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A
Glossary of Dream and Sleep-Related Terms
Apnea
- a disorder that affects breathing during sleep. Apnea can be life-threatening
by cutting off your breath and putting strain on the heart.
Bes
- the ancient Egyptian god of dreams
Bruxism
- the grinding of the teeth during sleep.
Circadian
Rhythm - the synchronized action of the
body's impulse to stay awake and fall asleep.
Conscious
- the waking mind policed by ethics, morality, rights and wrong. It self-imposes
rules, restrictions, and regulates action and behavior
Defense
Mechanism - a psychological term used to
describe ways in which we protect ourselves from fear and anxiety.
Deja
Vu - the peculiar feeling that a place,
situation, person, action, or conversation is familiar and has already been
experienced.
Ego
- from the Freudian school of thought, the conscious
part of one's personality that experiences the external world.
Enuresis
- bedwetting. It is unrelated to dreaming as it
occurs during non-REM stage of sleep where dream activity is low or
non-existent..
False
Awakening -
a sensation of waking and going about your morning routine when in fact you are
still dreaming. Occurs more frequently in lucid dreamers.
Hypnogogic
State - the neurological mechanism in our
brain that temporarily disables voluntary muscle movement when we are dreaming.
It is also commonly referred to as "REM Paralysis".
Id
- from the Freudian school of thought, the
unconscious part of personality centered around pleasure and desire .
Insomnia-
difficulty in falling asleep. waking up repeatedly
or very early.
Latent
Content - the underlying meaning behind
the symbols in a dream.
Lucid
Dreaming - the ability to consciously
alter the content and control the actions in your dreams.
Manifest
Content - the literal story and symbols
of a dream
Morpheus
- known in Greek mythology as the god of dreams.
Myoclonic
Jerk - sudden muscle spasms in
extremities.
Narcolepsy
- a sleep disorder characterized by being able to
fall asleep without warning and immediately going into REM.
Night
Terrors - severe sleep disturbances
occurring in non-REM sleep that produce feelings of deep fear, panic and
anxiety. Night terrors are not categorized as dreams.
Nocturnal
Emissions - also known as wet dreams and
occurs in males at around puberty. It is often, but not necessarily accompanied
by a sexually explicit dream.
NREM
- stands for non Rapid Eye Movement,
Oneirocritica
- derived from Greek terminology to mean "dream
interpretation".
Prodromal
Dream - a dream that signals that an
impending disease may afflict your body.
REM
- standing for Rapid Eye Movement, it describes the
stage of sleep where our eyes move rapidly back and forth. This is where the
majority of dreaming occurs.
Somnambulism
- sleep walking. This phenomenon most likely occurs
in those between the ages of 10 to 14 who are under tremendous stress.
Somniloquy
- more commonly known as sleep talking - talking out
loud while asleep. People who are under stress tend to be more likely to talk in
their sleep.
Superego
- from the Freudian school of thought, the censor
which enforces moral codes for the ego and suppresses or blocks unacceptable
impulses from the id.
Unconscious
- thoughts, memories, impulses, desires, and
feelings which we are not aware of but influence our emotions and behavior in
some subtle way.
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