Sleep studies in Serbian victims of torture: Analysis of traumatic dreams

One of prominent features related to the posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is according to DSM-5 “recurrent distressing dreams in which the content and/or affect of the dream are related to the traumatic event(s)”. The phenomenology and the underlying dynamics of traumatic dreams are areas of study that still need to be understood. The study presented in this chapter is a qualitative study of traumatic dreams of torture survivors of the last Balkan wars. Aims of the study were to demonstrate two different methods of qualitative analysis of dreams which could be used for the investigation of latent structures of reported narratives of dreams, and to demonstrate how these structures are reflected in posttraumatic states, as changes in affect regulation, symbolization and attachment to others. An additional aim of the study was to help clinicians to better understand their traumatized patients’ dreaming by identifying mechanisms related to posttraumatic processes within the dream and thus give a better understanding on how the traumatized dreamers attempt of healing fail in recurrent nightmares