Is it normal to dream a lot?

Answer 1

I have been a sleep therapist for 5 years and have studied under the best doctors at MUSC teaching hospital. You dream in a period(or stage, there are four: N1, N2, N3, REM) during sleep called "REM" (rapid eye movement). Every single person on the planet, along with many other animals go through REM. In fact 95% of people go through REM 4-5 times a night, every night, for their entire lives. Each period of REM can last between 5 minutes and sometimes up to an hour and a half, and it is normal to have multiple dreams during each REM period! That adds up to 50 or 60 different dreams every single night of your entire life! But remembering them is another story. It is argued that the better quality sleep you get you remember less of your dreams. It has been proven that if you do not commit a dream to memory upon waking that it disappears from memory. From my personal experience I have formulated this: people tend to remember the one or two dreams they had right before waking up, and have a much easier time remembering them if they wake up directly out of REM, but so far I have seen no correlation between age, sex, race, or quality of sleep and remembering one's dreams.

Answer 2

Sleep researchers have observed that most subjects go through the stages of sleep about every 90 to 100 minutes, averaging somewhere around 8 or 9 full cycles each night. But there might be several dreams in each full cycle, including dreams in non-REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. So it is impossible to pinpoint exactly how many dreams someone might have in one night. Moreover, individuals are as unique in their dreaming habits as they are in every other way.

Answer 3

Yes, it is quite normal to dream numerous times during each night.