Lucid Dreaming and depression/hypersomnia

Quest for Lucidity
1

Firsty i’d like to say that this is pure speculation, so please don’t flame me for this.

There may be a link between depression and lucid dreaming. As most of you know, lucid dreaming is high level REM sleep, comparable to waking consciousness. Subsequently, lucid dreaming takes a lot of energy and makes you feel exhausted afterwards. Check out these links:

https://www.janefirbank.com/articles/depressed.html#top

https://www.clinical-depression.co.uk/Understanding_Depression/understanding.htm

https://xmb.stuffucanuse.com/xmb/viewthread.php?tid=219

‘It’s been found that dreaming much MORE than normal is also bad for you’

Obviously this is only relevant to people who have lucid dreams at least once a night. I know when i do this, after a week or so I feel unbelievably
tired and depressed, and start sleeping 12-14 hours every night!

My interpretation: try to limit lucid dreaming to no more than a few times a week :smile:

What I want to know is: does depression cause lucid dreams, or do lucid dreams cause depression?

2

hmm, well I haven’t read those in depth, but they seem to be suggesting more that any extra REM sleep in general is what causes the depression - I’m not sure what kind of dream, and whether you’re very “active” in that dream or not is too important. It’s hard to say, there doesn’t seem to be much info on what actually causes this greater amount of REM sleep. They (possibly) suggest that people with depression tend to have about twice as much REM sleep, which is twice as much energy being used up, but will having a lucid dream as opposed to a normal dream have much extra energy usage?

hmm… heh.

edit: looks to me from the “cycle of depression” image on the second link that the extra sleep is caused by factors that aren’t directly sleep related…

3

Perhaps we should ask Pedro if he’s feeling depressed?

4

I agreee, it sounds liek they are saying more REM cycles is a result of depression. I think this is more in depth then they make it sound. This could also be due to melatonin levels and niether be the cause of or result of depression.

I also find it hard to believe that your body would allow itself to harm itself. That is usually something we have to do.

Something else that bothered me was the horrible grammar of the first article. Right now I am just posting to a message board, so grammar isn’t that important, but when you are writting an article and you have sentence fragments everywhere it looks kind of stupid.

Final thought… If it is true that too much REM sleep can make you unmotivated etc (which wouldn’t be depression, but would help put you in a position to become depressed), then the simple solution is to sleep less to eliminate some REM. If too much REM was the cause of the depression all doctors would perscribe is an alarm clock.

This could be good for lucid dreaming though… if you eleiminate some REM sleep and wake yourself up early then you need to regularly, then the days ou sleep in (one or two days a week) you will have lots and lots of REM.

Interesting, but like they say in science… correlation is not causality. I think that depression is primarily caused by choices you make, and altering your sleep cycle (getting up later, going to bed later) is one of those choices, which would cause altered sleep patterns. Because of your body’s natural clock which is regulated by levels of melatonin, you would receive altered levels of REM and NREM sleep. Depressed people choose to be depressed, even though they don’t know it.

5

when I first started getitng good at lucidity I would be lucid all night, when I got up in the morning I felt like I hadn’t rested at all, period, because I was just constantly doing all sorts of things in dream.

It drained me quite a bit, but of course my body had ways of compensating…

The way I see it if you’re in REM too much you’ll go into an NREM rebound and make up for it…

I now am not usually bothered by LDing except there are times where I stay dreaming TOO LONG, just way too long, and I get up and my head feels weird and I feel drained.

It isn’t a depressed feeling… really… I dont’ know, kind of like, man I shouldn’t have drank so much last night kind of a feeling, a bit “hung over” in a way…there’s this really odd pressure in your head.

I had it today, it’s gone now, only lasted an hour or two… I’m perfectly fine emotion wise, so… I don’t know.

Too much REM is not good for you, but I think your body has its ways of ensuring you don’t do it too much, just don’t push it too far and you’ll be fine.

(and I do sleep 12 hours a day, but quite often I wake up around 7 and it takes me a very long time to fall back aslepe, and i wake up around 3-4 and it takes me about 15-20 minutes to fall back asleep… so it’s not like i’m unconscious for 12 hours… I’m sure I get tons of light level NREM sleep in between my lucid dreams… which seem to be wanting to be 1-3 a night, naturally.

I haven’t been able to get lucid in my first dream cycle yet, but I’m trying.

and you know, there are other ways of reuglating seratonin than deep sleep, eating, excercising, sunlight, etc… all help I think.

6

I don’t think i really believe this… I never once felt tired or depressed after having lucid dreams. if i felt anything it was much happier and rejuvinated.

7

Lucid dreaming causing depression ??? If anything I believe it is more likely to cure it !!! I know you said it was just your opinion. I am trying not to be too hard on you but, have you ever had a lucid dream? I always fell much better after a lucid dream than normal dreaming.

I have not found this to be true at all. For me it is quite the opposite. A perfect example is a few days ago I went to the drive in even though I had to get up early the next morning. I thought I would get right to sleep a soon as I got home unfortunately, it did not work out that way. I only got about 4-5 hours of sleep but, I had 2 full lucid dreams and I woke up feeling great.

Again, I have not found this to be true fore me at all. Everyone is different and anything is possible. Perhaps lucid dreaming does have some negative effects on you but, I think you will find this not to be true with most lucid dreamers. Most lucid dreamers I have talked to are like me and find the opposite of your hypotheses to be true.

I think not !!!

There is also a third possibility. Have you considered that Lucid dreaming may have nothing to do with depression at all.

8

Perhaps depressed people are more interested in searching for other ways to be happy than people who aren’t?

9

I did not explore the links in depth I just took a quick look at them. From what I saw lucid dreaming is not mentioned once. I think the theory discussed in the links are fundamentally flawed.

First, the majority of people who suffer from depression also suffer from insomnia and there fore get less sleep ( including REM ) than people who do not suffer from depression.

Second, the articles fail to take into account that most people who suffer from clinical depression are usually treated with tricyclic or SSRI anti-depressant medications. One of the side-effects of these classes of medication can be an increase in REM sleep. Of corse the medications can also cause less rem as well. ( I know it’s confusing ) Anyway, from what I can tell the studies above failed to factor it into the equation.

No offence but, the research sited above seems to be the work of science fiction rather than science. There are just too many factors that are left unanswered to take the findings seriously.

patient_career_of_sleep wrote:

Now that makes more sense to me. True, many people who suffer from depression look for an escape from their symptoms and therefore my be drawn to lucid dreaming for that reason. However, I think it may go deeper than that. Manny who suffer from depression also experience distorted thinking, hallucinations, and disassociation. As a result of these symptoms, many people with depression may find recognizing the dream state much easier than people who do not suffer from depression. That’s an interesting thought !!! Do people who suffer from depression find lucid dreaming easier than other people ??? Perhaps someone should do a study. :hmmm:

10

Thats the point I was trying to draw. Just because there may seem to be some correlation, does not link the two together at all. More likely than anything increased REM sleep is a result of one of the many activities etc that the depressed individual engages in and is probably more a by product of depression and not linked to the cause.

11

Your comments demonstrate extreme ignorance of mental illness and of depression specifically. The exact cause of mental illness is not known to any level of certainly. But, we do have enough information to determine what does not cause depression. It certainly is not a choice people make subconsciously or otherwise. I assure you that people who suffer from depression would gladly “trade”there depression for any other disability. Your comments are a large part of the reason people with depression would be willing to do so. For example: you would not say that someone who was born blind is making a choice not to see. People often mistakenly what to blame the “victim” when it come to depression. Saying that they some how brought it on themselves or they can just snap themselves out of it.

Anyway, simply changing sleep patterns will not cure someone of depression as much as people with depression would wish that were so. Even if the findings of the above links are remotely true, which I doubt, that people with depression have more REM sleep. The increased REM sleep would not cause depression. There is a marginal possibility that increased REM could cause poor sleep and therefor less energy the next day. Low energy is only one symptom of depression much like low energy is only one symptom of the flue. Yes low energy is debilitating yet give someone with the flue a dose of “uppers” and they would still be unable to function in there day to day affairs untill the flue has passed.

12

Milod: from what I’ve learnt in psychology class, the humanistic outlook is that people actually make choices.

13

milod789 : I also think that people who suffering from hallucinations, etc. have a better potencial to be a lucid dreamer than other people.
And I also think that some syndromes can make a person more able to LD.

(I have read that some syndromes can make people very talented in music, art, etc.
And I don’t think lucid dreaming is any exception).

14

talk about ignorance milod… like patient said… when making that vague statement I was assuming that you would have some knowledge of psychology. Read what I was saying… there are too many things that cause depression to pin it down to one, but to pin it down to something that exists in every case of depression include my former cases (5 years and 3 years) was my choice to hold a self defeating view on my own situation.

I don’t remember what the humanist view said, but that sounds familiar :smile:. From the biological perspective you might say you have altered brani chemistry from birth, or you might say that the millions of choices you have made throughout your life have left you will a specific brain chemistry which causes your depression. The cognitive view basically says that you learn to be depressed; you learn to think about yourself and your situation like you do as well as make the kind of choices that lead to the downward spiral of depression. Even the behavioral psychologist would say people become depressed because of the consequences of their actions. I’m saything that they worked really hard to get an A on that test and they didn’t, so after a few failures their behavior has been modified and they wont try as hard next time and not care as much either (think defense mechanism). On the other hand this person smokes pot(:)) and it makes them feel great immediately and every time, so this person starts smoking pot, which takes away from their hobbies etc (a common sign for depression is the loss of interest in your old hobbies).

So basically what I am saying is that all of the psychological perspectives agree that depression boils down to either a self defeating point of view or generally self defeating behavior. No one knows exactly why one person becomes depressed and another doesn’t, but every psychologist would agree that to conqure depression they have to CHOOSE to over come it. So it does boil down to “people that are depressed are making the choice to be depressed…” where you or I like the way it sounds, but that smells as good as flowers to me, because I’m not blaming any one, but I am saying that they have the power to save their own life… which in my opinion (as well as the opinion of many psychological perspectives) was the best thing you could ever tell a depressed person.

15

That’s a good description. A sort of ‘neural overload’ type feeling.

Thanks for the feedback people. As i said, im not drawing any conclusions, just pointing out possibilities. But I think most people will agree that lucid dreaming is very tiring, after all, its no surprise that your mind has to work hard to construct a totally fictitious world, pretty mindblowing if you think about it. Awesome while it lasts, thats for sure.

From what I understand toadstool is right in that depression results from negative thinking patters. I guess the quote ‘Depressed people choose to be depressed, even though they don’t know it’ is easily misinterpreted as saying that it is easy to snap out of depression, which obviously it isn’t. Even if their being depressed is their fault, they shouldn’t be made to feel guilty about it.

16

toadstool:

Well allow me to enlighten you more. I work as an advocate for people with psychiatric disabilities and I am well aware of the theories you mention and I obviously do not agree with them. To be honest it is most likely not worth my time to explain where you are wrong. I have conducted numerous trainings on this subject. I can tell that like many others there is no way to change the way you think about this. I just pray that you do not work in this field. If you do I feel sorry for your consumers.

That is not true and is very much old school thinking.

Neptun wrote:

I agree

Ru§h wrote:

I think you should wait till you get a few more posts on this before making such a statement. I think you will find that most people will disagree with you. As I have said, I do not find lucid dreaming to be draining at all. I find it exhilarating afterwards. About the only thing I find depressing is that I have to wake up. :lmao:

Happy dreaming all

17

So you don’t think that is some one chooses to do nothing about their depression it will magically fade away? Regaurdless of any theories and any experience you have working with people that have psychiactric disabilities… they aren’t healthy… they are still sick, and I am not talking about living with depression, but over comming it. I have seen it time and time again, including myself… that a person will remain depressed until they decide to REALLY do seomthing about (that doesn’t mean get a perscription or just going ot the psychiatrist, althought hte psychiatrist mgith help). Change the way they live, become iengaged in activities, make new friends that take them away from old habits, and most of all just believe that they can be happy again. I suffered from serious depression for 8 years and I am only 20. The only way I was able to over come my depression was by choosing to give the world another chance.

If you deny that this is true then you are just being stubborn.

18

Quite the contrary many of the people I work with do recover from there symptoms. No they do not have to live with their”illness”. What I objected to was your very strong implication that people with depression “bring it on them selves” and if they do not recover it is their fault. What really pisses me off is that we would not even be having this conversation if we were talking about something like cancer, heart disease, or a person confined to a wheel chair. We do not say that people chose to have cancer. Some people recover from cancer while others do not. The same is true with mental illness. There are many people who recover from serious mental illness and go on to lead amazing lives. Unfortunately, not every one recovers. Not everyone recovers from cancer however, we do not say that they “choose not to recover”. I fight for systemic changes every day in hopes that soon everyone will recover from mental illness. It is your comment that people don’t recover because they “choose” not to that I find offensive. Especially when I see people fighting every day, doing everything they can to overcome there symptoms but, are still not getting better.

19

I completely agree with you milod789 :smile:

The only reason it might seem like someone doesn’t want to get better from depression is more to do with them loosing hope and finding it hard to be possitive.

20

i would agree with that.

Sometimes it can be a factor of media too… the depressed walking corpse self mutilation goth scene is popular.

You don’t ahve to do any of that to enjoy NIN or, whatever… though a lot of people who are heavily into that music do tend to fit the stereotypical demographics, there is no avoiding that, the music, in general, caters to those who embody the stereotypical goth traits…

So I mean, if kids were encouraged to be open and talk to each other about their problems, instead of encouraged to be an “individual” by dressing themeslves from the same damn Hot Topic that 5 million other kids shop from, and you know, if we didn’t sort of “embrace” that line of thinking (the self destructive angsty line of thinking) so much, we would see fewer problems.

You can’t deny record labels are evil. They hire bands that sound the same, that write the same lyrics, that apply to money grubbing teens with typical teen problems, typical teen angst… they monopolize media, you can’t escape them, everywhere they go they write whiney punk music about women, or whiney goth music about… suicide… or, whatever… not fitting in… look at me i’m different than everyone else, raaarrrrrrr 3 power chords in a row

You know, kids are exposed to a lot of negative BS and it’s not like they have an open medium, popular music is ■■■■, choose to be a slut like britney spears, or alternatively various pop boy bands… lots of pointlessness there… be all angsty and listen to Nirvana or emo, or goth, or whatever… be all angsty and listen to “punk” (by which I mean pop punk) and hardcore, and emo… and…

you know, what on the radio ISN’T marketed to impressionable idiots that don’t know any better (i know, they technically wouldn’t be idiots then) … granted musicians have to relate to their fans in order to succeede, but we dont’ need a band that rips off another band being ripped off by another band who directly rips off another band who sets a trend set by another band 5 months ago ripping off that band… and so on advertising, media, tv, movies, radio… they kind of show kids how to act…

They see the way kids are on tv and you know they are like “hey i can identify with that” they sort of base themselves on models of behavior that are shoved down their throats… counseling isn’t cool (not that i like most people in the mental health field) talking and working out problems isn’t cool, self analysis isn’t cool, cutting youreslf is cool, whining is cool… moping is cool… rebelling is cool.

this is what the stereotypical teen as pinted by the mass media mind does… the stereotypical teen is not at all mentally healthy on tv, or if he IS mentally healthy guess what he has: he has a girlfriend, he has a cool car, he’s popular, he’s all these things that most people can’t even ■■■■■■■ be.

so…

I don’t know where I’m going with this really, I just felt like talking about it I guess… I clearly hate mainstream media…

You know the shirt that says “You laugh because I’m different, I laugh because you’re all the same?” A COUPLE MILLION OTHER “INDIVIDUALS” BOUGHT THAT MASS PRODUCED SHIRT FROM THAT EXTREMELY TRENDY STORE, TOO… jesus… it’s just a huge circus act really… kids buy it… I used to like that shirt when I was younger… somehow they think they can find individualism in nifty shiny boxes and on MTV, where they are being told how to act.

You know? There’s a stereotype that is attractive to all naive teens, you’re popular? Okay, be a cheerleader… you’re a bit lonely? Turn into a “goth” or a “punk” … you’re smart? You have to be a prep, then… and blah blah blah blah blah…

companies make milions off of the self hatred and loathing and destructive behaviors and patterns of teenagers.

and you know, you aren’t safe at all, from birth you are bombarded with this bullshit and told how to be and how to think and what to wear… I see these little 6-7 year old girls dressing like ■■■■■■■ whores… it’s sickening.