Dreams in Abstinent Heroin Addicts: Four Case Reports

In the past, several studies have been carried out to analyze the effects of various psychoactive drugs on dreaming, e.g., LSD (1), imipramine (antidepressants) (2) or other drugs (3). These studies were almost always investigations on effects of temporary drug administration and on normal volunteers subjects. Effect of psychoactive substances abstinence or cessation, on dream content of chronic consumers subjects, more rarely, has been studied. Choi (4) observed that alcoholics who were abstaining from drinking dream about drinking. The author suggests that in these patients the wish to drink alcohol was repressed from consciousness and became satisfied in dreams. Furthermore, alcoholics who have dreams about drinking showed less anxiety and were able to be abstinent for longer period of time than those who did not have drinking dreams. From a theoretical viewpoint Choi concluded that the presence of dreams about drinking in abstinent alcoholics were consistent with Freud’s observations that undistorted wish-fulfillment dreams can occur in adults when the need is imperative (i.e. hunger, thirst) (5). Choi’s observations was replicated in others two studies (6,7). Christo and Franey (8) found drug-related dreams in polydrug users (alcohol, heroin, cocaine) since they stopped using drugs. Alcoholism such as drug addiction are both considered forms of pathological dependencies. Alcoholic patients such as heroin (opiate) addicts present mainly the inability to suspend psychoactive substance use with physical and psychological dependence (DSM-IV) (9). Consistent with previous studies the four case reports presented here, suggest the possibility of an occurrence of wish-fulfillment dreams in heroin addicts who are abstaining from use of heroin. All subjects attended a pharmacological Dreams in Abstinent Heroin Addicts: Four Case Reports