CLEVELAND, Ohio — Have you been having strange dreams lately? If so, you are not alone.
At the start of the pandemic, wild vivid dreams seemed to invade our sleep.
"People walking around with different types of masks, different types of breathing apparatuses. Seeing bodies in the streets, just lying there," said James Huetter of Lakewood, who has reported very strange, disturbing dreams since the onset pandemic.
"They're not nightmares, but they more than once have left me drenched in sweat and having like a real physiological response," said Stephanie Klein who also reports quarantine dreams have wreaked havoc on her sleep too.
Harvard researchers doing a coronavirus dream study found people's fears had morphed into bizarre scenarios during their slumber and shared them on Twitter using the hashtags, #quarantinedream, or #pandemicdream, as well as #coviddream.
"I've just seen dozens and dozens and dozens of every kind of bug in the world attacking the dreamers, swarms of flying insects, masses of worms, and grasshoppers with vampire fangs and bed bugs and everything," reports Deirdre Barrett, a Harvard researcher, and psychologist, about the study's findings.
Other respondents reported images of Tsunamis and lethal injections. These dreams may be disturbing, but sleep psychologists say, not to worry. Anxiety is more than likely, a major cause. And who isn't a little anxious these days?
"It's our brain's way of trying to clean out the files in a way and storing things. We don't have a real understanding of why we dream and that is hard to determine because we are only able to understand what people tell us and what they recall about their dream," explained Dr. Michelle Drerup, a sleep psychologist with the Cleveland Clinic.
Also in play? Many of us are actually getting more sleep these days. As we work from home, the need to get up early for those work commutes has disappeared. So we are getting longer, deeper sleep.
And our viewing habits have changed too. As we spend more time at home, we may be watching more television, especially those streaming services. That new series you are binging before bed could be creeping into your sleep.
"Part of what happens in sleep is to take memories or activities that have happened during the day and integrate them. The hippocampus is working hard to do that. And it creates memories. If what you put in at the last moment is murder, versus home building or a cooking show, or some other show. So as you go to sleep, that's what is going to integrate and it will get into your psyche," explained Dr. Wayne Pernell, a relationship expert who also coaches people on how to get the best rest in order to be productive.
Dr. Pernell recommends having paper and pen by your bed and doing what he calls a "brain dump" before you turn off the lights.
"Most people have quiet time as they wind down for bed and try to get to sleep. And then it's like 'Oh, I forgot that.' Guilt and shame start to show up. Write it down so that you don't have to ruminate on it. It will still be there in the morning.
Having a clear mind before you drift off to sleep can mean sharing fewer dreams with zombies.
RELATED: Weird dreams? We asked an expert