Dreams are a way for women to address their worries about their pregnancies, therapists say.

 
It makes sense that a woman eating for two and dressing for two also would dream for two.

Expectant mothers, it seems, often have the same dreams at the same points in their pregnancy. This happens, according to the authors of "Dreaming for Two" (Dutton), because the women have similar questions and concerns, and are often without an outlet to express them.

Society's rules say pregnancy should be a happy time and the mothers-to-be shouldn't have any doubts, says Sindy Greenberg, one of the book's three authors, but, in reality, many women are worried about changes in their identity and their bodies, and wonder if they'll be good mothers.

That leaves women to stew about these issues in their sleep.

"Dreams are conduits. They come from the mouths of real women," Greenberg says.

For their book, Greenberg and co-authors Elyse Kroll, a former magazine editor, and Hillary Grill, a psychotherapist, interviewed scores of pregnant women about their dreams.

At first most of the expectant mothers were reticent but once they got talking about their dreams, it seemed as if a veil covering many other topics was lifted, says Greenberg.

And while some pregnant women reported having happy dreams about their new lives with their babies, those were mostly daydreams, says Greenberg. The vivid nighttime dreams were about giving birth to aliens, ex-boyfriends and misplacing a baby in a busy store, she reports.

It might seem as if pregnant women dream more often but they're usually just lighter sleepers and remember more of their dreams, according to the book. The more one's sleep is interrupted, the more likely one will awaken during a dream cycle, making it easier to remember the dream.

	Dreaming for two An identity shift The dependency issue