I had one last night. I was happy to realize I was sober this morning. These must be gifts from God to remind us. I don't want to go back, ever. I have been having a few thoughts of drinking recently, but that's all they have been, they were idle thoughts. These drunk dreams are a good way to knock that horrible thought from my mind. Thank You God.
Any one else have these dreams? I am almost a year sober and have had 5 or 6 of them I think.
Yes, I have them. For me they got less frequent the longer I stayed sober. My sponsor told me: to enjoy them, it's the only time we can drink in safety! But, if I thought I could drink in safety I was dreaming.
Mike your response reminded me of the feedback my own (now deceased) sponsor told me after I had a very vivid dream at 22 years sober. I didn't go out in a sleep walk but I was concerned at how vivid it was. I needed to have my wife tell me "No you didn't leave this bed last evening" and the car was still in the garage in one piece. Charlie my sponsor said, "Then if you didn't go out and drink enjoy the one that you had...It's a freebie."
Mark I've had thought interruptions that cause me not to talk when ordering a "sparkling water" or "Perrier" with the twist because all my mouth wanted to say was "Tanguerey on the rocks with an olive and an onion." Truely a cunning, powerful and baffling disease.
My drinking dreams are always what I'd call passive. I don't think I've had a dream in which I actually took a drink. I dreamed I just finished off a 12-pack, or I was surrounded by empty cans, and knew I had been drinking, or I dreamed someone else in my dream was drinking (which many dream interpreters say represents myself). The recurring theme to all my drinking dreams is that they make me feel like I've been drinking all along, not just in that one dream but as if I've been drinking and lying about my sobriety. So when I wake up from the dream, my first thought is ok, I didn't drink - but then I think what about all those other times, and then I realize the memor of the "other times" was part of the dream also. That in general is how my dream brain works, it took me a while to figure out that some aspects of my "dreamland" seem to accumulate, so that the next dream builds on the previous dream. When I'm fully awake, and have time to think - and as the strong memory of the dream fades, I know I'm sober, that I have been sober all along.
I treat these dreams as regular reminders of my disease. In 21 years sober, I've had maybe 30, 40 of them spread out. Gradually decreasing frequency - at least among the ones I remember. I don't treat them as a chance to drink in a fantasy world... like I say, the dream is always that I already drank, and I never feel like I'm drunk.
Usually they don't involve anyone else unless that someone else - sometimes my dad, in one case a "celebrity" personality - is acting as my surrogate drinker in the dream. If it's me, I'm by myself, and I always think "Shit, I blew my sobriety" then "No wait, I've done this many times". Sometimes they are replays of actual times I drank in my real life drinking days - I'll be back at some college party, etc. But I never get to actually taste the alcohol, or feel its effects in the context of the dream.
I'm also a lucid dreamer, but my drinking dreams usually are not.
Had dozens of them. Always disconcerting and made me wonder. Haven't had one for awhile now. Maybe I'm done with them. One thing's for sure, if you're having them, you're an alcoholic. It's nice to Know and not wonder about that.
Oh yeah, have had several of them but not as of late.
One of them had me so freaked out that I really thought Id drank. It was so real. I remember crying and having to tell my sponsor.
The thoughts and feelings of the dream stayed with me all day long that particular day. Probably as a reminder, who knows.
But I"ll tell ya one thing ... when I have those drunk dreams ( nighmares ) I get out of bed and go directly to my knee's to thank God that its not real.
In my dreams I am always sober but the bottle is there and just out of reach. I do everything I can to try and get to it, but either gets moved or disappears before I can get to it. Always wake up releaved that I didn't get it. Think my HP is trying to tell me something?
