Snake Dreams

Hi,
I wonder if anyone else has had a dream like this. I was woken up fighting & gasping for breath. I was physically pulling at a massive snake which I could feel squeezing me around my neck. I felt it was real & was pulling at it trying to get it off me. I thought I could actually feel the snake in my hands. It freaked me out & am finding myself looking around my room before I go to bed now. I had been with my T that afternoon & was attempting to talk about some really difficult stuff. Anyone else experienced anything like this?
XXX

Welcome to PsychCentral, JoBo!
Hmm...When I was attending university, and minoring in psychology, textbooks of that time drew a distinction between night terrors and nightmares. The kind of dream you just described sounds more like a night terror than a conventional anxiety nightmare. Firstly, it occurred during deepest sleep (the way a night terror does) rather than during REM sleep (ordinary dream sleep, when nightmares more often occur). Secondly, the subject matter (fighting for your life and breath against a snake trying to squeeze them out of you) is not so different from the classic night terror where a thing is sitting on your chest trying to crush the breath out of you.

I wonder, though: do psychologists today draw the distinction between night terror and nightmare that they did during the late 1980's/early 1990's? More importantly, is there any clinical difference between people who have experienced at least one night terror and those who have only experienced nightmares? A good question for DocJohn, especially on Halloween....
(*sings Welcome to My Nightmare by Alice Cooper*)

This dream ties directly into your Therapy. This how you are feeling when dealing with difficult issues with your Therapist. Your Therapy is the process of getting that Snake off of you!

Hi Thunder Bow. Thanks for the reply. It does make sense to me when said as you have. Why does it have to be snakes though, as I hate them with a passion!!! XXX

The snake is also symbolic of the phallus, the penis.
Perhaps, your own male strength frightens you. Or.
A strong male authority figure around you, terrifies you.
There it is.

As we know, snakes are good constrictors.

Your not kidding!!!!