Every night, you’ll dream for around two hours, and while there are lots of theories about why our brains show us stories, places and faces while we sleep, no one really knows why for sure.
Some experts believe it’s our subconscious cataloguing our day, others suggest they help us process emotions – but what if your dreams were actually predicting the future?
While scientific research into whether dreams can come true is limited, the studies that have been done have produced surprising results.
Research by John Hopkins University found that pregnant women who had a dream that showed them the sex of their baby were right, 100% of the time. A 2021 Portuguese study revealed that the content of dreams can be an accurate predictor of Parkinson’s disease – dreams connected with negative emotions could be linked with future cognitive decline.
And, regardless of what the scientists say, there are those that firmly believe their dreams have come true. An American study of 900 people revealed that 33% of participants could recall a dream that then became reality.
Earlier this month, author Salman Rushdie said he’d dreamt about being stabbed in a colosseum, just two days before he was knifed at an event in New York in August 2022 – the venue was named the Chautauqua Amphitheater.
The dream was so vivid, he considered cancelling the event. He explained to the Telegraph: ‘I said to [my wife], I don’t want to go.
‘And then you wake up a bit more, and you think, it’s just a dream, and you’re not going to allow your life to be ruled by something that happened in a dream.’
Despite Rushdie unsurprisingly claiming he does not believe in prophecies, it seems pretty clear his dream did indeed come true.
Businesswoman Charlotte Wroe, 46, says that she had a dream that not only accurately predicted her future – but also saved her life.
The mum-of-three admits that she’s always been interested in the spiritual side of life, and has seen psychics before. ‘I think there’s so much out there that we don’t really understand,’ she tells Metro.co.uk.
But even Charlotte, who lives in Kent, knows that her story is extraordinary.
”I’ve always had vivid dreams. It’s like I’m watching a film,’ she says. ‘This was a normal Wednesday night, and I had to get up early the next day for a work call. In the dream, I was in some kind of office, and I felt a lump underneath my right breast. Then I was with a doctor, and I heard the words: “It’s breast cancer”.
‘It startled me awake – it must have been about 4am. I went to the toilet and I thought: “Let me just check myself.” I found a lump in the exact same spot. I actually thought I was still dreaming.’
It was too early to do anything about it, so rather than waking her husband, Dave, Charlotte got ready for the day.
‘When he got up, I asked him to have a feel and he agreed that there was something there. So I booked an appointment with the GP as soon as it opened.’
Initially, Charlotte was told that lump she found was likely nothing serious, probably just a cyst, but she’d be referred to the breast clinic as precaution.
‘I remember sitting in the waiting room at hospital, looking around at all the women thinking: “Someone is going to find out they have cancer today.” I just didn’t think that person would be me.’
After countless tests and scans, doctors confirmed the worst: Charlotte had triple negative breast cancer.
‘A few tears came down, but I just knew I had to be strong. My mindset was: “Okay, I’ve got kids, how do I get rid of this?”‘
In September 2021, Charlotte embarked on a journey of gruelling treatment, supported by Dave, and her children: stepdaughter, Jess, 24, and kids, Aimee, 20, and Jack, 15.
She had chemotherapy, followed by a mastectomy, radiotherapy and yet more chemotherapy.
‘It took a real toll,’ she says. ‘I was tired, and sick, and I’d get these nose bleeds that would go on for hours.
‘I remember one day, I was at home alone and I’d fallen out of bed and was being sick. But I just thought to myself: “If this is what the chemo is doing to my body, what’s it doing to my tumour?”
‘I was in the eye of the storm, but I felt safe and looked after, and I was determined to be okay.’
In March 2023, Charlotte finally finished treatment. There is currently no evidence of cancer in her body and, as well as the incredible NHS care she received, Charlotte credits her dream for saving her life.
‘It was surreal. I don’t know where I’d be without that dream – I dread to think. I didn’t check my boobs regularly before it.
‘There are people who have said it’s just coincidence, or I’d subconsciously felt the lump in my sleep. I know it all sounds a bit woo-woo. But I truly believe that the universe, or someone, was trying to send me a message, and I’m forever grateful.’
While Charlotte’s experience may seem remarkable, it is not completely unique. Corine Card, an author from Brighton, also had an odd premonition while she was asleep.
She tells Metro.co.uk: ‘My son, Harry, was a year old, and we were sleep training him as he had been waking up very early.
‘It was May 2014, it was a completely normal night and I didn’t have any concerns about him. He slept in a cot in his own room, near to ours.’
But one night, Corinne, 42, had an alarming dream. ‘In my dream, we arrived at a manor house, where we were going to stay on holiday. As my husband, Jon, got things out of the car, I took Harry to the gardens behind the building to explore.
‘There was a little stream and he ran over and went towards the stream. But as he walked over some pebbles he tripped and fell. He looked up and there was lots of blood running down his face.
‘I woke up horrified and in a cold sweat, I don’t have nightmares usually and I’d never had a bad dream about Harry.’
Corinne didn’t wake Jon up, but says she felt ‘unsettled’. ‘I couldn’t get back to sleep. I just wanted to check on Harry but it didn’t seem logical. It was just a dream!
‘I felt worried and wanted to see him and see that he was ok. But I knew it didn’t make any sense. I waited until about 6am and then decided to go and check on him.’
That’s when Corinne made a shocking discovery. ‘When I looked in his cot, there was blood all of his face and his pillow.
‘When I saw all the blood it was like lightening. I am an atheist and have never experienced anything uncanny like this. But it felt like I already knew somehow and the dream was a premonition.
‘I looked at Harry’s face and I could see the blood came from his nose. He didn’t seem bothered which made me feel a bit perplexed.
So, I Googled the symptoms and found that toddlers can have nose bleeds with a surprising amount of blood, but it isn’t a big deal and there is no need to have them checked over by a doctor. I washed his face and the bedding and went back to normal.’
To this day, Corinne says the dream is something she simply can’t explain. ‘I do wonder if there’s a real connection between a mother and a child, or any two people who have a strong bond, one where somehow you get a message – but I have no idea how that would work.
‘I know it seems far fetched. I like to imagine that as a parent, I have a close connection with my children and that I can help to protect them. If I ever have another dream like that I’ll probably check on them straight away!’
Not all dreams that seem to predict the future have to be bad, of course. In March 2019, Liz Roberta, 31, was struggling to get her self-help book published.
‘I had left my corporate career with an anxiety disorder, and had written a book about helping people to find their purpose,’ she tells Metro.co.uk.
‘I was putting the book proposal together and trying to get a book deal.’
Liz, who is based in Devon, was keen to land a contract with Hay House – now part of Penguin Random House – who are the world’s biggest self-help publishers, but as Liz says, ‘they kept rejecting me!’
But one night, Liz had a dream about Hay House’s founder, renowned author, Louise Hay, who had passed away two years earlier in 2017, aged 90.
‘I had never met Louise,’ explains Liz. ‘In my dream, we had a conversation and I remember expressing that I was unsure I would ever get a book deal with Hay House, because it didn’t seem to be working. She encouraged me to keep going.’
Liz says she saw the author with ‘clarity’, and says that ‘if regular dreams are 2D, this was 3D.’
Upon waking, Liz says she believes she was being sent a message: ‘I took the dream to mean that I was on the right track and should keep pursuing getting published with Hay House. It gave me the confidence to keep going and keep trying.’
Just as her dream suggested, Liz did indeed land her deal, and her book, Living in Tune, came out January 2022.
In the acknowledgements, she paid credit to what she saw that night, writing: ‘I feel obliged to thank Louise Hay for creating a safe home for people to share their spiritual message… I’m also thankful to your spirit for visiting me in a dream, which is a story I’ll tell another time!’
The Sleep Foundation offer up various explanations for what they call ‘precognitive dreams’. There’s the possibility that it’s down to ‘selective recall’, which essentially means that you’re more likely to remember a dream that accurately predicts the future, than those that don’t. Or, it could be because we’re interpreting ambiguous dreams to mean something. And, if you believe in the paranormal, you’re more likely to experience so-called premonitions.
There is also, of course, the possibility that it could all just be coincidence.
Speaking about how to make sense of the dream she had about her son, Corrine says: ‘My granny used to say: “There are more things on heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy”.
‘I feel as though it’s a nice idea if that’s the case. But honestly, I don’t know.’
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