Dreams causing real injuries?

[zapatos]

33 minutes ago, Wheniwasakid said:

If I had to give my best guess, I would have to say my brain did it.

Why would you guess your brain did it? What mechanism of the brain could cause relatively deep wounds to the skin? 

 

[Wheniwasakid]

2 hours ago, zapatos said:

Why would you guess your brain did it? What mechanism of the brain could cause relatively deep wounds to the skin? 

 

Because I haven't found another explanation..  Again, that's why I'm here, looking for answers.

[Strange]

5 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

Well it may not sound reasonable but my recollection is very clear. Also, I didn't mention that the scars lasted a few years and I also didnt mention how deep the wounds were. They were slightly more than superficial but deep enough to leave scar tissue for 2-3years. 

Your recollection may be very clear but it may not be accurate. Memories are very, very plastic. Each time you recall the event you change slightly what you remember. Especially in the case of traumatic events (having nightmares after seeing a horror film, for example.)

What you now remember will have been influenced by the fact that you decided (at some time) that the injuries may have been caused by your dream. With no objective evidence available as to the nature or seriousness of the wounds it is not possible for anyone to explain what happened. 

Also, scars are permanent. They do not disappear after a few years.

[Phi for All]

10 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

I believe it's too coincidental that my brother attacked me on the night of my nightmare.

I believe whatever caused the wound caused the nightmare. No coincidence at all. It's amazing the way the brain can weave real life into what's happening in dreams.

[Wheniwasakid]

All scars aren't permanent 🤣 where did you come up with that?

1 hour ago, Phi for All said:

I believe whatever caused the wound caused the nightmare. No coincidence at all. It's amazing the way the brain can weave real life into what's happening in dreams.

Understandable. Might explain why the dream was very short. I also used to have deja vu from recollection of my dreams. Unrelated but just shows there's a lot more we dont know.

[Strange]

11 minutes ago, Wheniwasakid said:

All scars aren't permanent 🤣 where did you come up with that?

Pretty much every single medical website. For example:

Quote

Although scars are permanent, they can fade over a period of up to two years. It's unlikely they'll fade any more after this time.

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/scars/

[Phi for All]

17 minutes ago, Wheniwasakid said:

Unrelated but just shows there's a lot more we dont know.

While it's true there are gaps in our knowledge, this doesn't seem to be one of them. The human brain is constantly scanning for patterns in nature, looking for the familiar as a filter to help us form opinions and decipher the unfamiliar. Dreams are often formed around some justification for a real life event, like the dream of crossing the tracks before an oncoming train that wakes you up, only to find that the tea kettle is whistling. For whatever reasons, in your dream the train whistling fit the pattern of what you were hearing better than the tea kettle, or may have added a bit more motivation to wake up and turn the stove off.

The most likely explanation is that something made the cuts on your arm that night and your brain came up with an elaborate dream to make sense of it and scare you awake so you could deal with the danger (Brother? Fork on the nightstand? Toy taken to bed for comfort? Door jamb scratch coming back from the loo?). We can feel when we're bleeding, usually, even when the cuts are clean. 

Was there a LOT of blood on the sheets from such deep cuts, or do you think the dream woke you up almost immediately after the wounds happened (however they happened)? This might rule out some explanations.

The brain has access to many systems within the body that could make a dream seem like it was visiting a physiological phenomenon upon the dreamer, but only in a limited way. Rashes/inflammations, excretions, exterior skin temperature fluctuations, these are all part of existing systems, and it's not unlikely that a dreaming brain could access them. But there isn't a mechanism in the human body to produce cuts like the ones you describe. What would we use THAT for? 

[zapatos]

9 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

Because I haven't found another explanation..  Again, that's why I'm here, looking for answers.

But if there is no known mechanism for the brain doing it, then it makes no sense to think that "the brain did it". You may as well blame it on god or pink fairies.

You say that you are 'looking for answers' but you dismiss every reasonable suggestion that is given to you. If you are looking for us to tell you that god or some other spooky thing caused an injury in your sleep, you've come to the wrong place.

[iNow]

The brain can surely create areas of inflammation and psychosomatic responses are quite real. It wouldn’t generally create a tear or cut across the skin though, and almost certainly not multiple parallel ones.

As others have mentioned, more likely is that the injury occurred in the real world... brother did it, or sleep walking into the kitchen and grabbing a knife and unconsciously doing self harm, for example... and the mostly asleep brain then later made up a story to explain the event after the fact. 

Edited November 27, 2019 by iNow

[Wheniwasakid]

1 hour ago, Phi for All said:

While it's true there are gaps in our knowledge, this doesn't seem to be one of them. The human brain is constantly scanning for patterns in nature, looking for the familiar as a filter to help us form opinions and decipher the unfamiliar. Dreams are often formed around some justification for a real life event, like the dream of crossing the tracks before an oncoming train that wakes you up, only to find that the tea kettle is whistling. For whatever reasons, in your dream the train whistling fit the pattern of what you were hearing better than the tea kettle, or may have added a bit more motivation to wake up and turn the stove off.

The most likely explanation is that something made the cuts on your arm that night and your brain came up with an elaborate dream to make sense of it and scare you awake so you could deal with the danger (Brother? Fork on the nightstand? Toy taken to bed for comfort? Door jamb scratch coming back from the loo?). We can feel when we're bleeding, usually, even when the cuts are clean. 

Was there a LOT of blood on the sheets from such deep cuts, or do you think the dream woke you up almost immediately after the wounds happened (however they happened)? This might rule out some explanations.

The brain has access to many systems within the body that could make a dream seem like it was visiting a physiological phenomenon upon the dreamer, but only in a limited way. Rashes/inflammations, excretions, exterior skin temperature fluctuations, these are all part of existing systems, and it's not unlikely that a dreaming brain could access them. But there isn't a mechanism in the human body to produce cuts like the ones you describe. What would we use THAT for? 

I'm just going to agree to disagree that my brother did it and leave it at that.

[Phi for All]

15 minutes ago, Wheniwasakid said:

I'm just going to agree to disagree that my brother did it and leave it at that.

Sorry I even mentioned him, since he's stolen the focus completely. 

[DrmDoc]

4 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

I'm just going to agree to disagree that my brother did it and leave it at that.

I want to put to rest this notion that our dreams can cause real injuries. Sleep is primarily a passive state of brain/body activity except when the brain is dreaming and when we sleepwalk as a result. Definitively, dreaming is activity our sleeping brain engages as a response to stimuli.  The key descriptive word here is "response", which means something has to happen before some other thing occurs.  Unless your experience involves sleepwalking, your dream and dreams in general cannot be the source of injury because they only occur as responses or reactions to something else.  Your Freddy Kruger dream experience was a response to an injury you likely sustained through physical trauma prior to the onset of your dream.  Dreams are essentially effects rather that causes of trauma, physical or otherwise.  Additionally, to reiterate iNOW's comment, no mechanism for the precision splitting of skin has been shown to exist in the psychosomatic dynamics of our mind/body connection.  Skin splitting could be caused by various maladies that causes dryness and cracking but you've made no mention of having a skin condition 20 years ago.  Memory isn't a fixed medium; it becomes more malleable as time passes.   More than likely, time has altered and embellished your recollection of what occurred when you were a 9 year old 20 years ago.

Edited November 27, 2019 by DrmDoc

[Wheniwasakid]

4 hours ago, DrmDoc said:

I want to put to rest this notion that our dreams can cause real injuries. Sleep is primarily a passive state of brain/body activity except when the brain is dreaming and when we sleepwalk as a result. Definitively, dreaming is activity our sleeping brain engages as a response to stimuli.  The key descriptive word here is "response", which means something has to happen before some other thing occurs.  Unless your experience involves sleepwalking, your dream and dreams in general cannot be the source of injury because they only occur as responses or reactions to something else.  Your Freddy Kruger dream experience was a response to an injury you likely sustained through physical trauma prior to the onset of your dream.  Dreams are essentially effects rather that causes of trauma, physical or otherwise.  Additionally, to reiterate iNOW's comment, no mechanism for the precision splitting of skin has been shown to exist in the psychosomatic dynamics of our mind/body connection.  Skin splitting could be caused by various maladies that causes dryness and cracking but you've made no mention of having a skin condition 20 years ago.  Memory isn't a fixed medium; it becomes more malleable as time passes.   More than likely, time has altered and embellished your recollection of what occurred when you were a 9 year old 20 years ago.

There's not many things that I remember so clearly so my memory of the event hasn't diminished or changed at all. I know what happened whether it sounds crazy or not. The impossible is possible. You may be the "dream doc" but you dont know everything. No one was involved with the injury I sustained. Neither were any objects. 👍

[zapatos]

3 minutes ago, Wheniwasakid said:

There's not many things that I remember so clearly so my memory of the event hasn't diminished or changed at all.

You don't know that. You just think that. I happen to have a vivid memory of the Easter Bunny in my backyard. I can even describe what he was wearing. 

This is a waste of time if you think "the impossible" is "possible". That is not reasonable and you should know that.

[Wheniwasakid]

27 minutes ago, zapatos said:

You don't know that. You just think that. I happen to have a vivid memory of the Easter Bunny in my backyard. I can even describe what he was wearing. 

This is a waste of time if you think "the impossible" is "possible". That is not reasonable and you should know that.

Yea well neither do you

[zapatos]

5 minutes ago, Wheniwasakid said:

Yea well neither do you

Brilliant retort. I give up.

[iNow]

Our OP would benefit by learning more about the malleability of memory and the ease with which we create then reinforce false memories 

[DrmDoc]

6 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

There's not many things that I remember so clearly so my memory of the event hasn't diminished or changed at all. I know what happened whether it sounds crazy or not. The impossible is possible. You may be the "dream doc" but you dont know everything. No one was involved with the injury I sustained. Neither were any objects. 👍

You're quite right, I don't know everything.  Also, I believe you are sincere in your memory of what occurred many years ago; however, belief in the possibility of an impossibility is not why you posted your dream related experience to a science forum.  If I'm not mistaken, you posted here because you were seeking an explanation in science for an experience you had as a child.  The explanations we've offered here are those within the realm of scientific possibility.  The impossibility of experiences like yours remain that way because science has produced verifiable, replicable evidence that they are not possible. Conversely, consider what belief in the possibility of the impossible implicates relative to the nature of dreams, which is that they can cause real physical harm.  That possibility would make dreaming more dangerous than true physical experience, which is contrary to the evolutionary basis of dreaming that provides a survival advantage among dreaming species.  Dreaming is an integral aspect of the sleep processes that promote healthy brain function, which is why such brain activity persist among species with complex brain structures. If the impossible were possible, then every conceivable and inconceivable injury and death in a dream would be possible and result in very clear physical evidence of their dream association.  By extension of this notion, gunshot and drowning dream victims would be discovered with bullet holes in their bodies and water in their lungs.  This possibility of imagined experiences being physically harmful is not conducive to the nature of survival at the foundation from which dreaming has evolved.  You may want to reconsider that the memories of trauma we experienced as children changes upon reflection as we mature into adults regardless of our certainty.

Edited November 28, 2019 by DrmDoc

[Strange]

7 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

There's not many things that I remember so clearly so my memory of the event hasn't diminished or changed at all.

You cannot know that. The only reference you have to compare your memory to is your memory. With no objective evidence (photos, doctors reports, etc) there is no way you, or anyone else can know if your memory is accurate or not.

7 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

The impossible is possible.

By definition, the impossible is not possible.

7 hours ago, Wheniwasakid said:

No one was involved with the injury I sustained. Neither were any objects.

I don't know what you are looking for here. 

Your claim that a dream caused your injuries is clearly not the case. Therefore it must have been a physical object.

If you are not going to accept reasonable responses, then this discussion is pointless. (It also appears to be off topic, as you are not providing any useful information about the subject of the thread.)

On 11/25/2019 at 3:44 PM, Wheniwasakid said:

Sleepwalking is a possibility I suppose, but very unlikely.

But infinitely more likely than the impossible.

[Jdub85]

I woke up this morning after a dream that I was being beaten and stomped and my arm had been run over.  After getting tired of trying to sleep, I finally got up.  I noticed a throbbing headache and my neck, chest, and left arm/shoulder felt very sore.  When I took off my clothes in the bathroom about 15 mins later, I noticed crazy red marks all over my upper body, arms, and legs.  I’ve looked in the bed and at the bedding and found nothing that resembles the markings on my forearm or my shoulder.  The ones on my chest look like boot prints(I tried to crop them to be more appropriate, apologies for their location).  It’s been about an hour now and most of the marks are slowly fading, but some have turned in to bruising.  My husband says the marks on my shoulders could be from my knuckles, but he has no response on the markings from my forearm.  Odd...  Thought it would be neat to share an example with you all to use  during your discussions.  Have a great day!

[dimreepr]

did you notice the car shaped hole in your bedroom wall?

[Jdub85]

Lol, I looked for sure.. no cars in sight!

[dimreepr]

use your second sight... 

[DrmDoc]

3 hours ago, Jdub85 said:

I woke up this morning after a dream that I was being beaten and stomped and my arm had been run over.  After getting tired of trying to sleep, I finally got up.  I noticed a throbbing headache and my neck, chest, and left arm/shoulder felt very sore.  When I took off my clothes in the bathroom about 15 mins later, I noticed crazy red marks all over my upper body, arms, and legs.  I’ve looked in the bed and at the bedding and found nothing that resembles the markings on my forearm or my shoulder.  The ones on my chest look like boot prints(I tried to crop them to be more appropriate, apologies for their location).  It’s been about an hour now and most of the marks are slowly fading, but some have turned in to bruising.  My husband says the marks on my shoulders could be from my knuckles, but he has no response on the markings from my forearm.  Odd...  Thought it would be neat to share an example with you all to use  during your discussions.  Have a great day!

There are two important clues in your comments that suggest to me what might have occurred.  First, you said you had a "throbbing headache" when you awoke.  This suggests to me that you were likely experiencing a hangover, which further suggests you may have been drinking before slumbering.  If you were drinking, then you may have been in such a deep state of unconsciousness that you could have experienced some measure of physical trauma without waking. Another possibility, if you were drinking, is that you could have experienced such trauma before going to sleep but have now awoke without memory of the experience. 

The second clue is in your husband's description of your bruises as knuckle imprints rather what is obviously a foot imprint across your upper breast and shoulder.  Someone, likely a heavy adult, stepped on you while you were sleeping and rolled a bike across your arm as can be seen by the imprint of slim rather than wide tire tracks.  

If you were not drinking prior to sleep when these injuries occurred, then you are obviously a heavy sleeper who was injured by someone while your were sleeping.  In my opinion, this is not a case dreams causing injury but more certainly a case of injury effecting a dream experience.  I hope this helps.

[Jdub85]

Thank you for those thoughts.  I was not drinking and it’s highly unlikely anyone created the injuries while I was sleeping.  I have no history of mental illness so that’s out..lol. I’m sure there is a logical reason for all of them.  Possibly the way my blanket or pillow were laying or something else.  The headache was most likely the change in weather we had between yesterday and today.  The blotches could be from stress the nightmare induced and possibly triggered a lupus flare up.  Interesting either way..  🙂