Based in Philadelphia, serving clients across Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Vermont
Treatment for Nightmares
Peaceful Sleep is Possible
You aren’t doomed to a never ending cycle of fear and fatigue.
It’s yet another evening of dreading bedtime.
It makes sense. Of course, you want to avoid yet another frightening dream, waking up trembling, yelling, or shaking, with a racing heart.
Who wouldn’t want to avoid that?
It’s the same 1-3 nightmares over and over again, and you remember them all too well. When it happens, you jolt awake and you may not even try to return to sleep as you fear going right back into the nightmare.
These chronic nightmares are so distressing, you may have started:
Sleeping with the lights on and television on.
Staying alert at bedtime
Drinking to try to avoid nightmares, only for them to rebound later
Trying to distract yourself with TikTok, TV or video games
Becoming increasingly anxious at bedtime no matter how much you try to relax beforehand
Feeling out of control, powerless, unsafe, and fearful - like you can’t trust yourself or anyone else
Maybe you talked to a doctor about it but it was met with a puzzled look - and prescribed sleeping medication.
Perhaps you worked hard in trauma therapy and found relief in the daytime, but symptoms at night and sleep problems stuck around.
It’s taking over your entire life, not just your nights. You’re fearful when you go to sleep and depressed when you wake up.
You’re exhausted and drink more and more coffee just to stay awake.
You sometimes fall asleep during the day and it feels like the only decent sleep you get.
You want to be there for your friends, spouse and children, but feel increasingly hopeless that you will ever be able to sleep through the night - or feel normal again?
You didn’t even know there was anything that could be done about nightmares. You hoped it would have gone away on its own by now but …. it’s still sticking around.
Nightmare therapy can help you reclaim your nights… and your days.
Imagine a world where that nightmare fades and becomes less frequent. You feel more focused and engaged during the day, allowing you to be more present in your relationships, less afraid of the night and ready to take on the day again - in just 6 weeks.
When someone has chronic nightmares, they’re often stuck in a vicious cycle of sleep deprivation, daytime stress, avoidance and nightmares.
Therapy for nightmares helps by breaking this vicious cycle, for good.
This isn’t a sleeping pill or another standalone relaxation exercise. It helps address the nightmares directly.
Nightmares are treatable. I’ll support you in several ways:
Education about nightmares, so you can feel empowered to understand what’s going on – and how to break the cycle.
Improve sleep using targeted, effective strategies.
Most importantly, this therapy targets the nightmare directly by:
identifying themes,
creating a new dream script and
rewriting the nightmare, which gives the mind new storylines, emotions and experience while asleep instead of the nightmare.
Similar to the way athletes visualize their performance before a competition, you’ll be practicing a new dream.
Therapy for nightmares can help you…
Regain a sense of control
Trust your body and brain again
Relax in the evenings, effortlessly
Improve your relationships
Sleep peacefully at night
You may be wondering, why haven’t I heard about this treatment before?
It’s here, it works, let’s get started.
Frequently asked questions about Nightmare Therapy.
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A: Nightmare therapy goes beyond the basics. While relaxation exercises can be a helpful tool, they’re not always enough on their own to address the issue. Nightmare therapy includes talking about the nightmare directly and “rescripting” it to create a new scenario for the dream.
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A: This treatment is quite brief and can be completed in just 6 sessions.
I use Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Nightmares and Exposure Relaxation and Rescripting therapy which are both effective, short treatments for nightmares.
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A: No, This is specifically to help people reduce nightmares. While there can be very interesting and fruitful conversations about the meaning of dreams, I’m not the therapist to help with that.
This is for you if…
You have nightmares or well-remembered distressing dreams once a week or more that:
Cause you to wake up
Have repeating themes or you have the same few nightmares over and over again
Cause problems in your life
Lead to upsetting emotions such as guilt, shame or fear.
Schedule a free consultation to learn more about the process.
This is not for you if…
You have stressful dreams occasionally, less than once per week that:
Don’t wake you up, you sleep through them and remember them later
Don’t repeat or have similar themes- they’re different each time
Don’t cause too much of a problem in your life. In other words, they don’t bother you that much.
If this is you, and you struggle with sleep, you may benefit more from CBT-I therapy. Click here to learn more
Never hesitate to reach out for a free consultation, If I’m not the right fit, I have a broad network of trusted colleagues who can help
Still have questions?