What‘s the worst nightmare you ever had and still remember?

13 comments

1. I was on an aircraft carrier attending some sort of ceremony. I was in these giant grand stands with a whole bunch of other people (seemed like thousands or more), when the aircraft carrier began to get bombed.

   I remember watching a whole lot of people die in very vivid detail… but it didn’t seem like anyone I knew. Finally, I was hit by a bomb… and it all started over. I went through at least 4 times that I remember (which is probably why it stuck with me). I just remember the existential dread each time it started over, knowing what was coming and being unable to stop it.

   Good times. I really need to quit watching WW2 documentaries before going to sleep.

2. This might not be what you’re looking for, but I occasionally suffer from sleep paralysis. This leads to two terrifying scenarios:

   1. I’ll know I’m having a nightmare but be unable to wake up. I’ll feel myself trapped in the dream. I’ll try to shout for my wife but nothing will come out.

   2. I’ll experience physical or auditory hallucinations as I’m waking up or falling asleep. I remember once as a kid I “woke up” and understood I was now awake in my room, but heard a voice as clear as day say “It’s time to wake up – we’re here for you” and felt my bed begin to tilt like I was going to fall out. It lasted for a brief moment but I was convinced it was real until I understood how sleep paralysis works.

3. I had a recurring nightmare for several months when I was young.

   Someone was breaking into our house to kill us.

   Every night I would have the same dream, and the guy would get a little further. Started with him just looking into the window, then he would open the back door, then he would climb up the stairs, then he got to my parents room, then mom ran out and got us into the car, and then he got to her before she could start the car, and started driving off with us in the back.

   It was horrible, and the slow reveal of what was happening over many nights really fucked me up.

   I still stress out when I hear a noise around the window at night, some 20 years later.

4. I was like 5-6 years old, and somehow I ended up watching some cowboys vs indians flick on TV. Later that night when I was sleeping, I dreamed.

   In my dream, I was riding a bicycle with my mother when 2 Native American “Indians” rushed us from the side of the road – they caught my mother and scalped/beheaded her, then chased after me until my mother woke me up.

   I remember the dream because it was so utterly vivid and un-dream-like to me – I can still remember most of the details here 30 years later.

5. I was in the Marines in the 90s and I’m sure most Marines have some form of this nightmare scenario in a bad dream every now and then.

   I was standing in formation and I realized I didn’t shave (I have a beard), but not only that I was missing my cover (the hat we wear). I start to panic. Then my platoon sgt notices me and my squad leader notices me, and suddenly I’m in full panic mode. Like “Oh shit, I’m so fucked right now. FUCK FUCK FUCK!!!!”

6. I wouldn’t call it a nightmare, but I had this dream at least twice as teen. Basically I was falling down and I had to take a shit. Yeah that’s it, pretty spooky huh.

7. The one where I watched all my friends die by some sort of lethal injection while struggling before I got it myself. Stg I got pins and needles in my whole body for real when they happened, it’s by far the most intense physical sensation I’ve ever felt in a dream, and that on top of already loads of emotional devastation. Not fun

8. Have a couple:

   Being chased by a cyborg dinosaur with a vacuum for a nose. Got chased into outer space where it fell off the spaceship and fell into hell where it burned to death crying no no no.

   Being chased by my dad who was going to kill me due to some mind control thing. When he caught up to me, I said I love you and his response was I don’t remember you.

   Seeing the serpent pop out from behind a tree. It was when I saw this episode from The Beginner’s Bible where the serpent tempts Eve. The serpent freaked me out as a kid.

   I think there was a dream where my skin was covered in holes. Like a lot of holes all over me and I could feel the holes with my fingers.

9. I’m not sure if this is a nightmare or just plain bizarre, but i had a dream where there was a wedding going on, on a newly harvested wheat field with piles of hay lying about. Suddenly the whole wedding breaks out into a huge fight, and the bride takes a huge, forehammer-sized conch-shell out from a hay pile and clobbers everyone around her.
   The dream ends when a combine harvester comes driving over a hill and harvests the entire wedding party.

10. It was around my teenage years. My dad did something or other I didn’t like, so of course I was all mad and stuff. Well that night I had a dream where we were all Legos, running from some person trying to kill us or whatever, who cares.

    At the end we both jumped off of a building, and he used some bricks to make sure I survived, but he landed on the bottom of it and turned into a pile of Lego guy bits. I woke up and cried for a few, then chuckled at the absurdity of crying about a broken Lego guy before going back to sleep.

11. A fat guy was walking down the street and fell face first into a manhole. I laughed at him and then pulled him out. But when I pulled him out I realized it was my daughter, and she had drowned because I took too long laughing.

12. I can’t remember the actual nightmare, but the aftermath still freaks me out. I must have been about 7 or 8 and had some sort of nightmare, and when I woke up I was extremely disoriented. It was so dark, and I reached for the door so I could go to the bathroom. The doorknob wasn’t there. There was nothing but smooth wall. Something about that really scared me and I started to panic. I pounded on the wall screaming and yelling until my mom opened the door… which was on the opposite side of the wall I was banging on. I’ve never felt so relieved and stupid at the same time.

13. That’s all I have.