I am in my upper 60's and had a nightmare this morning about being on a mission again. Sigh... How can this be so entrenched in my mind that it affects me 45 years later? I have not had this nightmare for a few years and it now reappears. The tentacles of this cult do run deep. Being an introvert and the 2 years of knocking on doors, with no success, seriously depressed me. I felt a failure and struggled with self esteem while being an active Mormon. I took Mormonism and the mission seriously, which was a mistake.

I took the wife to the airport this morning. The dream woke me an hour earlier than I had planned. I made some coffee, a simple breakfast and sat by the fireplace to relax before the drive to the airport. I feel for those of you who have to deal with Mormonism on a daily basis. A dream was enough to disturb me.

In Jana Reiss' book, she noted that man participants in the survey volunteered that they had flashback missionary dreams. She had already created the questionaire at that point, so she wasn't able to formally include it in her survey, but said it came up frequently enough that she felt she should mention it.

I have flashback missionary dreams too. I started asking friends about it and I think it's a near universal experience. Some of my flashback missionary dreams are good, others are distressing because in the dream I abandon my family and my vocation to return to my mission at my current age.

I have these dreams in clusters. A whole bunch within a few weeks of each other and then I might go a year or two before they return again.

I would love to see a sociologist look into this about how frequently they occur. I would guess that a majority of RM's have them.

FWIW, I am an active, NOM- believing member, which may affect how I experience these in contrast to OP who I assume is ExMo.

Eric K Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> A dream was
> enough to disturb me.

I used to have the mission dreams all the time. Regular mediation has really helped with dream things that bother me. They don't occur frequently anymore.

Same...probably get those dreams 2-3x per year, but always I am in the mission field, wandering about on foot or bike thinking to myself, "No God, No, I can't do this again.." The feeling is depression, anxiety, and doom in the dream. I am in my mid-50's.

Everyone one of mine deals with anxiety, restlessness and despair. I would honestly be tickled to death if I had just one; that was of a positive nature. "Hey, I am getting paid 100.00 an hour to tract, get rained on and be chased by vicious dogs."

Nope, every one has entailed an angry church leader, the task of improbability and a logistic nightmare. I had one where there was a room of people/families waiting for me to baptize them, but there was no one to witness the baptisms. The people became tired of waiting and I was running (somehow ~ ha ha) after them. Pretty pathetic.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/13/2019 02:13PM by messygoop.

I have been plagued all my life with the back on the mission dreams. It's been almost five years this time which is the longest ever.

Just goes to show how deep that experience goes into the psyche which isn't about to let go of it for anything. We were very impressionable at 19. Yanked out of our environment. Cut off from everything we knew. Obedient, controlled, to the point of going against our own nature and who we really were. We were tricked into being our own traitors? All cult tactics. Of course that goes deep.

I just hate those damn dreams. The only other recurrent dreams I have are those with Satan attacking me--courtesy of stories told by my Aaronic priesthood teacher.

One of the finds on RFM that delighted me was that I wasn't the only person who had those dreams. In fact, they were common as dirt. I rarely have those dreams, and they are usually set in Zona Sul (Ipanema and environs) part of Rio de Janeiro. I really wasn't there for very long, but it makes a really nice backdrop for a dream, even if it is otherwise a nightmare. :)

Did you meet the girl from Ipanema? I'm jealous!

They were in the tens of thousands of girls from ipanema. Buses on Saturday mornings were packed with teens heading to the beaches (which are enormous beaches), and it was 1967. The height of Bossa Nova. I don't even want to think about the missed opportunities.

I've been back twice since, and will probably make one more trip. The level of crime gives me pause, but that is true in a lot of places, and if you are careful, you are generally OK. It is always possible to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Imagine if you had been there a few years before. There's no telling whom you may have met!

https://www.today.com/news/brazilian-beauty-meet-woman-who-inspired-girl-ipanema-t101592

There are medications for unwanted upsetting dreams. Look into it. One is called Minipress, generic is Prazosin.

I was on Prazosin for a while after escaping from my abusive starter marriage. It worked.

hahahaha! "Starter marriage..."

I like that! Were training wheels involved?

if there were, I bet they were well oiled.

The wheels on the Buick went up and down, up and down, up and down...

Well, add me to the list.

I suffered through those for decades. It's been a while since I remember one, and I suffer from recurrent dreams constantly.

The "back on the mish" one was the worst. Later, I would have the viewpoint of exmo, so the idea that I was on a mission as an exmo in Japan really did pique my interest and I looked forward to some real skulduggery but would wake before I could implement any subversive works.

Usually, when one of my recurrent dreams comes true in a physical fashion, they end abruptly. This won't be one of those.

Very sorry to those of you who have mission nightmares.

I so detest the Mormon youth missionary system which is an evil indoctrination tool aimed at trusting, hopeful youth who have no idea they are being used and taken advantage of.

You're very much not alone in this.

https://www.exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1431136

Of the many I've had (returned 37 yrs ago; I'm 59), I still recall two dreams vividly – one was actually pretty good, the other creepy and unnerving as all hell. Maybe I'll write 'em up some day.

I once read an article that recounted nightmares of major league baseball players. The most common involved the player arriving late to the game, driving around and around the stadium and not being able to find a gate or other entrance, and feeling rising panic while hearing his name being announced over the PA in the starting lineup. Safe to say I'll never have *that* particular nightmare.

I never had recurring mission dreams, good or bad, but then I wasn't traumatized by the experience....I enjoyed it very much.

I have two recurring bad dreams quite regularly.....

Dream 1) I need to catch a plane for business travel. I'm either going abroad or I'm going home from abroad. I know I have to leave in time to get to the airport, but I just don't seem to get going, then the clock indicates that I have 15 minutes until the flight leaves and I can't make it on time....or I'm in the airport and I can't find my travel documents, or I can't find an open check-in counter, etc.

Dream 2) I'm in my home and I know some people are coming to harm me. Sometimes I know what time they will arrive, sometimes I don't. While waiting for them, I find one of my handguns, but I can't find any bullets. Or I find the gun and bullets, but later on, I don't have the bullets any more. Or I have the gun and bullets, but the gun won't fire or I can't hit what I aim at. The dream typically ends when I see the people creeping outside my home or I hear them entering and I posture myself for the attack. Sometimes I try and yell to scare them off, but only a whisper comes out....and about that time my wife wakes me up because I was tossing and moaning in bed. The attack never really happens...I maybe had one dream I was shooting at them, but couldn't hit them.

These two nightmares you have are actually common, I’ve had both as well, except in the second one I don’t have a gun (I’m British). Apparently the one with the airport or travelling, forgetting passport, etc, is a sign that a person is frustrated and feeling trapped (makes sense). Second one I don’t know, but with me the people get in, and then I literally experience sleep paralysis and it all feels very real. Sounds, touch, etc. (Mormons call this Satan visiting you but it’s actually an hallucination). Most frightening nightmare I’ve ever had.

My mission nightmares are about going out on a 2nd mission as the person that I am now. This is very bizarre because I know it is a sham yet there I am.

Other types of dreams I have where certain old mormon friends confront me, expecting me to straighten my life out in some manner.

In reality, I once returned home from a flight into SLC airport and as I walked passed the missionary welcome home signs, I noticed an old member of a bishopbric, who starred me down. I walked past hoping he wouldn't notice me, but yet he did. I ignored him and walked past, feeling somewhat shamed. He only knew me when I was an active TBM superstar. It was many years later while attending a different ward that I strayed, eventually divorcing, and starting a whole new life.

How about a new angle?

I never served a mission but I used to have periodic nightmares of suddenly being called to serve one.

Me too! I guess I've been hanging out here too long. Anyway, it was only the once.
I dreamt I was about to go out street knocking, when I burst into tears and tell my senior comp that I don't believe any of it, and I can't do it any longer. SC was very soothing and understanding. Then I woke up of a sudden.

I wonder if the mission dreams are related to anxiety? Perhaps you are feeling anxious about something else, and that triggers a mission dream? I still get the occasional school anxiety dream (i.e. I have a paper or test due for a class that I haven't attended all semester.) I also have occasional dreams in which I am trying to find my way around NYC.

I haven't had a return to mission nightmare for many years. However, I've had several more recent traumas that I dream of often. I wouldn't recommend those traumas as a remedy for mission nightmares ;-)

I get these dreams too, that I'm going back at my age to go door to door once again with a wobbly bicycle that's broken down in a big city, a dingy basement apartment that's dark with all the 1990's kind of décor and cheap tackiness, dirty dishes in the sink, and dampness everywhere, Just like it is in the South. And I'm suppose to go tracting in the hood again.

I was serious about my mission but not whipped into submission. I always knew I was a volunteer and they should feel lucky to have me just trying my best.

I'm also an introvert and it was never my style to push myself on others. I quietly offered my testimony but retreated when it was not desired.

I remember listening to a returned missionary sister talking to someone at BYU. She had been back quite awhile, at least a year, and was bemoaning that she had not baptized/converted anyone on her mission. She felt like a total failure and it was destroying her happiness.She was having a hard time moving forward with her life.

I wonder if those fakes at the top of LDS, Inc. know how much damage they are doing to good people who are just trying to do their best in this world.

I have them regularly too. Both about the ghost of mission past and the nightmare of being forced to go back. I won’t say I only have bad memories of the mish, but the bad stuff is pretty traumatizing. The good part for me is that it was scary enough that it launched my exit just 9 months after I got home. As far as dealing with the nightmare - I suggest therapy. And talking about here is good too. Makes me feel like I’m not crazy for having the dark dreams. Or we’re all crazy for having them. I vote for the former.

I've commented on this before so I'm sorry if this is repetitive. I got quite sick on my mission, and we had just changed mission presidents, the new mission president did not want to have any missionaries go home early, so he locked me up for about 3 weeks in the mission home trying to convince me to stay, while I got sicker and sicker. After I came home I had dreams several times a year that I was being ordered to go back and finish the remaining months of my mission, even though I was married, and later even when I had a job and kids and lots of responsibility.
I would wake up agitated and in a cold sweat, worse than reliving being in a car accident or seeing a friend killed on his motorcycle. Hard to understand why they were so unsettling.

Anyway I met several exmos from myu mission country online (the first one was here, and others from exmo facebook groups.) I took my wife to visit my old mission, we didn't go just for that, it's a country with amazing scenic beauty and historical sites (none of which I was allowed to visit while I was a missionary). We took in all of the sites and museums we wanted, and also visited my districts in three different cities, walked by the old apartments, visited some of my favorite spots in town and on the National Holiday, I had a great meeting with several exmos who I had met online, and we had sort of a exmo non-testimony meeting. I'm still friends with most of these folks, and the cathartic release of visiting my old districts exercised the dream demon. Now when I dream of my mission country in my mission language it's about putting together kayaking or ski trips with my exmo friends. I'm thinking of inviting a couple of my former companions ... not sure how they would react though.

I didn’t serve a mission (female, adult convert and a mother) but this topic caught my interest because even ten years after resigning I have nightmares about being mormon. They’re not very frequent but it tends to be the similar dream each time. For some reason I decide to go back to church, and unlike in real life, I fit in so well no one knows I’m an ex-Mormon, except the bishop. I start to enjoy it for what it is even though I don’t believe and somehow this is acceptable (and possible). Yet I’m a little on edge the whole time. Then I finally meet the man of my dreams at church and i get so comfortable that I totally forget myself that I’m no longer Mormon, except at the times I see the bishop looking at me. Then I realise I will have to tell this dude I’m actually an apostate and I realise I’m going to lose everything again, but this time it won’t be my own choice and I will be rejected as well as alone still.
Then I wake up in a cold sweat.
Just as well I have a therapist. Seriously, how does my subconscious come up with this shit? I’be never thought any such thing when awake! I never miss it and I’d never go back plus I was never comfortable in church.
This nightmare is basically the complete opposite of everything I experienced in real life in church. It is really horrible and disturbing.
We are all traumatised.

Me too!! I am now 78 and I still get that nightmare occasionally. When I was younger it happened a lot. There were different versions of it but always included my finding out after the dream started that it was another mission. That was usually enough to wake me up right there. Even in my active church years I dreaded the thought that I would have to serve a senior mission.

I got invited to a mission reunion last year, but I just couldn't bring myself to go. I was afraid those damn dreams would start again.

I think it’s been a few years since I had one. Like some of you I am my present age (now 60) in the dream. The setting is some dingy apartment and I have just started the two year trek. I am a non-believer but there is no way to bug out.

The irony is that I had a great mission experience (but I was TBM then)...it’s just that I would not want to do it again.

I'm always my present age, too. And, I can't figure out what I'm doing there, again because I know who I am now. And I'm aware that I am there *again.* And I feel this ENORMOUS pressure to do what I don't now what I am supposed to do. The anxiety that comes with the situation is awful.

which was not a good thing. I tried and tried to figure out why I was still there as I obviously had done everything it took to graduate and why were all my "friends" already done with high school.

Then my kids graduated--especially my son. Getting him through school was a chore!!! I ended up paying him $5 a day to go to school and he got to decide which days he didn't go. My dad was a school teacher and was really hard on us kids, but he told me to let up on my son. I told my son the above and then I told him I expected him to graduate, and he did. He had to take extra classes (wouldn't have had to if I hadn't had him in seminary for 1-1/2 years), but he graduated.

One HUGE chore with my son down. Didn't know I'd have so many more to go.

That mission certainly was a traumatic experience to haunt you this way.

Wish I had some easy advice to wipe it from your dreams for good.

I wish I understood enough psychology to know whether these dreams, which trouble so many of us, reflect PTSD or anything like that. There has to be an explanation for why such an unusual pattern is so widespread in a single community.

I had return to mission dreams for decades. Sometimes I returned and had to be the 3rd missionary in a former two companionship. Finally in my '60s they stopped. Or else I just returned and had to go back to college and couldn't find the books or the classroom.

Now I dream I can't find a bathroom when I really need it. And if I find one, there is a really long line, or else the toilet is missing.

Can't wait to see what my next decade has in store.

I’m 64 and I still have those dreams. PTSD

I have temple nightmares. Usually with family slicing their own throats and acting like its normal adult behavior.

Maybe it depends upon your mission president. I had a very liberal one who didn’t enforce hardly any of the rules. It was a fun place to be so I don’t have bad memories of it. We actually had missionaries dating and becoming engaged to the local girls while on their mission. At the time I thought it was crazy. Now I realize the mission president was smarter than some of the others I have read about since I have been home.