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I have had a nightmare the past two nights about something that has never happened to me in real life and yet it was so detailed and scary it still troubled me. I woke with a shaky start and had to think for half a second about where I was. Then I got up and popped a Golden Girls dvd in my tv and I realized insomnia is nowhere near as bad as having a nightmare.

They say our minds can't make up faces in our dreams, but I have trouble believing that since I don't think I've ever seen the person in them before.

These are some of the sources I've tried to see if I can figure things out. Surprisingly, Yahoo Answers is often a good, if sometimes a very uncomfortable source, even though you are rarely getting people with lots of expertise. Ask MetaFilter is also great, not just for life answers, but other things such as music.

As it appeared on answers.yahoo.com:

Your dream can be interpreted in many ways and have many meanings! Here they are:
#1: The dream could be reflecting your overall fears regarding sex. #2: Dreaming of sexual assault or rape symbolizes a betrayal of the most powerful kind. Someone in your world is pressuring you, harming you, forcing you to do things you do not want to and you don't have anyone to turn to for help... And if you do, that person is not sincere with you. Be careful in who you comfy! #3: To dream that you have been raped, indicates vengeful or resentful feelings toward the opposite sex. You feel that you have been violated or that you have been taken advantage of. Something or someone is jeopardizing your self-esteem and emotional well-being. Things are being forced upon you. Dreams of rape are also common for those who were actually raped in their waking life. To see a rape being committed in your dream, denotes sexual dysfunction or uncertainty. #4: Rapes in dreams can mean many things. Obviously if you have been raped then the dream could be taking you back to that moment. Rape sometimes link to sexual feelings in another way. If you are sexually inexperienced the dream maybe about you exploring your own sexual feelings and preparing to enter a sexual relationship. They may also link to issues of trust e.g. can you trust someone to look after your child? But rapes often are just metaphors for abuse and a sense of powerlessness. They may link to people who have lied and cheated to you and taken advantage of you. They may refer to a boss who has taken advantage of you or treated you badly. If no obvious link to the dream appears just try to think about your life right now and what is the bad thing within it?
As I said before, there are many other meanings to your dream... Since you had the same kind of dream 3x already, pay attention to your surroundings and be careful not to say more than you should, even to those you know! Good luck!!!

Other sources and some quotes that deal with nightmares:

http://io9.com/5852410/10-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-dreams 

(The above link mentions that most people dream about the same things, but I'm not so sure about that...)

 http://ask.metafilter.com/162715/Why-do-I-have-nightmares-every-night

http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/guide/nightmares-in-adults


“I still get nightmares. In fact, I get them so often I should be used to them by now. I'm not. No one ever really gets used to nightmares.”
― Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves

  “Those heart-hammering nightmares that start to lose coherence even as you're waking up from them, but that still manage to leave their moldering fingerprints all across your day.”
― Mike Carey, The Naming of the Beasts 

 “You can shoo people away in real life, but not when they force their way in through the dream door.”
― Donna Lynn Hope