Why You Remember — or Forget — Your Dreams

Do you remember the dream you had last night? First thing in the morning some of us might recall scenes vividly enough to share over breakfast, but later in the afternoon it’s probably fuzzy at best. Others of us tend not to remember our dreams at all. You might be wondering: Does whether or not you can recall imaginative stories from the night before say something about the quality of your sleep?

Not necessarily, experts explain.

“Everyone dreams, but not everyone remembers it,” says licensed psychologist and board certified behavioral sleep medicine specialist Shelby Harris, PsyD, an associate professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York. And as it turns out, there are a few reasons why you might remember or you might not — and whichever it is probably doesn’t predict how well you’re sleeping.

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Most of Our Dreams Happen During REM Sleep

When it comes to the question of why we dream, sleep medicine research has in fact revealed perhaps surprisingly little.

“While there’s no consensus about the functions of certain stages of sleep, the reality is that there’s not a firm consensus about why we sleep in general,” says sleep expert Wendy Troxel, PhD, senior behavioral scientist at the RAND corporation and author of Sharing the Covers: Every Couple’s Guide to Better Sleep.

The prevailing theory based on research suggests that the primary reason for dreams is to support emotional processing, she says. “What happens during our dreams may help us work through challenging things that happen during the daytime and that we may not be capable of processing during our waking lives.”

Most dreaming occurs during the rapid eye movement (REM) part of sleep, the stage of sleep where the brain is forming new connections and recalling experiences from the day, says Dr. Troxel. “It’s an opportunity for the brain in an unconstrained way to make sense of the world, problem-solve, think creatively, and support memory consolidation.”

About one-quarter of your sleep time is spent in REM, according to the National Sleep Foundation.

Research also shows that we do dream in non-REM stages of sleep, but these dreams are typically harder to remember, shorter, less intense, and more thought-like compared with dreaming in REM. In contrast, REM sleep dreams may be more story-like.

And it may be that REM sleep plays an important role in emotional processing, and supporting mental health overall, Troxel says.

One study tasked 76 healthy young women with viewing negative and neutral pictures before differing amounts of REM sleep. Interestingly, greater amounts of REM sleep was correlated with higher emotional reactivity to viewing the negative pictures (when they were awake) in the short-term compared with those who got no REM sleep. However, after two days, those who had at least one full REM sleep period had less emotional reactivity, as well as number and duration of memories of those negative pictures compared with those who got no or a short amount of REM sleep time.

The results suggest that REM sleep, over time, helps with emotional processing, making negative events less distressing.

“This suggests that a function of REM is to smooth out the edges of our emotional lives and help us selectively forget some of the negative things that happen so we don’t feel so overwhelmed by it,” she explains.

Though it’s worth noting that because there’s limited research looking into these questions — and because most of the studies that have been done are relatively small — dream researchers still consider these theories rather than established facts, Troxel says.

While recalling a dream suggests that you’ve reached a REM sleep cycle at some point during the night, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ve had more or less of that important stage of sleep than if you don’t remember dreaming.

If you remember your dream, it could be that you simply woke up during it, so it's fresh in your mind, says Deborah Givan, MD, sleep specialist and professor emeritus at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis.

Or remembering could mean that you’re remembering the very last dream you had rather than the dream in full. People tend to have most of their “dream sleep” in the second half of the night, she explains.

If your REM sleep accounts for 25 percent of a seven-hour sleep, that’s a little less than two hours in total — of which you might only remember the last 10 minutes vividly.

Anxiety, Medication, and Personality May All Affect Dreams and Dream Recall

Remembering your dreams doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with how restful your sleep is, Dr. Harris says. Instead, recalling those dreams is a lot more likely to depend on a number of factors, from your current level of stress to the medication you’re taking.

The following can influence whether or not you remember your dreams:

• Anxiety Levels Before Bed People are more likely to remember their dreams when they're anxious or depressed, Harris says, perhaps because they also tend to wake up more when they're worried, and do so in the middle of various dreams.
• Medication or Health Problems Certain medicines, including some drugs that treat depression, can suppress dream sleep, says Shyamsunder Subramanian, MD, a sleep medicine specialist at Sutter Tracy Community Hospital in Tracy, California. Similarly, sleep apnea (a condition characterized by short pauses in breath many times while you sleep) can also minimize the time you spend dreaming.
• Gender and Personality Past research has found that adolescent girls were more likely than their male counterparts to remember their dreams. This study also found a link between creativity and dream recall: Participants with stronger dream recall were more likely to identify themselves as creative compared with those less likely to recall their dreams.

Can You Get Better at Remembering Your Dreams?

If you wish you could remember more from the night before, you’re not entirely out of luck. You can improve your dream awareness, says Lauri Loewenberg, author of Dream on It: Unlock Your Dreams, Change Your Life. “The most important thing is giving dreams time and attention."

The best time to try to recall your dreams is in the first 90 seconds after you wake up, before the memory goes away. Loewenberg recommends trying to keep your body in the exact same position that you were in when you woke up, as this will help boost your dream memory.

After two minutes spent replaying and piecing together the thoughts, feelings, and images from your recent sleep, write them down right away. “If you don’t write your dreams down or tell your partner, they’ll likely be gone after breakfast,” says Loewenberg.

Rereading words on a notebook page, however, stands a chance to trigger a memory of the dream later on. Start keeping a notebook and pen on the nightstand. Not only is it a conscious reminder to focus on recalling your dreams, but it also helps you get into the habit of journaling each morning — a practice that is better than even recounting to another person, according to one review.

Loewenberg also says that nutrition may play a role in dream recall — specifically the amount of vitamin B6 you get. One small, randomized, prospective study that included 100 participants found that individuals who took a vitamin B6 supplement before bed were more likely to remember their dreams compared with individuals who did not take the supplement. It’s worth noting, however, that the lack of corroborating evidence makes this research still preliminary — and those in the study who supplemented with B6 before bed reported worse sleep quality and felt more tired upon waking up.

You can incorporate more B6 into your diet naturally by cooking and eating meals that feature foods like poultry, fish, milk, bananas, and spinach. And pay attention to dosage if you’re getting B6 via supplements. The safe daily upper limit for adults is 100 milligrams a day, according to the National Institutes of Health Office of Dietary Supplements. An overdose could cause nerve damage or neurological problems, including loss of control over your limb movement and balance issues. It’s always a good idea to check with your doctor before starting any supplements.

Snoozing for 10 more minutes in the morning may also contribute to lucid dreams. Though the connection isn’t perfectly clear, a small study found a link between pressing the snooze button for another few minutes of sleep and remembering dreams vividly. It may well be that the brief wake-up allows the brain to be conscious enough to register and remember dreams in a final REM cycle.

Still, be somewhat wary of hitting that snooze button if you want to stick to a healthy sleep schedule. Sleep medicine experts don’t recommend doing it because the sleep you get during those last few minutes of sleep is more likely to be lighter, less restorative sleep. Plus waking at the same time each day helps keep your body on a consistent sleep schedule, making it easier overall to fall asleep at night and wake up in the morning.

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Additional reporting by Kathleen Corlett and Jessica Migala.