Are your nightmares trying to warn you? Study links ‘horrific’ dreams to autoimmune diseases
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For many of us, a bad dream is a fleeting discomfort quickly forgotten with the light of day.
But what if your nightmares were trying to tell you something more? What if they were a harbinger of a silent, lurking disease that could impact your life in profound ways?
This isn't the plot of a horror movie—it's the startling finding of a recent study that could change the way we view the nightmares that haunt our sleep.
The study, published in the journal eClinicalMedicine, has uncovered a chilling link between intense, horrifying nightmares and the onset of autoimmune diseases such as lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and other systemic conditions.
These aren't your garden-variety bad dreams; they're vivid, distressing, and sometimes so severe that they linger as 'daymares', hallucinations that persist even when you're wide awake.
‘There's a serial killer after me, and the last few years, I have the same one,’ a patient said.
‘He's got my legs or something I can still feel something on my legs even when I'm then awake.’
Another patient described their nightmares as ‘where I can't breathe and where someone is sitting on my chest’.
‘Horrific, like murders, like skin coming off people,’ a third patient said.
Another patient recounted his nightmares, saying, ‘I think it's like when I'm overwhelmed, which could be the lupus being bad…so I think the more stress my body is under, then the more vivid and bad the dreaming would be.’
Autoimmune diseases like lupus are notorious for their ability to affect multiple organs, including the brain. They can cause inflammation and pain throughout the body, leading to a wide range of symptoms that can severely impact a person's quality of life.
Cognitive issues and neuropsychiatric symptoms, though often invisible and difficult to test for, can be just as debilitating as physical manifestations of the disease.
The study's lead author, Melanie Sloan from the University of Cambridge, emphasised the importance of recognising these symptoms. They can be early indicators of a disease ‘flare’—a sudden and potentially dangerous worsening of the condition that may require immediate medical attention.
‘This is particularly the case in a disease like lupus, which is well known for affecting multiple organs, including the brain, but we also found these patterns of symptoms in other rheumatological diseases, like rheumatoid arthritis, Sjogren's syndrome, and systemic sclerosis,’ Sloan said.
In a March 2019 study, researchers discovered a correlation between inflammatory arthritis and other autoimmune and inflammatory conditions and the occurrence of nightmares and other REM sleep disorders like sleep paralysis.
REM, or rapid eye movement, is the phase of sleep associated with dreaming and memory consolidation.
In the study, participants reported experiencing vivid and distressing nightmares just before experiencing hallucinations.
These nightmares often featured themes such as falling, being attacked, trapped, crushed, or committing violent acts.
For example, one participant recalled being threatened by feral birds of prey, while another dreamed of a loved one in grave danger with no way to help.
A subsequent study surveyed 400 doctors and 676 individuals living with lupus, conducting in-depth interviews with 50 clinicians and 69 individuals living with systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases.
The findings revealed that three out of five lupus patients and one out of three patients with other rheumatology-related diseases reported increasingly vivid and distressing nightmares preceding their hallucinations.
‘I'd be riding a horse, going around cutting people out with my sword. One of them was somebody attacking me, and I ended up slitting their throat,’ one patient said.
‘I'm not a violent person at all. I don't even kill an insect.’
‘And I came to the conclusion that's probably me fighting my own (autoimmune) system... I'm probably attacking myself, that's the only thing I can logically make sense out of it.’
This is where the study becomes a call to action.
‘We are strongly encouraging more doctors to ask about nightmares and other neuropsychiatric symptoms—thought to be unusual, but actually very common in systemic autoimmunity—to help us detect disease flares earlier,’ senior study author David D'Cruz, a consultant rheumatologist at Guy's Hospital and Kings College London, said.
For those who experience the occasional nightmare, there's no need to panic.
‘It is indeed “perfectly normal” to have occasional nightmares and even daymares or hallucinations, which 'are also more common than we think,' Sloan said.
However, if symptoms become intense, like extreme fatigue, headaches and other signs of autoimmune disorders, you ‘should be discussed with a doctor’.
‘People shouldn't be afraid or embarrassed to talk about these symptoms,’ she said.
‘In some cases, reporting these symptoms earlier, even if they seem strange and unconnected, may lead to the doctor being able to 'join the dots' to diagnose an autoimmune disease.’
What do you think of this study, members? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.
But what if your nightmares were trying to tell you something more? What if they were a harbinger of a silent, lurking disease that could impact your life in profound ways?
This isn't the plot of a horror movie—it's the startling finding of a recent study that could change the way we view the nightmares that haunt our sleep.
The study, published in the journal eClinicalMedicine, has uncovered a chilling link between intense, horrifying nightmares and the onset of autoimmune diseases such as lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and other systemic conditions.
These aren't your garden-variety bad dreams; they're vivid, distressing, and sometimes so severe that they linger as 'daymares', hallucinations that persist even when you're wide awake.
A new study revealed there’s a link between nightmares and autoimmune diseases. Credit: Shutterstock
‘There's a serial killer after me, and the last few years, I have the same one,’ a patient said.
‘He's got my legs or something I can still feel something on my legs even when I'm then awake.’
Another patient described their nightmares as ‘where I can't breathe and where someone is sitting on my chest’.
‘Horrific, like murders, like skin coming off people,’ a third patient said.
Another patient recounted his nightmares, saying, ‘I think it's like when I'm overwhelmed, which could be the lupus being bad…so I think the more stress my body is under, then the more vivid and bad the dreaming would be.’
Autoimmune diseases like lupus are notorious for their ability to affect multiple organs, including the brain. They can cause inflammation and pain throughout the body, leading to a wide range of symptoms that can severely impact a person's quality of life.
Cognitive issues and neuropsychiatric symptoms, though often invisible and difficult to test for, can be just as debilitating as physical manifestations of the disease.
The study's lead author, Melanie Sloan from the University of Cambridge, emphasised the importance of recognising these symptoms. They can be early indicators of a disease ‘flare’—a sudden and potentially dangerous worsening of the condition that may require immediate medical attention.
‘This is particularly the case in a disease like lupus, which is well known for affecting multiple organs, including the brain, but we also found these patterns of symptoms in other rheumatological diseases, like rheumatoid arthritis, Sjogren's syndrome, and systemic sclerosis,’ Sloan said.
In a March 2019 study, researchers discovered a correlation between inflammatory arthritis and other autoimmune and inflammatory conditions and the occurrence of nightmares and other REM sleep disorders like sleep paralysis.
REM, or rapid eye movement, is the phase of sleep associated with dreaming and memory consolidation.
In the study, participants reported experiencing vivid and distressing nightmares just before experiencing hallucinations.
These nightmares often featured themes such as falling, being attacked, trapped, crushed, or committing violent acts.
Researchers discovered a correlation between inflammatory arthritis and other autoimmune conditions and the occurrence of nightmares and other REM sleep disorders. Credit: Shutterstock
For example, one participant recalled being threatened by feral birds of prey, while another dreamed of a loved one in grave danger with no way to help.
A subsequent study surveyed 400 doctors and 676 individuals living with lupus, conducting in-depth interviews with 50 clinicians and 69 individuals living with systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases.
The findings revealed that three out of five lupus patients and one out of three patients with other rheumatology-related diseases reported increasingly vivid and distressing nightmares preceding their hallucinations.
‘I'd be riding a horse, going around cutting people out with my sword. One of them was somebody attacking me, and I ended up slitting their throat,’ one patient said.
‘I'm not a violent person at all. I don't even kill an insect.’
‘And I came to the conclusion that's probably me fighting my own (autoimmune) system... I'm probably attacking myself, that's the only thing I can logically make sense out of it.’
This is where the study becomes a call to action.
‘We are strongly encouraging more doctors to ask about nightmares and other neuropsychiatric symptoms—thought to be unusual, but actually very common in systemic autoimmunity—to help us detect disease flares earlier,’ senior study author David D'Cruz, a consultant rheumatologist at Guy's Hospital and Kings College London, said.
For those who experience the occasional nightmare, there's no need to panic.
‘It is indeed “perfectly normal” to have occasional nightmares and even daymares or hallucinations, which 'are also more common than we think,' Sloan said.
However, if symptoms become intense, like extreme fatigue, headaches and other signs of autoimmune disorders, you ‘should be discussed with a doctor’.
‘People shouldn't be afraid or embarrassed to talk about these symptoms,’ she said.
‘In some cases, reporting these symptoms earlier, even if they seem strange and unconnected, may lead to the doctor being able to 'join the dots' to diagnose an autoimmune disease.’
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