Scared Scary, realistic, terrifying nightmares / hallucinations at night from Opiates

[TRTCure]

I’m wondering if anyone else has had either insanely realistic, long and horrible nightmares while on opiates. And not just when asleep, sometimes when I look into the darkness of my room at night I see things.. scary things.

Shadows and figure like beings.

I’m not crazy and no I’m not on a week long meth bender. Opiates have a side effect, not well known but they can cause serious night terrors and mine are really getting to me.
Like I’ll wake up so fucking scared and perplexed I’m literally in a fight or flight mode ready to attack something.

One time on a long fentanyl binge (not Street heroin, actual liquid fentanyl) I had literally the worst paranormal thing happen to me in my life. I VIVIDLY recall being attacked by a creature and being lifted off of my bed all the while my dog was barking at growling as this happened and then I was dropped and it ended. I checked my blood pressure after it was 180/100.

Can anyone relate? It seems these are getting worse for me and it’s making me want to quit opiates again entirely.

 

[Mafioso]

Usually the night after I took them, I was so sedated that I don't dream or if I do, I don't remember them. One of the reasons I love sedatives in general is that I have always had trouble sleeping and nightmares. Not just when I started using drugs either, from early childhood pretty much. Definitely when in withdrawal or even lowering the dose when addicted will make the nightmares worse.

Even 6-7 months completely sober I still got pretty much what you described, waking up in fight or flight, drenched in sweat and ready for the worst- or having to calm myself down that the worst didn't just happen.

2 years since daily use of opioids and I definitely think my nightmares have subsided, although I still relapse on benzos more often than I'd like to admit, which will also make my sleep and mornings complete hell, like heart pounding out of my chest and all I can think of is "how do I stop this". It's something I'd like to see a doctor and sleep specialist about, I'm just worried they'll throw me on some pills and call it good.

One thing that seems to help without fail is cannabis, although when I've been smoking daily or even just nightly, not having it seems to make things worse. I guess I still get dreams like that even when smoking every night, but it's much less frequent and a smoke to calm me down really helps as well. From what I understand, this is probably because THC prevents REM sleep, so essentially I'm just not dreaming(as much, I don't think the brain can survive without dreaming at all). I think this is part of what causes the memory problems as well as the groggy feeling the next day, as it's poorer quality of sleep even if it feels more relaxing. Another thing I noticed when I quit everything was that I could make more sense of my dreams, and that usually when I was having stressful dreams it was because I felt I needed to be doing something or not doing something(like look for work instead of laying around and napping, or an ethical/moral problem at work, stressful situation I was worried about dealing with, etc).




TLDR: The opiates will definitely make it worse. Some of it is possibly the opioids leaving your system and your body entering into withdrawal, some of it could be a rare reaction with your physiology. Do you take them for pain or recreation?

 

[ChemicallyEnhanced]

I'm incredibly lonely and still grieving for my soulmate. In opioid-induced dreams we are together again and I'm SO happy. They give me the opposite of nightmares.
I do have some really weird dreams sometimes, though. Not necessarily good or bad, just fucking weird.

 

[TRTCure]

Usually the night after I took them, I was so sedated that I don't dream or if I do, I don't remember them. One of the reasons I love sedatives in general is that I have always had trouble sleeping and nightmares. Not just when I started using drugs either, from early childhood pretty much. Definitely when in withdrawal or even lowering the dose when addicted will make the nightmares worse.

Even 6-7 months completely sober I still got pretty much what you described, waking up in fight or flight, drenched in sweat and ready for the worst- or having to calm myself down that the worst didn't just happen.

2 years since daily use of opioids and I definitely think my nightmares have subsided, although I still relapse on benzos more often than I'd like to admit, which will also make my sleep and mornings complete hell, like heart pounding out of my chest and all I can think of is "how do I stop this". It's something I'd like to see a doctor and sleep specialist about, I'm just worried they'll throw me on some pills and call it good.

One thing that seems to help without fail is cannabis, although when I've been smoking daily or even just nightly, not having it seems to make things worse. I guess I still get dreams like that even when smoking every night, but it's much less frequent and a smoke to calm me down really helps as well. From what I understand, this is probably because THC prevents REM sleep, so essentially I'm just not dreaming(as much, I don't think the brain can survive without dreaming at all). I think this is part of what causes the memory problems as well as the groggy feeling the next day, as it's poorer quality of sleep even if it feels more relaxing. Another thing I noticed when I quit everything was that I could make more sense of my dreams, and that usually when I was having stressful dreams it was because I felt I needed to be doing something or not doing something(like look for work instead of laying around and napping, or an ethical/moral problem at work, stressful situation I was worried about dealing with, etc).




TLDR: The opiates will definitely make it worse. Some of it is possibly the opioids leaving your system and your body entering into withdrawal, some of it could be a rare reaction with your physiology. Do you take them for pain or recreation?

I was sober for a long time but I definitely think you’re right about when I’m withdrawaling or my dose is just diminishing. The last few weeks I’ve been taking 2 mg of suboxone in the morning, which makes sense by night i May be having these nightmares. Maybe I will try some cannabis to help with it because it is very scary

 

[endlessnameless]

No nightmares due to very little to no sleep, but major hallucinations when withdrawing, to the point of temporary psychosis. This is mainly after not sleeping or keeping hydrated enough due to the symptoms of withdrawal itself (sweating, insomnia).

 

[OrbitalCombustion]

I’m wondering if anyone else has had either insanely realistic, long and horrible nightmares while on opiates. And not just when asleep, sometimes when I look into the darkness of my room at night I see things.. scary things.

Shadows and figure like beings.

I’m not crazy and no I’m not on a week long meth bender. Opiates have a side effect, not well known but they can cause serious night terrors and mine are really getting to me.
Like I’ll wake up so fucking scared and perplexed I’m literally in a fight or flight mode ready to attack something.

One time on a long fentanyl binge (not Street heroin, actual liquid fentanyl) I had literally the worst paranormal thing happen to me in my life. I VIVIDLY recall being attacked by a creature and being lifted off of my bed all the while my dog was barking at growling as this happened and then I was dropped and it ended. I checked my blood pressure after it was 180/100.

Can anyone relate? It seems these are getting worse for me and it’s making me want to quit opiates again entirely.

I thought I was the only one. Coming from a life of ultra-vivid dream recall and lucid dream induction tecniques in college, I always get pulled into uber-elaborate dreams that come one after another and affect me upon waking more than when sober.
I once lived with an ancient princess stuck in an underground cave for a millenia, I swore I lived every second of that twisted prison dream.

A bizarre dream that still lingers lucidly in my mind is the dark empty room I meandered in, only to find a lonely Transformer toy who was actually a distant alien who needed to talk to me about all manner of important things. In fact I got stuck in that nightmarishly cold and empty existence for what seemed eternity before I emerged from my withdrawal-laden slumber.

It has never failed that I have to swallow the alternate realities of my corporeal hell when using opiates. It honestly has been a great deterrent to future abuse.

 

[Larimar]

I ha e had a few instances where my mind woke up but my eyes body could not move . Tried so hard to open my eyes but could not . Was scared I went blind . I guess it’s like sleep paralysis.