Unable To Talk Properly Whilst Dreaming

by Steve
(Pontypool, South Wales, UK)

I have a few questions to ask about sleep talking. I sleep talk quite a lot and have been known to talk, shout, swear and sing. I've even been known to bark, speak in "tongues" and speak in a different accent.

Anyway, I have two questions. Firstly, I've lately been experiencing the unsettling "problem" of being unable to speak properly during my dreams. I can make sounds but the words are very indistinct and I am fully aware of this inability whilst I'm dreaming and it always makes me feel uncomfortable. I can only describe it as the kind of speech one sometimes hears from stroke victims. The only explanation that I can come up with is that on these occasions my mouth may have become very dry and my tongue is stuck to the roof of my mouth. Could anyone shed any light on this?

My second question is more out of curiosity. I was wondering why people only seem to voice their own words in a dream but never seem to articulate the words being spoken by other characters in the dream. This seems odd as all the dialogue is being created by the same brain. Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Regards

Steve (Captain Frantic)

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Kevin: Hey Steve (aka Captain Frantic :). Interesting questions. The second I may have more thoughts about than the first, although they're just a bit simple and intuitive. Here they are:

Even during our dreams, our minds act with a certain expectation system built from our experience with the physical world that effects some aspects of the dream content itself. In most people's dreams, for instance, the laws of physics are still somewhat at play. The people around you still walk with their two feet on the ground. There are often the occasional exceptions to these normalities, but many of us often don't even pick up on the fact that, wow, it was really weird that my little sister just turned into that horse over there by the water! (But when we do start to pick up on these changes and recognize them as abnormal we can start doing cool things like lucid dream. In a lucid dream we can say "To hell with physics! I know I'm in a dream and gravity need not apply here! I'll fly now please.")


While it's not always that easy (to fly ;), I think the point these thoughts are trying to make is that maybe your dream mind is still operating on a system that expects you to only utter the words that the "dream you" is saying, since that's how things normally work. Perhaps it is prior experiences from the physical world that guides the movement of your physical body in relation to your dream sequence.

Hopefully that's somewhat coherent, but it's entirely possible that it's not! Anyone else have any thoughts on this out there?

And for your first question, I don't have any personal experience with hearing anything quite like what you describe. I found it fascinating that you are aware of the difficulty speaking while the dream is going on. That seems rather remarkable! Another thing to note perhaps is that sleep talking episodes typically occur during NREM sleep stages 1 & 2 (also known as the stages of "light" sleep), where vivid dreaming does not occur.

Not sure what to extrapolate from that but there you go. Perhaps investing in a Zeo Personal Sleep Coach may help you with some answers to that end. It's essentially an at home polysomnogram, measuring your sleep and giving you feedback on when you're in REM and NREM sleep throughout the night. Perhaps if you tested when you personally most commonly talk in your sleep it will further shed more light onto your questions.

Warmly,
Kevin

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