So, you’ve had a dream about a car accident, and now you’re wondering if it is a sign of impending danger. You may ask yourself, “Does that mean I will get into a car accident soon? Is there something bad coming my way?”
Trying to find meaning in your dreams is normal—in fact, many people search high and low to figure out the potential underlying message in their dreams. However, when dreams about car accidents or other subject matter begin to cause significant worry, anxiety, or distress, it could indicate a mental health problem. Persistent and intense fear of car accidents in your dreams is associated with a number of mental health conditions, such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
Keep reading to find out if these dreams have any meaning and what you can do if they’re causing a lot of distress you can’t seem to overcome.
What do car crash dreams mean?
Depending on who you ask, you may hear a plethora of possible “meanings” or explanations for your dreams about car accidents—which are often difficult to back up with hard facts. These interpretations include feeling like you’re losing control, feeling overwhelmed, coping with past trauma, or feeling vulnerable.
Despite the perceived “meanings” people may attribute to dreams about car crashes, it’s important to understand that dreams typically don’t have any underlying message you need to dig for. “There is no way to know with 100% certainty whether your dreams mean something or not, but science has not shown any promising correlation between dreams and facts,” says Tracie Zinman-Ibrahim, MA, LMFT, CST, Chief Compliance Officer at NOCD. “No scientific evidence proves that if you have a car accident in a dream, that’s because you’re going to have one in the next 14 days.”
Why am I so worried about dreams about car crashes?
Let’s be clear—reflecting on your dreams in the hours after waking is not uncommon. But, if you find that you can’t stop ruminating on dreams about car accidents—or if you become fearful that your dreams mean something about your life—it could be a symptom of any of the following conditions:
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
Similar to PTSD flashbacks, people with PTSD often experience distressing dreams related to their traumatic experiences. If you’ve been in a real car accident, having dreams about it is actually a pretty common symptom of PTSD. The dreams are vivid and intrusive—constantly replaying the traumatic event. These nightmares can lead to persistent, distressing thoughts during waking hours, causing significant emotional turmoil. Hyperarousal (irritability, sleep troubles, difficulty concentrating, etc.) and intrusive thoughts are symptoms of PTSD that may contribute to recurring dreams about car crashes.
Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)
GAD is characterized by excessive worry and anxiety about various aspects of life, including potential accidents. These persistent fears may manifest in dreams, causing people to ruminate on catastrophic scenarios like car accidents.
Major depressive disorder (MDD)
Major depressive disorder (MDD), or simply depression, is a mental health condition that can intensify negative thinking patterns, leading to disturbing dreams about car accidents. People with MDD may experience feelings of hopelessness and despair, influencing the content of their dreams.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a mental health condition characterized by intrusive thoughts, images, urges, feelings, and/or sensations (obsessions) and repetitive behaviors or mental acts (compulsions) performed in response to the distress caused by these thoughts. OCD can manifest in various different themes or subtypes, one of which is known as harm OCD.
Harm OCD involves persistent fears of causing harm to yourself or others, often leading people to engage in compulsive behaviors to prevent the feared harm. Hit-and-run OCD is a form of harm OCD that involves obsessions about hitting a person or animal while driving. Hit-and-run OCD can be triggered by hearing news stories of hit-and-run accidents, feeling the vehicle go over rough terrain or a pothole in the road, driving in adverse conditions, or feeling distracted while driving near pedestrians.
“People with hit-and-run OCD might have dreams about hitting people or running them over because they’ve been ruminating about it so much,” says Zinman-Ibrahim.
Having a dream about a car accident could trigger obsessions, such as:
- Does that mean I’ll get into an accident today?
- What if that’s an actual memory that I repressed?
- I’m the person who is responsible for the hit-and-run I just heard about.
- That dream means that I could have killed someone.
- Is this a premonition? Am I going to die?
- What if I caused a hit-and-run in the past and don’t remember?
If you have OCD, obsessions like these lead to engaging in compulsions to relieve distress or to avoid getting into a car accident—or even to avoid having a similar dream in the future. Here are some examples:
- Frequently stopping while driving to check that you didn’t hit someone
- Avoiding driving altogether
- Urging loved ones to avoid driving
- Mentally reviewing, such as replaying scenes in your mind of driving to “check” if you are repressing a memory of an accident
- Insisting on driving with others in the car or demanding that others drive
- Avoiding driving in the dark or new areas
Zinman-Ibrahim also says that the dreams may result from a fear of losing control. “This could look like thinking ‘I might drive out of the lane, swerve my car, or run a red light,’” she explains. “The underlying thing is that you might lose control, so it could be about anything—driving, harming somebody, or being suicidal.”
To be diagnosed with OCD, your obsessions and compulsions need to cause distress, reduce normal functioning, or take up a lot of time. If OCD symptoms are taking up that much mental bandwidth during your waking hours, it’s reasonable to assume that, at some point, that same content will show up in your dreams.
People with hit-and-run OCD might have dreams about hitting people or running them over because they’ve been ruminating about it so much.
Tracie Zinman-Ibrahim, MA, LMFT, CST
How to cope with disturbing dreams about car crashes
If dreams about car crashes are causing you significant distress, it’s a possibility that there’s an underlying mental health disorder present. Rather than self-diagnosing, it’s important to seek help from a licensed mental health professional to get a proper diagnosis and treatment recommendations.
Here’s what treatment may look like for the following mental health conditions:
- PTSD. Treatment for PTSD typically involves trauma-focused therapies such as prolonged exposure (PE). These approaches aim to desensitize you to the traumatic memories and reduce their grip on your life.
- Generalized anxiety disorder. A specific form of behavioral therapy, known as exposure and response prevention (ERP) therapy, focuses on practicing new behavioral responses in the face of uncertainty and doubt and is highly effective for GAD—which we’ll discuss more later in the case of OCD. Medications such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) may also be prescribed to treat GAD.
- Depression. Psychotherapy, particularly cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) or interpersonal therapy (IPT), is often a first-line treatment for MDD. These therapies address negative thought patterns, helping you reframe your perspectives and develop healthier coping strategies. As with GAD, SSRIs can also be used to reduce symptoms and improve daily functioning.
Using exposure and response prevention (ERP) to overcome distressing dreams
If you suspect that you’re dealing with harm OCD—or any OCD subtype—ERP will be the best way to get your symptoms under control. ERP is a specialized therapy designed to treat OCD and co-occurring conditions, such as GAD, depression, PTSD, and eating disorders. This therapeutic approach involves gradually exposing you to anxiety-provoking situations and preventing the usual compulsions you might do to relieve distress. The goal of ERP is to help you break the OCD cycle of obsessions and compulsions so you can regain control over your life.
You’ll work with a therapist specializing in ERP to complete therapy exercises known as exposures and response prevention techniques. They will tailor the exercises to make them specifically about dreams about car accidents, in which you’ll lean into feelings of uncertainty while learning to resist compulsions.
Your therapist might guide you in saying to yourself, “I could get into a car accident today. Maybe not, but who really knows for sure?” This will probably make you start to worry about driving, but you’ll choose—in gradual steps—to accept that uncertainty and rely less on compulsions. You may start with smaller fears (e.g., watching a news report about a car accident) and then work up to something more challenging, such as going on your usual car commute, even after a dream involving a car accident.
As a result of these ERP exercises, you’ll gain a new relationship with uncertainty and learn that your dreams don’t actually impact your life. After all, uncertainty is a necessary part of life, and no one can control what they dream about. But what you can do is reduce the impact of these distressing obsessions, and become less burdened by the dreams you have.
You don’t have to be afraid of your dreams forever
As disturbing as dreaming about car accidents can be, know that these dreams really don’t hold any meaning. However, if you’re ruminating on the content of dreams and are engaging in behaviors to prevent something that may or may not happen, please consider seeking help from a mental health therapist. An ERP therapist can identify the underlying causes of your distress and create a personalized treatment plan to address your symptoms.