Do you know what many Indians dreamt of in 2022? It was about their teeth falling out!

ThePleasantDream used Google Search data of common dreams in India to find that the query “dream about teeth falling out” witnessed an increase of 81 percent in 2022 when compared to 2021.

What people searched about

Dreams of teeth falling out. (Wikimedia Commons)

The website shared the analysis report recently with South First.

The analysis also found that among the other dreams that were searched the most by Indians were “dreams about snakes”, which was the highest in 2021.

It did not see a change in search numbers from 2021 to 2022.

Interestingly, the number of people searching for “dreams about dogs”, “dreams about pregnancy”, and “dream of money” also remained around the same from 2021 to 2022.

Searches for dreams about spiders saw a fall of 18 percent, and those for dreams about being chased witnessed a drop of 19 percent in 2022 when compared to 2021.

Why do dreams recur?

Bengaluru-based Spandana Hospital and Research Centre’s founder and consultant psychiatrist Dr Mahesh Gowda told South First: “Generally, dreams reflect the basic worry or the phenomenon that really bothers them. Most of the time it’s about anxiety about not doing well, losing something that we have, or about future issues.”

Meanwhile, Dr Satish Ramaiah, a medical director at Maarga Super Specialty Psychiatry Hospital as well as a consultant neuropsychiatrist and sleep disorders specialist, said: “Recurring dreams are fairly common and are usually manifested as going through unpleasant experiences of loss, threat, danger, etc, like being attacked, losing teeth, falling, accidents and so on.

He added: “More often than not, the underlying reasons are psychological in nature like anxiety, PTSD, phobia, etc, or could be linked to something stressful the person going through or even organic problems like epilepsy.”

Representational pic of anxiety (Creative Commons)

Psychologists and sleep experts South First spoke to said normally when people have recurring dreams, they get stressed and lose a good night’s sleep.

While there is no scientific evidence to say that recurring dreams always have some meaning, doctors say that in some scenarios they may give the psychologist a hint at what the patient would otherwise not open up to about their life.

Explaining this Dr Himani Kashyap from NIMHANS in Bengaluru said: “Dreams help us understand a client’s internal world especially when a client is not aware or able to connect the dots themselves.”

She added: “Dreams may or may not be discussed in all therapy sessions. It may depend on many factors such as the client’s reflective abilities or therapist orientation.”

Kashyap also said: “Sometimes the only way major life events and losses can be processed is in the unconscious, in our dreams.”

However, she warned that discussions of dreams must only be done with trained professionals.

Do recurring dreams have any pattern?

Doctors said there was no rule that each time a dream had to be in exact same order of occurrence.

For instance, if someone was dreaming about falling, the person could dream of falling from a cliff, some stairs of the house, or an elevator falling and the person being inside it.

“So, the theme may be the same. In this above-mentioned case, it is the fall. It could be from the stairs, it could be from a cliff, it could be from a helicopter, anything for that matter. This still counts as a recurring dream,” explained Dr Aditya P, a CBT counsellor from Bengaluru.

Dr Nereida Gonzalez-Berrios, a reviewer and certified psychiatrist of ThePleasantDream, commented, “Dreams are usually based on our daily-life activities, thoughts, or other issues in real life.”

She added: “Besides, it is essential to note that the dream’s context, surroundings, and the dreamer’s personal associations and feelings can significantly influence the interpretation of the dream.”

Ramaiah concurred as he said, “Dream interpretation continues to be an enigma to the scientific and clinical fraternity, despite several complex hypotheses put forward. Such is the nature of dreams! It is like thinking in a different biochemical state.”

Also Read: How people are using hypnotherapy for physical, psychological ailments

Let’s interpret your dreams!

So what’s with this highly searched dream of teeth falling off?

Gonzalez-Berrios explained that people often think that a dream about teeth falling out is associated with dental health. “But it symbolises mental unrest, as per research,” she said.

When someone is losing teeth in a dream and can’t seem to find them, it suggests that there is something in one’s waking life that they wish to say but don’t know how to say it. Losing teeth may also symbolise a loss of words.

According to psychologists, it could also mean that the person was facing some kind of anxiety and was either expected to compromise on a major aspect of their life and take an important decision involving compromise or let go of something precious.

Interestingly, a 1984 psychological study, “Typical Dreams: Stability and Gender Difference” published in Psychological Reports”, said women seem to dream more about teeth falling out than men.

The website ThePleasantDream said there are many versions of the teeth-falling-out dreams whose interpretations have been searched for on the internet.

There is also this dream of teeth falling one by one. This dream, as per the experts who have interpreted it for the website, is indicative of words falling out of the mouth unfiltered: The words one wishes they hadn’t said.

“Therefore, when you see this dream, re-evaluate your last day’s communication, because there are chances you might have leaked information you were supposed to keep quiet about,” said the psychologists.

Meanwhile, another version is about “teeth breaking”. It apparently means losing something important.

Also, if the person is undergoing a massive change and is afraid to make a compromise that is costly or invaluable to them, they may dream of teeth-breaking.

Some people also dream of teeth being pulled out. This dream, according to experts, may have a negative meaning. This probably means that they think they’re useless or are going through some kind of mental anguish.

Experts explain that it may also represent painful transitions. Whatever it might be, people may use these clues to lead a life of positivity.

Crumbling teeth in dreams mean reflecting on one’s wrong decisions, difficult decisions, losing power, or self-neglect, said experts who analysed the dreams for the website.

Dream of failing in exams

Meanwhile, another common dream that psychologists who South First spoke to mentioned was failing in tests or exams.

Gowda recounted, “Several of my patients have told me of dreaming about writing the exams. They have the papers, they have not been able to complete the exam, or their paper was being taken away, or they went blank and panicked.”

He explained: “Failure at exams is something that people keep consistently dreaming about even 10-15 years after their last exam.”

This could be linked with anxiety and stress or even fear of failure, fear of taking important life decisions, feeling unconfident about something, feeling one is unable to finish tasks on time, and similar emotions.

Are dreams always related to illness?

Gowda explained that dreams are generally normal physiological responses and don’t have to always be linked with illness.

People with anxiety, depression, and worries generally have more dreams.

Meanwhile, Ramaiah said not all dreams need medical attention. But dreams, that result in significant unpleasant experiences — like nightmares and night terrors that are intense, frequent, severe, and have an impact on a person’s sleep quality or quantity, morning freshness and daytime functioning — need evaluation by sleep specialists.

“The sleep expert does a thorough evaluation of all possible underlying factors and works on addressing them, which should help the person to overcome problematic dreams,” he explained.

Gowda said that interpretations happen using the content analysis of the dreams that happen in Freudian analysis and psychoanalytic schools of thought.

However, doctors explain that one needs to try and understand what this dream means to the person emotionally and whether it indicates something.

For instance, in one of the cases, a client spoke quite a bit about snakes everywhere, and they were trying to close the door so that the snakes did not enter their room.

A doctor from Kochi explained that here snakes represented intimacy and also relationships with people.

The client was unable to make any personal connections. He feared intimacy or a close relationship with anyone.

So, his dreams of snakes and closing the door meant that he was scared of opening up to the therapist.

Gonzalez-Berrios said, “People need to try and understand what it brings up to you emotionally and whether it indicates something.”

To know if it’s a recurring dream, one can maintain a dream journal. The more detailed it is, the better, she added.

This dream journal will help people relate one’s dreams to their daily chores and fill in the blanks. Of course, if nothing works, one can always seek professional help.