Nightmare Tips

kaoticspoonie:

borderlinebravery:

Use relaxation strategies pre-bedtime to decrease the fear and anxiety associated with the “anticipation” of nightmares/inability to sleep.

If awoken by a nightmare:

1. Turn on a light and move to a different part of the room or bed
2. Get out of bed if you can’t fall back asleep and read, or do some other form of self-soothing or relaxing activity.
3. Get an ice pack or ice water and use for at least ten minutes to decrease arousal level that interferes with getting back to sleep (TIP).
4. Use grounding materials to be mindful (i.e., cat purring, worry rock)

Imagery Re-Scripting And Rehearsal:

• Write down a new dream that you would like to have, and then practice the new dream (making it as dreamlike as possible) twice a day for 3 minutes. Any intrusive/negative images should be stopped immediately – not rehearsed. After a couple of weeks, the nightmares will dramatically decrease in frequency.

Breathing Exercise:

• Breathe in, saying to yourself “Mindfully breathing…”
• Breathe out, saying, “Letting go of distressing images…”
• Repeat this for 10 minutes or more, especially when going to sleep.

Bedtime Script: 

• Say to yourself: I may awaken in the night feeling ____ (name of anticipated feeling, usually fear), and will be sensing in my body ____ (describe 3 or more bodily sensations) because I will be remembering ____ (‘title’ of trauma – no details). At the same time, I will look around, where I am now ____ (current location) in ___ (current year, date), and I will see ____ (describe some of the things that are present in current location around bed and room), so I will know ____ (‘title’ of trauma) is not happening now/anymore.

Grounding: 

When awakened from a nightmare, turn on the light and:

• Name 5 things you see, 5 things you hear, 5 things you feel
• Name 4 things you see, 4 things you hear, 4 things you feel
• Name 3 things you see, 3 things you hear, 3 things you feel
• Name 2 things you see, 2 things you hear, 2 things you feel
• Name 1 thing you see, 1 thing  you hear, 1 thing you feel
• Repeat as many times as you’d like

Disclaimer: BB does not own the above material. It was taken from Alyssa’s personal DBT notes. The author is unknown. No copyright infringement intended.

Also if you have a dog or other trainable animal you can teach them some tricks that would help. (Teaching a dog service dog tasks as tricks does NOT make them a service dog).

For nightmares the two that come to mind are pressure therapy – basically teaching them to lay on you. My cat is trained to lay on my chest with her forehead against my chin.

And clearing a room or house. (There are lots of ways to train this and I find video easier but basically you train them to search every corner and bark if they find someone. You can make this into a fun game of hide and seek during the day.)

Oh also hitting light switches.

@makethwoman