Hey all,
A friend of mine pointed me to this site in hopes it would help with a fairly tough "funk" I've been in for the last week or so.
I was raped by a guy in my class 20 years ago (I'm 34 now). I've been through hell and back, tried therapy, counseling, etc. For the most part, I think of myself as a survivor and have been able to move on with most aspects of my life. I am married with four wonderful children.
My biggest difficulty is with nightmares and night terrors. I relive the entire experience through vivid dreams. I often shake violently and if it weren't for my wonderful wife would probably injur myself.
Does anyone have any suggestions/advice/real help for dealing with the nightmares? Like I said, I've tried therapy, etc. and nothing has worked. My latest bout has me experiencing the dreams as many as 6 times a night. I've slept a total of 7 hours in the past four days, partly because of being woken up during the nightmares and partly because of a fear to go back to sleep.
Thanks for anything you can pass along.
lars

Welcome Lars,

You have come to the right place.

Lots of hope and help on this site.

I used to have nightmares all of time. What has helped me was and is still, going to sleep watching color christmas lights on my wall (non-blinking) of my bedroom to calm me down and the colors relax me.

Also it helps to orient me to where i am if i wake up feeling scared.

I also cling to my teddy at night to get me to sleep.

Just some thoughts. I am sure others here have other ways.

Take Care, Jim

welcome to MS Lars

I'm glad your friend led you here and I hope that you'll find much healing here

when my dreams were at their worst I kept a dream journal in which I would write every bit of detail that I could remember from the dream down in - and then after I was done dreaming I would say out loud to myself in an authoritive tone before going back to sleep "I do not need to dream this dream again because I have written it down" - sure, I still had repetitive dreams - but after a while they did slow down

I hate to ask this, I'm almost afraid of the answer: do they ever go away?

Lars,

I can't say they will go away totaly because they hav'nt for me - but... what I can say (in my own experience only) is that the frequency has dropped and the intensity of the dreams has dropped dramaticaly over time

Lars - I'm not a therapist, but I've read that EMDR therapy has been effective treatment for traumatic events for some people, according to peer-reviewed research. I don't know if that was part of your therapy or if you've heard of it. If not, EMDR (according to Wiki) stands for Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) and is a form of psychotherapy that was developed to resolve symptoms resulting from disturbing and unresolved life experiences. It uses a structured approach to address past, present, and future aspects of disturbing memories. The approach was developed by Francine Shapiro to resolve the development of trauma-related disorders as resulting from exposure to a traumatic or distressing event, such as rape.

I wish you the best in your journey. I honor your courage.

m

Hey Lars,

Welcome to MS, you are amongst friends here.

Lars,

EMDR has helped me immensely.

I have already posted my results several times, so I will just provide you with links to them.

http://www.malesurvivor.org/board/ubbthr...1373#Post211373

http://www.malesurvivor.org/board/ubbthr...6150#Post256150

http://www.malesurvivor.org/board/ubbthr...3231#Post253231

Let me know if you have any questions.

Allen

pufferfish

Thanks for the tips on EMDR. I'll look more into that.
I actually slept halfway decent last night, only two nightmares, which is quite an improvement over the rest of the past week.
Allen, thanks for the links, I read each one over and will try visiting with my doc.

Lars