Lamictal Day 43: To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

It's not on the list of side effects the pharmacist gives you, but brain meds are known for giving you weird or unusually vivid dreams.  It took me by a bit of a surprise back in the day, when I was first dx'd with depression and put on Zoloft, but then I decided it made a certain amount of sense.  I mentioned it to my therapist to make sure it didn't portend some latent psychosis (ha!) and she assured me that a change in dreaming was pretty normal.

Any sleep researched can tell you that everybody dreams.  People who think they don't dream simply don't remember them.  I found that during my years of Jungian analysis, I usually remembered one or two dreams per week.

Modern Jungian therapists -- at least the competent ones that I had -- don't simply rely on orthodox psychoanalysis to treat their patients.  They also draw on family systems theory, behavioral and cognitive behavioral approaches, and psychoeducation (educating the patient about their illness) in order to treat their patients.  Dreams, nonetheless, are still considered to be very important.  They relate to the patient's inner life, to the symbols the patient finds meaningful, and provide clues for how the patient might act more authentically in waking life.