Yes, I do. I am 58 years old and have had nightmares since I was 3 years old. I am now a chronic insomniac. The nightmares are from both sexual abuse, and from psychological abuse and cruelty. I feel as though I am past the sexual abuse, and can let it go now, but the psychological cruelty has done extreme damage. Being a very strong person, I survived, however. I take pride that I've survived and raised two children to be good, decent people, on my own. These later years are for me to find joy wherever I can. I did see a professional over a year ago, in my middle 50's. His idea was to spend however much time (probably years) digging into the memories to relive them so I could 'heal' from them. I don't know that this is necessarily the right thing for all abuse survivors. I have a mild heart condition as a result of a difficult life with more than one trauma, and also suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I felt his ideal was impractical. If I didn't suffer from cardiac arrest during a revelation, and lived long enough to be 'cured' I would most likely be in my 60's. To do what? Get my degree by 68 or 69, and start a new career? Marry, start another family....? I now accept that I am what and who I"ve become from all the circumstances that made me this way, good or bad. I take pride in the strength it took for me to be where I am. I live in relative peace and find joys in little things. I work on my self improvement in many ways, on my own terms, without outside stress. However, the nightmares are a part of my life. But now, Instead of laying in bed unable to sleep for hours in a dark room which leads to ruminating and eventual depression, not to mention eventual nightmares, I leave the lights on, grab a good book or go online, or occasionally even exercise. I work around it, and not fight it in order to conform to the 'norm'. I don't survive on pills to sleep, which will lead to who knows what kind of medical problems in a decade or so. The bad dreams are a fact of life. I work at adding good things into my days to balance the bad nights. I don't believe we can always be 'fixed'. I think we have to work with what we've got. Talk or blog about it, over and over till you reach the next step, which is acceptance of yourself, then the realization that's theres lots of you no one could squash, then fight for your health and improved life and do whatever you can for that purpose. Don't do what others expect of you, do what you think you can, and don't listen to others who may not see your small gains. I've started having good dreams, and nights without the bad. A younger person would probably do better, and have a good part of his/her life actually happy.

Okay, that didn't sound the way I meant it. Too gloomy. lol. I meant, someone younger will have more years to practice healing and perhaps have a large portion of their life be fulfilling. As for me I can say I'm pretty happy now. Slightly messed up, yes, but happy.

**Should probably put a trigger warning on this**I actually recently wrote about one of the reoccurring nightmares that I have in a ds journal entry. The dreams take place in different houses where I remember running from my step dad (who was the one who sexually abused me). I'm usually the same age I am now instead of 4-7. I run around the house hoping he wont catch me, and when he finally does, I manage to break away long enough to find something to stab him with. The whole thing plays out like some kind of George A. Romero cult classic with low budget corn syrup blood and layered latex flesh for that peeling effect. There's nothing I can do. I stab his eyes out, and he still knows where I am. I slash away at tendons, and he still has perfect control over all limbs. I sever main arteries, and he's aok, seemingly invincible. I usually know it's a dream, and I try to leave myself objects to help myself. It doesn't work. I just run around waiting to wake up.

The other, far less violent dreams I have (kinda) are of being my current age but still living at home. One day I come back from school or work and he's at our dinner table, my mother catering to him as usual. I usually say something like "but why, mom?" She tells me to be quiet and respect my elders. The adults are talking now. I do my best not to cry at the table and eventually lose it. I get up and throw a glass across the room and start yelling. "What kind of mother does this? You KNOW what he did to me. How can you go back to how it was before?" They both look at me like some insolent brat. My mother says something about how he served his time and as a Christian, she's forgiven him. She tells me I should do the same. At this point I either run out of the house in no particular direction with no particular destination until I wake up or I reach across the table and start to strangle him. The same effect as before, nothing. Sometimes he even laughs at my pathetic attempt to take him out. He looks over at my mom and says," Gloria! Can't you DO something about your DAUghter?" In the stern, authoritative tone she only ever used with me, she says, "Estephanie! Stop!", over and over again in Spanish. Sometimes she pleads, "do it for ME!"

I guess the first kind of dream is mostly about helplessness. The second one is about my position as subordinate to everything in the family. My needs, wants, curiosities, and opinions always came last, and when I happened to snap and show some kind of anger, it wasn't understood. My mom could never figure out why I was such a bad, irrational, trouble-making, authority-challenging child. What I did never made sense to her, and she acted like I was just needlessly trying to ruin her life with my feelings for my own selfish amusement.

I have lots of reoccurring nightmares. I have one where the horse I am riding (who was a dearly beloved horse I rode when I was an adolescent) crumples underneath me, when I dismount I find that both his hind legs have broken, and I start crying for help. There are all the people I cared for around me, all my abusers, but no one helps. A few are laughing. After a length of time of me begging and pleading, one brings me a gun, and tells me if I love him, I will put him out of his misery. And I shoot my horse, as he screams in pain and looks to me for help. I always wake up shaking from that one.
I have another where my sexual abuser has me cornered in some house, and is tearing off my clothes while he tells me "I know you like it, quit fighting me!" Over and over, but a strange man walks in and pulls him off of me, and walks me out into the sunshine. Sometimes, sometimes he doesn't come, and I just relive the rape all over. Usually I have this one a few times in a row, until I wake up.
I have another nightmare, of my mother. She is ho;ding me while I am crying, but I don't know why. She is muttering sweet things to me, "it's ok, it will be ok, your ok" etc. But then she grabs me by my hair and pulls me off of her, slaps me and tells me to shut up, grow up, and stop crying like a baby. I have this one a lot.
And I have one that happens to take place with my son. He comes to me, and he must be about 15? Or so. He tells me I am worthless, and that he finally understands why everyone hates me, and he never wants to see me again, and he leaves, and I cry.
And here recently I have been having one of my SO, I come home from riding and he is there, but he is loading all his stuff into his truck. I ask him what is going on, and he looks at me and says "I quit, I can't do this anymore, you are just to much trouble to deal with. I don't love you anymore." And he gets in his truck and drives off, and I chase him, crying, but he won't stop.
Thats about it. All my other nightmares are just random clips of the abuse I went through, literal memories. More often then not though, I don't dream, or don't remember my dreams if I do. I usually wake up right after a nightmare and can't sleep for a few days. I wish I could make them stop.
I guess most of mine are abandonment related! LOL!

I have nightmares that are symbolic of the abuse I suffered and the fears that I have.

All of my dreams are nightmares in one way or another. Either I'm being made to feel more worthless by those around me, being marginalized, screamed at, whatever. Even the "positive" dreams where I get held/comforted by someone make me feel worse because they give me a taste something I can't have but desperately need. There is no area of my life where I feel accepted or liked, and it's always reflected in my dreams. The best I can hope for is to be useful when needed and forgotten the rest of the time.

I have a lot of bad dreams too. I suppose they're mostly nightmares, since nothing good ever happens and I'm always anxious and struggling to find my way home or I've lost my car and can't find it. I dreamed recently of being sexually assaulted by a middle-aged, obese man who pinned me with his fleshy body against something and laughed at my struggles to get him off me.

I just assume that my dreams reflect the train wreck of my waking life, and I doubt if I will ever have good dreams...not while things keep going so wrong for me all the time in my waking life. That's not likely to change anytime soon. Some of it probably reflects all the abuse and neglect I endured in childhood, and that's something that will always be part of me.

My dreams vary. Some times it will be a a short flashback of my abuse, but they're usually more obscure. I'll be running from someone/thing, or something odd will happen, etc. and they sort of lead into random 'scenes' of things that terrify me or are just bizarre or strange. Very few of them are sexual in nature, but I still feel the same fear (heart racing, labored breathing, panic) from some of these 'unrelated scenes' that I do when triggered, sometimes even more so. Oddly enough, I've found myself having certain dreams that I haven't had in a few months or years, but they seem to reoccur and I know I've had them before. They seem completely unrelated to my abuse, but I have the feeling they aren't, not completely.

Some of the tips offered by members here at DS have been helping me relax and fall back asleep, though! And I tend to daydream about whatever I'm writing at the moment a lot, so my mind's 'default' when feeling stressed is to go through plotlines and whatnot. I think that forcing myself to imagine happier situations that I definitely have complete control over helps foster happier or more neutral dreams.