Eric Stroud, a web and marketing consultant, thought it would be nice to have a glass of wine an hour before bedtime. Wine is healthy, right?
But after seven or so nights of this, he began to have unpleasant dreams of a sort he’d never had before. They became more and more visceral, nightmarish, and anxiety-drenched. This continued four or five nights. Then he stopped drinking the wine. The bad dreams went away in one or two days. Something similar happened to one of his cousins.
He believes the bad dreams were due to the sulfites in wine. When he drank sulfite-free wine, he felt fine.
I’ve not experienced this with wine, but I certainly have with magnesium supplementation: 500mg before bed will reliably give me–not nightmares exactly–but intense, ‘visceral’ and disturbing dreams.
Supposedly all wine has naturally occurring sulfites. When a bottle of wine indicates that no sulfites are added, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it is sulfite-free. Perhaps the form which is artificially added to wine is more harmful than the naturally occurring one? Or maybe it’s a matter of quantity?
I had to give up drinking red wine because it was causing bad dreams. Quite reliably, a glass or two of red wine in the evening would lead to really awful, hyper-emotional dreams, often about suicide. Given that in the daytime I’m one of the world’s cheeriest and most appreciative people, this clearly wasn’t right, and it clearly wasn’t me. Gave up the red wine, the bad dreams (at least those bad dreams) went away. White wine and spirits don’t bother me similarly. I’ve run into other people who’ve had similar problems with red wine, god knows the term “red-head” (for being bothered by red wine) is pretty common.
Might this also have to do with the fact that red wine contains some mycotoxins from the fermentation process?
I have noticed that since starting anti-fungal herbs and medication (Diflucan) I have had a strange nightmare almost every night.
Drinking either Red or White wine has been giving me horrible, terrifying nightmares! After being up all last night, and then reading this blog… I’m giving up wine for good! It’s not worth it!
I drink red wine before bed on a regular occasion as part of my night time prep ritual. Not controlling variables I do believe I remember my dreams more and overal experience more lucid dreams, but I can’t relate to having more nightmares.