The Nightmare And The Number 2

A while back I had been reading about people who have, what I would call, nightmares. These are ones which feature a dark or black cloaked figure, usually thought of as being male.

I read of dozens of similar cases where this figure is often in the corner of the room or sometimes floats above the person having the 'nightmare'. Most describe the figure as being evil. One woman wrote, "It reeks pure evil and I just know it’s there to hurt or kill me. I have never felt such fear in all my life."

Another woman told of how, "I find myself sitting straight up screaming. Should my husband try to grab my arm or wake me up, it just makes it worse. I have kicked, scratched and hit him. He's a 250 pound man and I only weigh 120 but I have kicked him clear off the bed and onto the floor thinking he was someone trying to attack me."

What made me write about this is, because of something I read about the number 2 in association with such an experience, an example being:

"Also for some reason the number 2 seems to play a prominent role, with some dreams starting with me fixated over the impression that I am surrounding with a great number of people before that number becomes divided down into two, as in me and the presence."

I have only ever had one nightmare in myself. It was as a child of 4 or 5 but is still imprinted on my mind. I dreamt that I was being chased by the number 2! I remember my mother afterwards telling me how I was standing up in my bed pointing to the corner of the room where I was insistent that a number 2 was coming to get me. To this day, I can still remember how terrified I was of that number 2.

Fortunately, though, I have nothing against the number 2 nowadays!

It's fascinating though, how many people have dreams / nightmares / night terrors about evil dark figures and how sometimes a number 2 is involved.

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Choose The Right Cheese To Dream Of Love, Nostalgia And Wacky Things

Forgive me, I'm off on a tangent today. I think it's because I'm trying to cut down on cheese - one of my favourite foods - and I find myself seeing cheese everywhere!

Back when I was a child I was always told that I mustn't eat cheese before going to bed, as it would give me nightmares. But, according to the British Cheese Board, this isn't true:

"A British Cheese Board study asked 200 volunteers to eat 20 grams of hard cheese about half an hour before they went to bed. None of the participants experienced nightmares, in fact most recorded a good night's sleep with pleasant dreams. Interestingly the type of dream experienced appeared to be influenced by the type of cheese eaten."

All well and good, but there's been more research on this important issue (well, it must be important to someone, somewhere). This time research was carried out at the Middlesex University. Professor Ian Hindmarch, said:

"The relationship between cheese and sleep is a particularly complex one, but it was interesting to see that the study suggested no causal relationship between eating cheese and nightmares"

Being a lover of British cheeses this is good news for me. But it does appear from the study that different cheeses have different effects on sleep and dreams. A few examples:

• Eating Somerset Brie will make you drop off to the Land of Nod quickly and you are then likely to have abstract dreams about love.
• Munching of Red Leicester will make your dreams more vivid.
• Stilton will make you sleep more deeply.
• But, interestingly, if you are still with me, Cheshire stops you dreaming! Or maybe it just helps you to forget them.
• Red Leicester seemed to be produce very nostalgic dreams that people were having about things that happened in their childhood or with their families

And a couple of dreams caused by Blue Stilton, which were the nearest to being nightmares: One of the volunteers said that she dreamed of a vegetarian crocodile who was upset because he couldn't eat children. And another one dreamed that they had soldiers fighting with each other with kittens instead of guns. Sound pretty normal to me!

So, why the variations on dreaming to what type of cheese you eat? Tryptophan is the said to be the answer.

Tryptophan is one of the amino acids found in cheese and has positive effects on mood and sleep. It could well be that the different effects of various cheeses on dreams and sleep are due directly to the effects of this substance.

Professor Ian Hindmarch concluded, "Overall, this study suggests that in changing the levels of tryptophan, cheese can assist in improving our mood and help to promote a good night’s sleep."

And not part of the study in any way was Natasha Mukhina, but she reached a conclusion about another cheese: "I've noticed that each time I eat Stilton blueberry cheese I have wacky dreams. Just last night I dreamt of a building flooding and I get on the elevator, on my way up I see floating heads... I'm pretty sure that I met the Charlie's Angels too..."

I've therefore added Stilton blueberry cheese to this weeks shopping list!

Dreamy cheese - or maybe not - with my favourite: a strong, English Mature Cheddar. Heaven!

"Cheddar originated from Somerset around the late 12th Century and took its name from the Gorge or caves in the town of Cheddar that were used to store the cheese. The constant temperature and humidity of the caves provided a perfect environment for maturing the cheese. The town also gave its name to a unique part of the cheese-making process – known as Cheddaring - which is the process of turning the slabs of curd and piling them on top of each other in a controlled way to help drain the whey.It also stretches the curd. The process helps to create a harder cheese with firm body and is unique to Cheddar making." Source

Okay, that's enough cheese for today.

P.S. One more, just remembered, when Karin was a teenager in Germany she had to milk sheep for cheese making while at agricultural college. She was obviously meant to be a farmer's wife but somehow ended up with me.

More Dream Posts:
Ancient Egyptians And Their World Of Dreams
Evil Nightmares And The Number 2
10 Story Posts Featuring Dreams