, Tony, arrive to empty the bins, which he does on a daily basis. He does a full clean on a Monday, when he also vacuums the carpets. He is usually whistling or singing while he is doing his job. After Tony left, I must have fallen asleep again.

I woke up. This was a false awakening. I did not have sleep paralysis. I got out of bed and decided to vacuum the carpet of my bedroom and hallway just outside (I would never voluntarily vacuum my carpet!) The vacuum cleaner was different to the one we have in real-life, but I did not notice this. I then stopped and got back into bed and tried to go to sleep (even though I was already asleep and in a dream!) I heard the doorbell ring and my former cleaner Rachel was at the door. I then 'realised' (in my dream, not real-life, although I thought I was awake and experiencing reality) that Tony was still downstairs. Rachel told Tony that her vacuum cleaner had broken and she needed to borrow ours (which was now downstairs, without me having to return it). Tony said she could, and I heard them getting the vacuum cleaner and having a conversation, very clearly. I then heard Tony come upstairs again. He knocked on my door, saying: '[My real name], I'm checking to see if you are alright...' He then opened my bedroom door (he would never do this in real-life) and entered my room. I was facing the wall and could not see him. He pulled my duvet off me and I was naked (I was clothed in real-life, so this should have been an indication of a false awakening). He grabbed me violently and tried to pull me out of the bed, which scared me a lot. I did nothing to retaliate. He must have failed to pull me out of the bed and decided to leave. I turned around and saw my bedroom door was open (in real-life it was shut, as I had left it). I actually woke up shortly after this. 

TIME: 05:30 - 12:00 hours (I think the first part of the dream - before the false awakening - happened before 10:30 hours and the false awakening happened just after Tony left in real-life, so between 10:30 - 11:30 hours)

LUCIDITY: None - despite the fact I usually become lucid during false awakenings and had plenty of dreamsigns

SPECIAL NOTES: I had tried to meditate on having a lucid dream before I fell asleep

Dreamsigns

• The attitude/behaviour of the doctor and fact the consultation was taking place in a hotel foyer, publicly (IA - Inner Awareness/A - Action/C - Context)
• It was New Years Eve (IA - Inner Awareness/C - Context)
• Victoria Wood owned a boarding house (IA - Inner Awareness/C - Context)
• The entire false awakening scene was a dreamsign which I missed while in the dream (IA - Inner Awareness/A - Action/F - Form/ C - Context)

Recurrent Dream Themes:

• The Crown pub in Sherngham as a dream scene (i.e. Dream 375, Dream 399 & Dream 406, plus many more)
• Strange hotels/boarding houses and being in someone else's bathroom (Dream 391).

Potential Day/Dream Residue:

• The day of this dream I read about abortion on the internet - I cannot recall the context.
• The day of this dream I had a discussion with an Australian male online and he informed me of the Halal Certification scandal and the fact that some alcohol companies had the certification on their label - which is completely ridiculous as all alcohol is haram and inappropriate for halal-only Islamic diets.
• The day of this dream I had made a comment about my only interest in cars being when it was the early hours of the morning and I need a ride home.
• DL and I were discussing 1970s-style furnishing after seeing a 1970s-style home on a 'history of food'-themed TV show where a family recreated the living conditions, cultures and diets of past decades.
• The day of this dream I had looked at an article showing pictures of people getting caught while in the process of taking 'selfies' in bathrooms. The influence here comes from the image of someone suddenly walking into a bathroom and taking you by surprise.

Waking Thoughts & Emotions:
I woke up feeling really confused by this dream. Firstly, the trying to recall the secondary dream within the primary dream was very odd and may have affected my overall logical understanding of the dream. The middle section of this dream was quite enjoyable. However, the false awakening was quite scary and I am not sure why I did not pick up on any dreamsigns and then do a reality check. I think it may be because I did not experience sleep paralysis during the false awakening, as it is usually this which acts as a trigger. Also, because the false awakening happened just after Tony had left my house in real-life - and involved me getting back into bed and trying to fall asleep again, it seemed realistic that he might in fact be downstairs, whereas some of my previous false awakenings have featured impossible nightmarish characters which cause me to question reality much sooner and successfully.

* I know I have forgotten some vital parts of this dream from the scenes prior to the false awakening (which is recalled in full detail). If I remember any of the forgotten aspects of this dream,  will record them below.

Dream 332

'The One Where I Had Sex With Johnny Depp' (Lucid Dream)

This dream happened during an afternoon nap. When I have a successful lucid dream I will detail the specific techniques or circumstances which enabled it so my readers can note which methods of induction or dream-boosting practices work best for me. This was one of the most successful DILD (Dream Induced Lucid Dream) I have ever experience, mainly because of the superior level of control I managed to exert over my dream. I was able to manipulate the dream better than I have ever been able to do in previous dreams!

Method

• 8 hour sleep, awake for 4 hours, 2 hour afternoon sleep
• MILD Technique (Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreaming - meditations and affirmations before sleep)
• Reality checks (previous days, regularly throughout the waking day)
• REM Rebound Effect (48 hours since smoked cannabis)

I started in a normal non-lucid dream. I was with another girl, who I do not recognise from real life nor recall from the dream. We were attending a meeting with her academic supervisor (a female professor) in a large office. Behind her supervisor (who was a mature woman with grey hair in a bun and a tall, slim figure), was a floor to ceiling bookshelf which was completely filled with books. My female dream character friend was enrolled on a poetry course and this is what she was discussing with her supervisor. While the discussions were taking place, I was looking at the contents of the bookshelf, from my position, seated in front of the supervisor's desk. I saw that on one of the lower shelves was a book (on poetry, I think) which belonged to me. When the supervisory meeting was over, the supervisor left, I retrieved my poetry book. My writing was on the front cover and pages inside the book (I did not read what was written). I felt justified in taking the book. My female friend and I stood at the side of the room and debated whether it was right for me to take the book without asking, and I was arguing that it was OK.

I then woke up in bed. My laptop was on top of the duvet (on my stomach) and the screen was detached/broken. There was also an orange on the bed. This alerted me to the fact that this was a false awakening. I was not suffering from sleep paralysis and could move easily. I felt excited and decided to quickly get out of bed and try and lucid dream. I got out of bed easily. I found that my bedroom looked different. Where my desk usually is, there was a tall wooden wardrobe, and where my wardrobe and cupboard should be, there was just a larger than normal blank wall. I opened the wardrobe door and saw a white plastic shopping bag on the shelf. This was the only item in the wardrobe. I wanted to look inside the bag, but was worried that there might be something nasty in it, so I asked myself for an object with which to touch the bag (so I did not need to use my hand). Suddenly, I had a hammer in my hand. I decided to smash the bag with the hammer, and I could tell that there was an object in the bag, but it wasn't moving and felt solid. I decided to just look in the bag, as if there was something alive in there, it would now be dead because of the hammer blows. Inside the bag was simply a white box. I was distracted from looking in the box, because the door to my bedroom was opened. I looked up to see who was coming in, and noticed that the wall beside the door (where my wardrobe and cupboard would normally be) was covered in green graffiti. LM (a boy from my school) entered the room. He wanted to have sex with me and pushed me onto the floor. I was laying on the floor and said: 'NO!' forcefully, pushing him away. He disappeared. I fell back asleep into a normal dream.

In the normal dream, I was then standing in the back courtyard of the Two Lifeboats Hotel, the pub my mum used to manage. I was outside a seafront house which is attached to the pub and in which I used to live for a couple of years when I was very young. It was dark, and instead of a narrow concrete path, there was now a wide road with trees lining it. I instantly realised that this was not what I would expect to see in real life, and became lucid again. As soon as I became lucid a group of young men on bikes started cycling towards me. I felt in danger and knew they had bad intentions, so wished that I had a weapon. A handgun appeared in my hand and I started firing it at the men on bikes, which caused them to disappear, although the one at the front of the group just fell off his bike into the road.

I woke up again. I thought I was really awake and looked at my mobile phone to see what the time was (I had an alarm set for 16:00 hours). The clock said it was 19:00 hours and therefore I realised I was asleep and dreaming, this being another false awakening (because I did not hear my alarm and I was expecting a guest at 18:30 hours, so I knew I would have been awoken before 19:00 hours by the phone/doorbell). I then decided that I should get out of bed again and try and have another lucid dream. As soon as I thought this, I saw a man standing beside my bed, with his trousers undone, and his erect penis pointed towards my head as if he wanted me to give him oral sex. I wanted to get out of the situation, but then I looked up and saw it was Johnny Depp! He said to me: 'We can get married and start a family if you want...' I said: 'What about Amber Heard?' [his supposed girlfriend] to which he replied: 'I broke up with her because my children and Vanessa [Paradis, former partner and mother of his two children] didn't like her'. I was really happy that Johnny wanted to be with me and we started having sex almost immediately (missionary position), which created a feeling of sexual excitement (although I did not orgasm, so not quite a wet dream!). However, after a while, this feeling began to fade and it seemed like we had stopped having sex prematurely. The dream started to fade around the edges and grow fuzzy (a sign I was waking up and needed to use a lucid dream stabilisation technique). I started shouting 'CLARITY NOW!' and my vision cleared and I was again, fully lucid within the dream. I felt overjoyed it worked! Johnny said to me: 'I can't find your vagina!' which worried me, and I reached down and touched between my thighs and noticed that I did not have a vagina, which made me panic (as I had a normal vagina just moments earlier, before I started losing lucidity). I wished for my vagina to return, but it didn't and I asked myself how I could figure out how to control this aspect of the dream (because I wanted to continue to have sex with Johnny!) 

Suddenly, I found myself in front of a woman (non-descript - middle aged, medium build, brown hair, plain clothing) who was standing in front of a display. On the display was a model of a woman's vagina and a woman's torso, with bear breasts. These were both similar to the kind of models used for medical students and were purplish in colour, and seemed to be the texture of human skin, although I knew that they were not real. The woman said: 'What can I do for you?' and I was aware that she practiced witchcraft, although I am not sure how I knew this. I said: 'I've lost my vagina and want to get it back!' The woman said: 'You're lucid dreaming right now and in lucid dreams the breasts are just folds of fat but they are one-dimensional and can't be held and the vagina is a box with no lid'. I looked at the models and the 'vagina' was actually just a smooth surface (like the crotch of a Barbie doll, without detail) and the breasts were square and both one-dimensional and three-dimensional at the same time. The woman started flicking the breasts with her hands, but when I reached out to touch them, my hand just went straight through them and there was nothing there, although I could clearly see them! The woman said: 'If you can get back to Johnny, your vagina will be intact again'. I wished myself back to my bedroom and found I was standing in the middle of the room. Johnny was still there, now wearing sunglasses. His hair looked greasy and was falling around his face. He was wearing a checked shirt open over a brown T-shirt and baggy blue jeans. The dream started to fade again and go fuzzy around the edges, so I used the same lucid dream stabilisation technique as before, saying: 'CLARITY NOW!' This worked perfectly again. I then found myself kneeling down on the floor beside my bed while Johnny had sex with me doggy-style. I thought I might orgasm, but Johnny finished before I could. He then said: 'We could have a baby together!' which was a thought which didn't distress me too much! He said we needed to go and do something (he was being secretive and would not tell me what) and said: 'Afterwards, we can go and elope', so I was happy to join him on his secret mission. We left my bedroom and started walking down a staircase which was very dark and looked like those you find in council towerblocks. At the bottom of the steps was a brick wall. Johnny had something in his hand, which he rested against the wall (so he could write on it) - it was a small brown picture, although I could not really see what it was of, because it was so old and faded. Johnny was signing it. I asked what he was doing and he said: 'Forging some art'. The dream then started to go fuzzy and faded again and I could feel myself waking up. I said: 'CLARITY NOW!' but the fading/fuzziness continued. Desperately, before I woke up, I tried to say to Johnny: 'Johnny tell me something about myself I don't know!' (because I am aiming to ask a dream character something about me as a person to see what my subconscious will answer!) but it was too late. I woke up in my bed and performed a reality check and looked at my phone. It was 15:58 hours and I found I was really awake!

An Introduction to False Awakenings & Dreams Within a Dream

'All that we see or seem, but a dream within a dream'

- Edgar Allen Poe, A Dream Within a Dream (1849)

I previously wrote an introductory article on Sleep Paralysis, but since I had a rather scary series of false awakenings (and dreams within a dream), I thought I should continue my investigation into this topic.

A false awakening is an extremely vivid and convincing dream about awakening from sleep, which feels completely realistic at first. However, the dreamer is still asleep, but not immediately aware of this. During the false awakening, the dreamer may experience sleep paralysis, or alternatively, dream that they are performing routine activities, such as getting out of bed, dressing or washing. A particular subset of false awakenings, i.e. those in which the dreamer has awakened from a dream, are known as a dream within a dream or a double dream. This phenomenon is the subject of Nikolai Gogol's The Portrait (1835).

It is common for a false awakening to follow a non-lucid or lucid dream and especially in circumstances in which the dreamer's false awakening follows a lucid dream, it may become a pre-lucid dream, where the dreamer questions whether they are actually awake or still asleep and dreaming. The term pre-lucid dream was first referred to by Celia Green in Lucid Dreams (1968). Such experiences are predominant in dreamers who intentionally cultivate lucid dreams - indeed, my false awakening and multiple dreams within a dream followed an attempt to incubate lucidity the same evening I attended a lucid dreaming group in the city. 

In a study by Deidre Barrett, 'Flying dreams, false awakenings and lucidity: An empirical study of their relationship' (1991) Dreaming: Journal of the Association for the Study of Dreams 1(2), 200 subjects (2,000 dreams) were analysed and it was found that lucidity and false awakenings were more likely to occur within the same dream or within different dreams of the same night. False awakenings often precede lucid dreams, acting as a cue (particularly where the experienced lucid dreamer performs a reality check), but could also follow the onset of lucidity, leading to the loss of lucidity. 

Another type of false awakening occurs in a continuum - the dreamer falls asleep in real life, but in the following dream, the brain is stimulated in a way that occurs when the dreamer is still awake, making the them mistakenly believe they are still awake. During this type of false awakening, the dreamer may perform waking activities unknowingly. This is the type of dream popularised in the movie, A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). This phenomenon is often linked to sleep walking or the carrying out of activities in a state of unconsciousness. 

During the false awakening experience, certain aspects of the dreamer's world may be dramatised or appear changed and out of place - details of their environment or person may be wrong and they may experience difficulties in movement, speech or reading - see C Green & C McCreery, Lucid Dreaming: The Paradox of Consciousness During Sleep (1994). In some situations, the dreamers senses may be heightened or changed and the dreamer experiences a mixture of reality and unreality which may be confusing or anxiety-provoking. 

As the mind continues dreaming after the false awakening, there may be multiple false awakenings within the same dream, a subset of the false awakening phenomenon characterised by the repetition of the experience. The philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970) claims to have experiences a succession of about 100 false awakenings when coming round from an anaesthetic - see B Russel, Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits (1948). The phenomenon has been referred to in popular culture, for example, an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants; the movie Night of the Dead (1945); the first volume of Neil Gaiman's graphic novel The Sandman (1989); Joan Baez's The Dream Song (1992); the animated film, Waking Life (2001); Inception (2010); and Doctor Who episodes, 'Amy's Choice' (2010) and 'Listen' (2014).

Celia Green has stated that it is important to differentiate between two types of false awakening:

Type 1

Type 1 is the most common form of false awakening, in which the dreamer feels like they have woken up, but find themselves in unrealistic surroundings - i.e. not their own bedroom, or a familiar room which appears to be different in appearance. This is often a form of pre-lucid dream - usually the dreamer will believe they have awoken, and then actually wake up in their bed or fall back into a normal dream sleep. Another very common form of false awakening is the 'late for work/school' variety in which the dreamer awakens in a typical room, which appears normal, and then realises that they have overslept and missed the start of work/school. If the dreamer looks at a clock, they will find that the time confirms that they are late, although the resultant panic is strong enough to jar them awake for real (similar to awakening from a nightmare). This type of false awakening may also result in bed-wetting because during the false awakening, the dreamer has performed normal every day tasks which they would usually do after getting up in the morning, such as urinating, erroneously believing that they are using a toilet.

Type 2

Type 2 false awakenings are much less common. The dreamer wakes up in a normal manner, but there is an atmosphere of suspense. The environment appears typical and realistic at first, but they gradually become aware that something is odd or uncanny in the atmosphere and may experience unusual sounds and movements. The dreamer may wake suddenly in a stressed and 'stormy' atmosphere with feelings of apprehension and fear. This experience is often very confusing and akin to a nightmare.

Charles McCreery analysed the phenomenon in C McCreery, 'Hallucinations and arousability: Pointers to a theory of psychosis' in G Claridge, Schizotypy, Implications for Illness and Health (1997) where he claimed that there was similarity between this type of false awakening and the 'primary delusionary experience' described by German psychiatrist and philosopher, Karl Jaspers (1883 - 1969) in General Psychopathology (1923), where the author stated that patients notice that something is uncanny or suspicious and everything takes on a new meaning. Perception remains unaltered, but there is a change which envelops everything in a subtle, pervasive and uncertain light, creating a sense of tension, and discomfort. McCreery suggest that this similarity is not coincidental, because both Type 2 false awakenings and primary delusionary experiences are both forms of sleep disorder. He states that primary delusionary experiences - like other forms of psychosis such as hallucinations, and secondary (or specific) delusions, represent an intrusion of stage 1 sleep processes into waking consciousness. Some argue that the reason for these intrusions may be that the psychotic subject is in a state of hyper-arousal, which psychiatrist and sleep researcher Ian Oswald (1929 - 2012) refers to as a a waking 'micro-sleep'.

The concept of a dream within a dream (i.e. a portion of one dream enacted within the envelope of another) has been studied intensively by sleep and dream researchers. Sigmund Freud emphasised the function of a piece of reality being inserted into the dream within a dream in an attempt to obliterate it and deprive it of its significance, although he did not delve further into the opportunity for the dream researched to explore the dynamic relationship between the two dual fragments of the discreet and segmented dream narrative and the possibility of multiple meanings of the illusion. The Psychoanalytic Theory of dreaming has been applied to the dream within a dream phenomenon in the published study, EJ Mahon, 'Dreams within Dreams' (2002) Psychoanal Study Child 57.

Dream 303 - Worst False Awakening I've Ever Experienced

6 Level False Awakening

Yesterday, I attended my first meeting of the Exploring Lucid Dreaming in Norwich Group and as a result of setting a personal goal of having a lucid dream and using it to ask a dream character something about myself, incubated an intention to experience lucidity in a dream, performing my usual reality checks. I went to bed early (for me).

(1) I woke up and my laptop was on my bed, on my chest/stomach area. It was playing a Kendra Wilkinson sex tape. In the video, Wilkinson was laying on a beach and someone was inserting a bicycle pump into various holes which had been cut into her body, while she was masturbating. I had my own hand down my trousers, touching myself.

* Note in real life, Wilkinson has been confirmed as a contestant on the ITV show, I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here and this week reports re-emerged that many years ago she had made a sex tape which has been leaked. I did not consciously know about the sex tape and had not seen the recent news articles, certainly not yesterday or the say before, when I hadn't used the internet or seen/read any news (I discovered the news about the sex tape by Googling it now).

I realised immediately that I was asleep and this was a false awakening, because (a) I wouldn't have my laptop on me while I was in bed asleep; (b) I wouldn't watch a celebrity sex tape; and (c) I wouldn't touch myself while watching Kendra Wilkinson or any other celebrity making amateur porn, especially not when there is blood/gore and bicycle pumps. I did not need to reality check. I decided to change to Youtube and see what video started playing. I didn't even need to type in the URL, as immediately upon thinking about changing the image on the screen, a movie/TV show started playing. It was a drama about a young man and his girlfriend who ran a bar in America. The woman befriended another young, attractive girl and invited her to the bar to hang out with her and her boyfriend. This backfired on the girlfriend, because the new girl got completely drunk on spirits while at the bar (which was crowded with patrons) and then stripped off and started dancing in her underwear, attracting the attention and admiration of the boyfriend, who decided to cheat on the girlfriend with the new girl. I found this movie/show quite boring, so I moved my laptop and placed in back on my set of drawers at the end of the bed (where it usually sits and where it was in real life at this time). I then felt something alien moving around in my stomach, trying to push its way out through my belly button and I felt scared, and so tried to go to sleep.

(2) I woke up again. Something felt odd, so I performed a reality check and found that my right hand was the back of an old school 1990s Nintendo Gameboy. I realised I was in another false awakening. I saw lots of very small red demons floating in the air, in a diagonal line, above my bed. I reached out to try and swipe them away with my hand, but my hand went through them as if they were holograms. I felt a little bit anxious and tried to wake up properly, but instead just went back to sleep.

(3) I woke up again and saw that a coat hanger with a white T-shirt was floating in the room, near my desk/chair. It was being shaken. I felt even more scared because the third false awakening in a row. I tried to wake up, and felt a little bit relieved that on no occasion did I have sleep paralysis which would have made the experience worse.

(4) I woke up again, this time, seeing that the white T-shirt was in fact a white carrier bag from my university shop, which was upright on the desk (in real-life, the only white thing on or near my desk is a white bath towel which is draped over the back of my desk chair). I heard someone moving around downstairs and just knew it couldn't be my housemate, BG. I then heard someone whispering my name in a voice which was neither distinguishably male or female. I desperately wanted to wake up and so started screaming: 'Help, help, help!' hoping that my housemate would hear me in my sleep and come and bang on my door to see what was wrong so I would wake up. Nothing happened and I knew that I wasn't making any actual noise, it was just in my dream. I tried even harder to scream at the top of my lungs (it seemed very loud to me) and even hoped that my neighbours, SC and DB might hear me through the walls. Nothing happened again. I started jumping up and down on my bed, hoping this might wake me up and I felt paranoid that I was stuck in this series of false awakenings. 

(5) I then 'fell back' onto my bed, and woke up with a start - in my fifth false awakening. It was if I 'landed' in my own bed and the jolt of landing 'woke' me, but I knew I was still asleep, because the strange voice was still repeatedly whispering my name and now I could hear heavy footsteps on the stairs (which run parallel to the wall beside my bed). I then heard a noise which sounded exactly like someone using a broom to sweep the carpet behind my bed (I sleep at the foot of my bed so I can face my drawers and watch my laptop in bed, so the 'top' (head end) of my bed is a foot away from my bedroom door, facing away from it. I turned around and I could see nothing which would be making this noise, but blue mist was rising from the floor. I felt so panicked that I thought I might hyperventilate and was so confused as to why I was experiencing so many false awakenings, one after the other, with no escape. I pushed myself out of the bed and fell on the floor, landing hard.

(6) I woke up with a jolt in my bed again - in the sixth false awakening. I could still hear the sound of a broom sweeping the carpet behind me. I actually thought I would be trapped in this false awakening situation forever at this point, because I was so out of control of the experience. I didn't dare get out of bed to investigate because I didn't want to 'meet' the thing/person who had come into my house and walked up the stairs, as I was sure it/they were lurking outside my bedroom door, waiting for me to do this. I had no belief in my power to control the experience, as so far every attempt to end the terror had failed. I tried to go back to sleep.

I woke up and I was really awake. I did a reality check to confirm this and saw my laptop was on the screen which had been open when I fell asleep in real life and that the white towel was on the back of the chair. There was nothing odd, but I decided to check my mobile to see the time - it was 6:23 am - so I had been asleep for roughly 5 hours. I then wanted to distract myself, so I logged onto Facebook to shake away the fear which I was left with. The fear came from the fact I was lucid and consciously aware that I was in a false awakening state throughout, but could not leave or control the experience.

Dream 291

'Kidnapping and Drugs'
Dream date: 31 October 2014 (afternoon nap)

This was my most successful lucid dream to date because I managed to control the actions of my dream characters and also stabilise the dream really well, using standard techniques. I also entered the dream in a lucid state rather than becoming lucid during a normal dream, which is my usual experience. I wish I hadn't wasted this lucid dream doing stupid things which weren't as enjoyable or exciting as they could have been, but I see this as a good practice dream for next time I experience lucidity. 

I was in a normal dream, which I can hardly recall, other than the fact that I was in a big car park at night and I was standing in front of a big, square white building which did not have any windows or doors that I could see. I woke up. This was a false awakening, although I did not realise it at the time - my bedroom looked the same as it had when I went to sleep, except it was completely dark with no light and my laptop screen was not on - which it had been when I fell asleep. I later discovered this was a false awakening, as during this stage of the dream process, I looked at my mobile phone (on which an alarm was set for 5:00 pm as I needed to wake from my nap to get ready to go out in real-life). My alarm said 9:00 pm (which I accepted, but wondered why my alarm had not gone off). I fell back asleep. 

I am not sure if I had another normal dream during this period of sleep. I woke up again. This time I was really awake. I looked at my mobile phone and discovered it was 4:00 pm. It wasn't very dark - it was normal light outside for this time of the day. My laptop screen was on as expected. I decided that I should try and enter another dream for the final hour of my sleep (using my natural waking as a spontaneous Wake-Back-To-Bed method). As I drifted back to sleep, I thought about the dark car park and the big square white building, visualising them and telling myself that I would revisit this dream. I entered a dream state, lucid. I instantly knew I was in a dream. I was in the car park, standing at the corner of the white building. It was still night. I discovered that I was naked, with just a duvet wrapped around me. I found this annoying as it hindered my movement, so I told myself that I should get dressed properly - and discovered that I was wearing the black strapless sundress that I was wearing in real-life at this time. I walked around the building and saw a bench at the edge of the empty car park. There was a family of four adults and a small, dark-haired female child (aged approximately 2 - 3 years) being carried by a brunette female. I did not know or recognise any of the dream characters - they were all strangers to me. The adults were bending over the bench, packing some clothing into holdall bags (white and blue) I walked over to them and decided to be antagonise them in some way to see if I could start an argument. I said: 'You've kidnapped my daughter!' to the adults. The female adult carrying the child said: 'no, it's my daughter!' I stood my ground and said; 'No, I'm her mummy!' The child looked at me and then reached out her arms, crying and screaming: 'Mummy! Mummy!' I felt really pleased that I was able to convince the child that I was her real mother. I shouted: 'Kidnap!' A male adult, a middle-aged man with grey hair, wearing a navy blue jumper and brown trousers (the husband of the brunette woman carrying the child) said: 'We're sorry, we;re sorry, we're sorry!' He looked very anxious and scared - as if he was really being accused of kidnapping a child. I said: 'I want my daughter back!' to which he responded 'Yes, you can take her back!' The child was still reaching and calling out for me. The grey-haired male said: 'I will leave this lot and come with you and the child'. To further play with this family and antagonise them, I said: 'You better divorce your wife then!' He was nodding very fast. I walked away from the family, with the grey-haired male (I'll call him 'Dream Husband' for ease) following me. I left the child with the brunette 'Dream Wife' character and the other two adult dream characters. I went to the other side of the car park. I said to the Dream Husband: 'Give me some drugs' and he agreed that he would do whatever I wanted. I asked him to put a line of cocaine on the back of my hand. I do not use cocaine or any other Class A drugs, because I am worried about addiction, can't afford them and don't want to ruin my health - however, in my lucid state I realised that I could safely experiment with any substance I wanted to and wondered if I would experience a realistic altered state. The Dream Husband placed a bump of cocaine on the back of my outstretched hand. I sniffed it up, without the use of a banknote or other implement used to take drugs in this way. I felt a momentary buzzing sensation which was pleasant and intense. It quickly faded and I realised I did not much like the sensation of taking cocaine. I do know (from real-life) that I like smoking cannabis, so I asked him to roll me a spliff. He used his mouth (no hands) to roll me a blunt, using a cigar skin or blunt wrap. He took it from his mouth and passed it to me, already lit. I started smoking the blunt and felt the effects. I said: 'So you do whatever I tell you?' to which he agreed. I said I wanted to leave the car park and he would have to drive me. I asked him to get the holdalls which his family had been packing and my daughter. He asked if we could leave the child behind. I said: 'No, I want her now. You aren't my husband or boyfriend, you're just a servant'. He agreed that he would go and get the child (who was still across the other side of the car park with the rest of the family). I then told the Dream Husband that he looked like James Franco and he transformed halfway to looking like James Franco, but still middle-aged and much larger in height and weight. I then realised I was going to wake up. The Dream Husband/James Franco was blurring and distorting in front of my eyes as if my vision was going hazy. I tried to stabilise the dream, remain asleep and maintain my lucidity by shaking my hands very frantically. I felt some kind of air resistance as I shook my hands - it felt as if I was moving them in jelly. Gradually, my vision improved and the Dream Husband came back into clear view in front of me. I said: 'Take me to DL then' and the Dream Husband ran off to get my child, the bags and bring his car over to where I was standing. I waited for a moment, but then woke up.

This was a false awakening. I know this, because again, my room was pitch black and when I looked at my mobile phone to check the time it was 8:00 pm. I drifted back to sleep, but cannot recall any further dreams. I woke up properly at 5:00 pm when my alarm clock went off as planned.

Dreams 267 - 272

Dream 267

'Ice Skating on the Surface of Jupiter'

Dream date: 23 July 2014

I was with an unseen person - we were being instructed to ice skate on the surface of Jupiter. I am not sure who was asking us to perform this task - I could not see the other people in this dream. We would be sent into space and then our craft/rocket would hover several feet away from the surface of the planet and we would jump down onto the surface and perform the ice skating. I felt apprehensive because Jupiter is a gas giant. I wondered why we weren't being asked to ice skate on Mars, which has a rocky surface. I then realised that Mars was closer to the sun in this solar system - it was the third planet, having swapped places with Earth - and therefore was too hot for ice skating. I wondered if the surface of Mars could be artificially cooled. However, I ended up being taken into space and looking down, could see the universe around me and Jupiter below. I leapt downwards with my colleague, and we landed on Jupiter and began ice skating. The next thing I recall was being returned to Earth, where my ice skating success was being praised and celebrated.

I then found myself at night, in an outside location. I was with two other unseen persons and it transpired that we were part of a coach trip, about to leave for home. The coach was parked in a space at the centre of some non-descript buildings, waiting for all the passengers on the tour to arrive before setting off. An Asian male (unfamiliar in the dream and in real-life) took a large machete and started waving it at me aggressively, provoking me to fight with him. I picked up a large stick and we began fighting. I felt the machete connect with my face and touched the skin just below my left eye and found that it was bleeding from an open wound. The Asian male and I continued fighting - it was a little like a jousting match or a sword fight. I managed to get away from him and found myself in an outside concrete toilet block, where other females from the same tour were using the facilities. I stood outside the toilet cubicles, by the wash basins. A young blonde female entered and began to give me some abuse. I punched her once, in the stomach. She fell to the floor. One of my unseen friends told me we should leave quickly. I wanted to get on the coach, but was convinced that the police would arrive soon so it was better for me to go into hiding. We ran around the block and crouched down in some bushes, a short distance away. My friend was telling me that we should go on the run, but I was worried about getting home and didn't want to miss the coach. I thought we might be in Ipswich or Peterborough - and wanted to return to Norwich. Without getting on the coach, I could not think of another way of getting home. We heard police sirens. I decided to return to the coach and hand myself in - I assumed I would be charged with GBH. I then realised that the female I had attacked was dead and I was responsible for her murder. As I approached the coach I was informed (I am not sure how) that the dead female had previously killed or attacked a member of the Government with a fire iron/poker and therefore the authorities were glad she was now dead. I was able to get on the coach to return home, without being arrested. 

Dream 268

'The Horse Accident'

Dream date: 27 July 2014

It was daylight and it seemed as if I were in Egypt - I was in a sandy yellow dessert in blazing hot sunshine. There was a large pyramid, but instead of having flat sides, it was like a 'ziggurat' structure (like some of the student accommodation on my university campus) - whereby the sides were stepped terraces, with successive receding levels/stories. On these receding levels, were benches made from the same material as the pyramids, which were bright yellow. It was very hot and sunny. I was mid-way up one of these pyramids, holding an iPad up to the sun. I felt calm and serene. There were people on the levels above and below me, but I did not pay attention to them. I felt as if I was on holiday. The scene changed and I saw SJ/LW (a composite character, not sure which of the two persons I know in real-life was represented) with a newborn baby laying by her side, swaddled in a white blanket. I could only see SJ/LWW's torso and she was wearing a cropped top exposing a very slim waist and a belly button piercing.

The scene changed again and I was now in an outside environment and it was daylight. There was a very green leafy hedge in front of me and I think that there was an (unseen) person to my side. Behind the hedge was a brick wall. I saw a young female horse rider on horseback. The horse jumped the bush/hedge and crashed into the wall, falling on the ground. The young girl's arm appeared to have been skinned - the skin was peeling away, revealing the red flesh and blood underneath. She held this injured arm in the air as she and her horse lay in a crumpled heap on the grass. It seemed to me that the girl and her horse looked more like animations than actual persons. The horse was laughing hysterically. 

Dream 269

'Multiple False Awakening'

Dream date: 30 July 2014

I had really bad toothache so I decided to take an afternoon nap. I found myself sitting in bed, smoking a cigarette, having just woken up again from the nap. I was by myself. I realised that this must be a false awakening as I did not have any cigarettes in real-life. I was too tired to try and have a lucid dream, so I laid down and tried to get back to sleep properly. I woke up again. I thought I was really awake this time. However, I then found that I was totally paralysed. I tried to scream, but my voice was less than a whisper and no matter how hard I tried, I could not make any noise come out at all. I went back to sleep. I woke up again - still paralysed, still unable to emit any kind of noise. I kept trying and trying to call for help and felt scared. I heard DL (from another room) shout through to me: 'stop screaming!' which confused me further. I wondered if I really was actually awake and screaming, I must have fallen back asleep again, as I woke up to find DL standing over me. He assaulted me by stamping on my legs. I felt the sensation of pain. I woke up, this time for real.

Dream 270

'Bad Noses & Blue Eyes'

Dream date: 29 July 2014

I was seated in a classroom, doing something related to learning/education, although this part of the dream is very vague. There was some kind of fish dish being served in the school/college. I then found myself and DL in my bedroom. We were watching something on the internet, which involved a girl talking to a camera in a room with others in the background. The girl was either JG (a young female) or KD (a lawyer) - she had a blonde bobbed hairstyle and a very strange nose that looked like a large concrete triangle, taking up much of her face. I made some criticism of her looks - most likely about her unusual nose. It was so distracting - it looked both triangular and crooked, like the beak of a parrot, about three times larger than an average human nose, and very prominent/angular. DL said he thought the girl was beautiful 'because she has blue eyes'. He then went on to list other women who he considered beautiful because they had blue eyes. I felt annoyed and jealous, because I have dark brown eyes that usually get me a lot of compliments. I asked him if blue eyes were more attractive than brown ones and he said: 'yes, blue eyes represent female'. I attacked him and physically assaulted him, pushing him against the wall. I told him not to look at my eyes again.

The scene changed and I was in a supermarket, with JGH. JGH did not have the concrete triangle nose at this point. CJS was queuing and suddenly there was a panic, with other shoppers and  supermarket workers standing around. I walked over to CJS, who was laying on the floor, wearing a nurse's outfit. This section of the supermarket, which was by the tills, was actually outside in bright sunshine. Someone (unfamiliar, unrecalled) came over with a huge syringe, squirting liquid into the air. JGH started screaming. I said: 'they'll inject her better', which is what happened, as CJS then rose to her feet and seemed in better health for having the injection. 

Dream 271

'Consciously Reliving my Life from Age 10'

Dream date: 31 July 2014

I was in a classroom when I realised that I had travelled back in time and was reliving the period of my life when my mum first moved in with my stepdad and I lived with my stepbrother (the same age as myself, but in the year above me at school). My stepbrother and I started discussing this and decided that instead of falling out and arguing (as we did in real-life for many years) we should use our hindsight (we had full adult knowledge and memories, although we had returned to the point in our childhoods where we were about 10 years of age) to actually get on and be friendly with one another. I felt sceptical however and worried about my stepbrother taking advantage of our new childhood friendship. Whilst in the classroom, Gwyneth Paltrow took a seat next to me at a long table where all the pupils were seated. I realised she had travelled back in time also - she was her normal adult self, but was now part of my relived childhood. I thought: 'oh just like in that movie she starred in' and remembered this as being The Talented Mr Ripley. Gwyneth was rocking backwards and forwards in her chair. I thought: 'this dream will make an excellent novel' and kept having this recurrent thought throughout the dream. I then became aware that our former family dog, Kelli, had died (we got Kelli as a puppy around the time that my stepbrother and I were 10 or 11 years old and she died many years later of heart problems). I kept asking my mum how this happened, but she wouldn't tell me. Behind her were two identical square white wooden boxes - which looked exactly like small coffins. I begged my mum to tell me what happened to Kelli. She said Kelli had been hit by a car and severed in two, hence the need for two coffins. I felt devastated. I saw my stepbrother lounging in an arm chair and he made a strange face at me. I felt I should get away from him as I had no idea what his intentions were, but had a strange feeling that something bad might happen to me.

Dream 272

'Deforming Puppies'

Dream date: 31 July 2014

I was excited as a huge litter of puppies had just been born. I was with DL, standing in a large, white, open room. He was picking up each puppy - with was either a Staffordshire bull terrier or a pitbull terrier - and using some kind of metal device to cut off one of their back legs. The puppies were then placed on the floor, where they tried to walk on three legs, but ended up bent round, with their head trailing on the floor as they looked backwards and down at their missing legs. I was hysterical, screaming at DL to stop the cruelty, but he just laughed and said: 'tripods!' The dogs looked to be suffering in great pain and I was very anxious about their welfare. DL was gathering them up to put them on a plane, where they would be flown abroad for sale. All I could do was loo on, helpless.