Weird dream again, anxiety

[dancerja77]

So I often have bizarre dreams. And I have sexually based instrusive thoughts because I work with children, and I would NEVER hurt them, but my fears come out and I think horrible things. I've been calmer lately but last nights dream freaked me out. I often have orgasms in my dreams.. idk why and yes I'm a girl. Anyways as soon as it happened, I thought about the little boys name that I watch. It wasn't like I was thinking about him in a sexual way. It was like it just popped In my head with NO relation to what was happening. I am so disgusted and confused by this. I don't understand why this would happen. Maybe because I LOVE the kids so much, and I'm constantly thinking about them, because they are like my own. I would never hurt them, and I'm confused and sick today about all of this.

Side note, when scary fears happen in dreams, are we allowed to safely dismiss them and say it was just a dream? Because I feel like my dreams often don't make sense, but I'm still scared there is more to it.

[MyNameIsTerry]

What sticks out to me is:

- you love them dearly
- you are committed to them
- you know consciously that you would never hard a child

We also know you have anxiety, hence being on here, and you have intrusive thought themes of a sexual nature, which are well known in OCD & depression but can be experienced by anyone.

The issue is your reaction. If you didn't care about these thoughts so much, they would fade.

Would they go altogether? Possibly not. I've sorted my intrusive thoughts twice over the past 5 years and they no longer affect me but I still get them sometimes. Now they flash through with an intuitive "meh" after them.

As far as dreams go, you can't control them and they mean nothing. Your subconscious is just working it's way through things to prepare your mind for the next day. Think of it this way - if you spend your day worrying about things, aren't they bound to pop up in your dreams during the time the subconscious is busy doing it's "filing"?

What matters is your deep beliefs and your schemas. These are the whole reason you are even reacting with negative emotions like shame or guilt or fear. People who enjoy harming people don't have deep beliefs guiding them which were built early on in life, hence they are strongly linked to our identity, because they don't believe it is wrong. They built deep beliefs about it being ok. So, they harm people.

I've known violent people. Do they react with fear & remorse? Yes...when they are caught or are in front of a judge pleading for a lower sentence. I've known violent people who would be laughing when they were harming someone on the floor or uploading it for their mates. Does this sound like the type of person who worries about harming someone?