Trauma and Dreams

278 Pages·1996·1.2 MB·English

by  Deirdre Barrett (editor)

Trauma and Dreams

Trauma and Dreams
edited by deirdre barrett
harvard university press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England
Copyright © 1996 by the President and Fellows
of Harvard College
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
Second printing, 2001
First Harvard University Press paperback edition, 2001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Trauma and dreams / edited by Deirdre Barrett.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-674-90552-0 (cloth)
ISBN 0-674-00690-9 (pbk.)
1. Dreams. 2. Post-traumatic stress syndrome.
3. Psychic trauma. 4. Nightmares. 5. Dream inter-
pretation. I. Barrett, Deirdre.
RC489.D74T73 1996
616.85′21—dc20 96-13023
To our research subjects and psychotherapy clients,
whose collective experience may guide those who
cope with and treat trauma in the future

Contents
CCoonntteennttss
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
deirdre barrett
Part One Dreams after Childhood Trauma
1 Children’s Traumatic Dreams 9
kathleen nader
2 Dreams and Nightmares of Burned Children 25
frederick j. stoddard, david s. chedekel, and
laura shakun
3 Identifying Sexual Trauma Histories from Patterns of Sleep
and Dreams 46
kathryn belicki and marion cuddy
4 The Use of Dreams with Incest Survivors 56
johanna king and jacqueline r. sheehan
5 Dreams in Multiple Personality Disorder 68
deirdre barrett
Part Two Adult Trauma in Wars and Natural Disasters
6 The Healing Nightmare: War Dreams of Vietnam Veterans 85
harry a. wilmer
viii Contents
7 Who Develops PTSD Nightmares and Who Doesn’t 100
ernest hartmann
8 Sleep, Dreaming, and Coping Style in Holocaust Survivors 114
peretz lavie and hanna kaminer
9 Dreaming Well: On Death and History 125
robert jay lifton
10 The Collective Nightmare of Central American Refugees 140
adrianne aron
11 Jasmine: Dreams in the Psychotherapy of a Rape Survivor 148
karen hagerman muller
12 Dreams of Firestorm Survivors 159
alan siegel
Part Three Traumas of Normal Living
13 Dreams and Adaptation to Divorce 179
rosalind d. cartwright
14 Dreams in Bereavement 186
patricia garªeld
15 Neurological Dreams 212
oliver sacks
16 Integration and Ambivalence in Transplants 217
robert bosnak
17 Recurrent Dreams: Their Relation to Life Events 231
antonio l. zadra
References 249
Contributors 269
Index 271
Acknowledgments
AAcckknnoowwlleeddggmmeennttss
The Association for the Study of Dreams introduced me to many of the
authors in this book. The association’s annual conferences provided an
opportunity to hear of research and clinical ªndings that were not yet in
print, and some of those now appear here.
I would like to thank Dan Brown and Bessel van der Kolk for reviewing
an early proposal for this book and suggesting additional topics and chapter
authors. G. William Domhoff read and commented on several of the chap-
ters in progress.
At Harvard University Press the book was adeptly guided by Angela von
der Lippe, and many graceful phrases owe their existence to Elizabeth
Gretz’s editing.
Portions of Chapter 6 ªrst appeared in Quadrant: The Journal of the C. G.
Jung Foundation for Analytical Psychology, published by the C. G. Jung
Foundation of New York, © copyright, The C. G. Jung Foundation of New
York, 1986, and in Spring, A Journal of Archetype and Culture (Putnam,
Conn.) (1986): 47–61, and are reprinted by permission.
The material in Chapter 9 was originally presented at a symposium on
dreams sponsored by the Department of Human Development and Health
Sciences of the University of California, Los Angeles, and the Southern
California Psychoanalytic Society and Institute. It appeared in another form
as Chapter 13, “Dreaming Well: Frontiers of Form,” in Robert Jay Lifton,
The Future of Immortality and Other Essays for a Nuclear Age, © 1987
HarperCollins Publishers (New York: Basic Books, 1987), and is reproduced
with permission.
Chapter 15 is an expanded version of an article that originally appeared
as “Neurological Dreams,” MD Magazine, February 1991.