It is quite popular form of déjà vu called déjà rêvé. Happens to me all the time, more often when I'm stressed or sleep deprived but almost never when I'm physically exhausted.

https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/imp/jcs/2017/00000...

> Nearly 80% claimed to have had such experiences and the associated frequencies are presented. Age was negatively correlated with the incidence and there was little gender dependence.

I can relate. I have a handful of recurring dream worlds that I visit. Sometimes I'll have a series of dreams over a few days that all take place in the same dream world. Months or years can go by and then I'll find myself dropped back into a dream world that I had forgotten about. Sometimes the world has progressed since my last visit, and sometimes I'm put back nearly where I left off last time.

The weirdest thing for me is that I swear I have a separate set of memories in these different dream worlds; a personal history exclusive to that dream world, where once I'm in that dream world, I suddenly remember previous visits to that world, places I've visited, events that took place. It's an incredibly strange feeling that can momentarily make me question my sense of self.

I should note that I nearly always dream lucidly. Not sure if that plays a role in this phenomena.

I have a series of dreams that happen in my town, whose geography in the dreams is as I naively imagined it as a child. The map of the dream town is an exact circle. The bus route from my home (my parents' home) to my school is a straight line (in reality it is more like a spiral). As a consequence, some places exist in my dream map that do not correspond to anything in reality. Sometimes I wake up with a feeling that it is important to go to those places in real life, because something important that I forgot is there.

Across a large street from my parents' home, there are some trees that kinda look like a beginning of a forest. In reality those are just a few densely growing trees, followed by more streets and houses. As a small child I didn't know, because we rarely walked in that direction, so in my dreams, there was a forest. Now I know what is actually there, and have walked there many times. But in the dream world, there still is a forest.

The dream map refuses to update and keeps the misconceptions of my childhood. Of course, during the dreams, it is a real map containing places that I merely "forgot" and "should visit again".

I've experienced that dream memory thing too. A whole other set of memories that I hook up with when I'm in dreamland.

It makes you think.

That is fascinating. Sadly No, i never continued dreams. They are a stand-alone experience, so to speak.

I have very long story arch dreams, an ex-girlfriend called them epic dreams. They're strange, some times I have recurring dreams with long story arcs in which I am in them as myself, sometimes I am in them as another person, sometimes they are narrated, sometimes they span generations, sometimes I'm not in them at all, sometimes they are episodes of a tv show that never had those episodes.

Examples - one dream was set in a post apocalyptic wasteland, sort of like A Canticle for Leibowitz, with narration, there was a kingdom being misruled by a duke and the only one who would be able to stop him was the exiled bishop, his brother, I turned out to be the bishop - an old man returning after many years of exile to the kingdom etc. etc. there were sword fights, radiation monsters, extra sensory perception..

Another dream was a very long special episode of Laverne and Shirley were the girls came out and had their first kiss, I think it was a Christmas episode also.

Actually funny enough I had three dream flashbacks just a couple days ago, first I remembered a comic book store and then I remembered no that store was from a dream, then I remembered a couple other locations from dreams that I had not had for lots of years and had forgotten about.

I'm completely the opposite. 50 years old and I have never once in my life remembered a dream. Never. I see things about dreams, such as this like, as interesting, but can relate to them at all, because they are things that happen to other people. I assume I have dreams, but when I wake up, I never have any recall of them.

It's entirely probable that this experience is shared by plenty of others, we just don't hear much from you guys.

If you're curious to discover whether you dream or not, have someone wake you when you're in REM sleep. Your favourite search engine will help you to determine when this is happening. Usual caveats apply about taking advice from a random person on the internet.

If you're not entering REM sleep but you feel fine, hey, nice. Contact a sleep scientist and ask if they want to study you.

If you enter REM but have no dreams, hey, nice. You're apparently in the minority. Contact a sleep scientist and all if you want to study you.

Abruzzi -- I'm 45 and only started dreaming in the last 5 years. I don't know why or how but I do now. It's incredible. Maybe you will, too!

To me it is important to start recalling my dream as literally the first thing after I wake up. Anything else... and the dream is probably lost.

It helps to have enough sleep, not wake up with an alarm, not have anything important to do after waking up. Have a pen and paper next to the bed, to remind you. Think about how you want to remember your dream, as you are falling asleep.

Do you have any interest in remembering your dreams? Taking a magnesium glycinate supplement may help.

I got very strange dreams while taking Chantix (varenicline) to stop smoking.

If you don’t recall any of your dreams, AND you currently smoke, you could give it a try.

Try vipassana meditation. It'll make you remember your dreams. And more.

Are there any obvious proximate causes, such as history of mental illness, heavy drug use, or severe sleep disorders?

How do you know it's a "true" memory? Does that even matter to you? I don't think it would to me! But, I'm curious how confident you are about whether you're in the same space or your brain is rapidly manufacturing the sensation.

I have this. I always imagine these are bubbling up one last time to the surface and I never experience these thoughts ever again.

If you write them down and actively try to remember, they enter a more permanent state in memory. I can more easily recall them that way and even continue the memory explosion.

But then I always wonder if I'm remembering the original or the remembrance. Like for childhood photos. There is even one for which I still remember exactly where I was when it bubbled up, but I don't recall the topic at all…

I always wondered if anyone else had this! People I have asked all seemed surprised by the question.