Getting a solid night’s rest when you’re sick can seem like an unattainable goal for any number of reasons. It’s difficult to fall asleep and stay asleep when you’re plagued by a stuffy nose, a ceaseless cough, or some combination of those and other intolerable symptoms.
生病時(shí)似乎很難安睡一夜,這其中有很多原因。當(dāng)你鼻塞、不停咳嗽或還伴有其他難以忍受的癥狀時(shí),就會(huì)難以入睡且容易醒來(lái)。
Fevers can make quality sleep even harder, thanks in part to fever dreams: especially vivid, weird, or downright disturbing dreams that occur when you have a fever. As the Sleep Foundation explains, fever dreams sometimes involve “spatial distortion,” such as moving walls and melting objects; “threats or danger,” which can be anything from insects to terrorists; and illness. If you were to have a dream fitting this description when you weren’t sick, you might just write it off as a garden-variety nightmare. But since people seem to experience such strange dreams more often during fevers, it’s given rise to the idea that the two things must be linked.
發(fā)燒時(shí)更難保障高質(zhì)量的睡眠,部分原因是“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”,它尤其指當(dāng)你發(fā)燒時(shí)會(huì)出現(xiàn)的生動(dòng)、怪異或令人不安的夢(mèng)。睡眠基金會(huì)解釋稱(chēng),“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”里有時(shí)會(huì)出現(xiàn)“空間扭曲”,例如移動(dòng)的墻壁和融化的物體;“威脅或危險(xiǎn)”,如昆蟲(chóng)、恐怖分子等各種元素;以及疾病。如果你在沒(méi)生病時(shí)做了一個(gè)符合上述特征的夢(mèng),你可能會(huì)把它當(dāng)作一場(chǎng)普通的噩夢(mèng)。但由于人們似乎在發(fā)燒時(shí)更經(jīng)常做這種奇怪的夢(mèng),因此會(huì)認(rèn)為兩者之間一定存在聯(lián)系。
While there’s a lot about fever dreams we don’t know, there is at least a little evidence supporting the theory that some people’s fever dreams are different from their regular dreams. In one retrospective study from 2016, researchers asked 62 people to describe past fever dreams and found them to be “more bizarre, more emotionally intense, and often negatively toned than [regular] dream[s] from an age- and gender matched sample.”Of the 164 people who participated in a 2020 survey, 100 reported fever dreams. The researchers noted that these dreams “included more references to health and temperature perception compared to ‘normal’ most recent dreams.”
我們對(duì)“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”的了解并不多,但一些人的“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”與他們平時(shí)做的夢(mèng)不同,至少關(guān)于這一點(diǎn)是有據(jù)可循的。在2016年的一項(xiàng)回顧性研究中,研究人員要求62人描述曾經(jīng)做過(guò)的“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”,結(jié)果發(fā)現(xiàn),這些夢(mèng)境“比年齡和性別匹配的研究樣本做的(普通)夢(mèng)更奇怪,情緒更強(qiáng)烈,而且往往是消極的”。在2020年一項(xiàng)164人參與的調(diào)查中,有100人報(bào)告做過(guò)“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”。研究人員指出,“與近期‘尋常’的夢(mèng)境相比,這些夢(mèng)出現(xiàn)了更多關(guān)于健康和溫度感知的內(nèi)容”。
As for why fevers beget bizarre nightmares, scientists have some ideas.“[One] theory is that the brain doesn’t process sensations normally when we have a fever,” Dr. Beth Malow, director of Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s sleep division, told Health in 2020. So burning up in your bed might just manifest itself in a dream full of melting objects and seemingly unrelated perils.
至于為什么發(fā)燒會(huì)引發(fā)奇怪的噩夢(mèng),科學(xué)家們有一些猜測(cè)。2020年,范德比爾特大學(xué)醫(yī)學(xué)中心睡眠科主任貝思·馬洛博士在接受《健康》雜志采訪時(shí)稱(chēng),“有一種理論認(rèn)為,當(dāng)我們發(fā)燒時(shí),大腦無(wú)法正常處理感覺(jué)。”因此,睡覺(jué)時(shí)發(fā)燒,感覺(jué)到的可能只會(huì)是一個(gè)充滿(mǎn)融化的物體和看似無(wú)關(guān)的危險(xiǎn)夢(mèng)境。
The reason fever dreams seem so vivid could be related to fever’s tendency to interfere with REM sleep: the period of deepest sleep during which most dreams occur. As Dr. Alcibiades Rodriguez, medical director of NYU Langone Health’s Comprehensive Epilepsy Center-Sleep Center, told Health, “If we get a spike in fever during REM sleep, we may feel more uncomfortable and have micro-arousals (shifts between deep and light sleep). This increases the likelihood of us remembering our dreams.”
“發(fā)燒夢(mèng)”如此逼真的原因可能與發(fā)燒有干擾快速眼動(dòng)睡眠的傾向有關(guān)??焖傺蹌?dòng)睡眠是最深的睡眠期,大多數(shù)夢(mèng)都是在這一時(shí)期發(fā)生的。紐約大學(xué)朗格尼醫(yī)學(xué)中心癲癇-睡眠綜合中心醫(yī)學(xué)主任阿爾西比亞德斯·羅德里格斯博士告訴《健康》雜志,“如果我們?cè)诳焖傺蹌?dòng)睡眠期間發(fā)燒,可能會(huì)感到更不舒服,并產(chǎn)生微覺(jué)醒(深淺睡眠之間的轉(zhuǎn)換)。這增加了我們記住夢(mèng)的可能性。”