CES and When Dreams Defy the Injury

Exploring the Mystery of My Wet Dreams After Spinal Cord Injury

Five years ago, my life changed dramatically when I suffered a spinal cord injury due to Cauda Equina Syndrome at the L3 level. As a result, I became a paraplegic, losing movement and sensation in my lower body. Yet, despite this, something unexpected started happening: I began experiencing regular wet dreams.

Now, that alone might not seem unusual—many people have them. But what struck me as bizarre was that during these dreams, I wasn’t just passively experiencing sexual activity in my mind. When I woke up, I realized that my penis was actually moving on its own, rhythmically thrusting before I ejaculated—without me touching it or making any voluntary movement.

This led me to ask some big questions:

1. Is my penis moving because of the dream, or is the movement happening first and influencing my dream?

2. How is this movement even possible when I’m supposed to have lost control of those muscles? Does this mean there are still hidden pathways between my brain and the lower parts of my body?

So, I started digging into the science behind it. What I found was fascinating.

What Controls Erections and Ejaculation?

Normally, sexual function is controlled by a mix of signals from the brain, spinal cord, and nerves in the pelvic region. Here’s how it works:

• Psychogenic arousal: This is when the brain creates arousal from thoughts, fantasies, or dreams. It sends signals down the spinal cord to trigger an erection.

• Reflexogenic arousal: This happens when physical touch triggers a reflex in the spinal cord, leading to an erection or ejaculation.

• Nocturnal erections: These occur automatically during REM sleep, a stage of deep sleep when dreaming is most vivid.

For someone with a spinal cord injury, the ability to get an erection or ejaculate depends on where the injury is and whether those nerve pathways are still working. Since my injury was at L3, it mainly affected the nerves going to my legs, bladder, and some sexual function—but it didn’t completely cut off all the nerve pathways.

The Big Question: Does the Dream Cause the Movement, or Vice Versa?

At first, I wondered if the movement of my penis was somehow triggering the sexual dream, the same way that feeling thirsty in real life might make you dream about drinking water. But after looking into the neuroscience, the evidence points in the opposite direction:

The dream is most likely causing the movement.

Here’s why:

• Dreams originate in the brain, specifically in the limbic system (which controls emotions and sexual desire).

• During REM sleep, the brain sends signals down the spinal cord to activate sexual reflexes, which is why most men (even those with spinal cord injuries) still get nocturnal erections.

• If some of my spinal pathways are still intact, those brain signals could be reaching my lower body, triggering contractions and movement.

So, my erotic dreams aren’t just fantasies playing out in my head—they’re actually triggering real physical responses below my injury. This means my brain and spinal cord are still communicating in ways that aren’t fully understood.

Hidden Pathways? Evidence of Brain-Spinal Cord Communication

One of the most surprising things about my experience is that it challenges the idea that my lower body is completely “disconnected” from my brain.

In spinal cord injuries, doctors usually talk about “complete” and “incomplete” injuries.” A complete injury means there’s no communication at all between the brain and the body below the injury. An incomplete injury means some signals still get through. I was diagnosed as complete but later became incomplete. 

Since Cauda Equina Syndrome affects nerves rather and the spinal cord itself, there’s a chance that some of my autonomic nerves (which control automatic functions like erections and ejaculation) are still partly working. This would explain why my dreams can still trigger movement in a part of my body that I otherwise can’t consciously control.

The Feedback Loop: A Mind-Body Connection I Didn’t Expect

One of the most interesting parts of this experience is how it might work as a feedback loop:

1. The erotic dream starts in my brain, activating sexual arousal centers.

2. These signals travel down to my lower body through any remaining nerve connections.

3. My penis starts moving involuntarily, reinforcing the sexual nature of the dream.

4. The movement makes the dream even more vivid, strengthening the cycle.

It’s almost as if my body is responding to the dream, and the dream is responding to my body. This suggests that, despite my injury, there’s still a functional connection between my brain and lower body—just not in the way I expected.

What This Means for Others with Spinal Cord Injuries

My experience isn’t just a weird personal mystery—it actually raises important questions about how much we really know about spinal cord injuries and neuroplasticity (the brain’s ability to adapt and rewire itself).

Doctors typically tell SCI patients that lost function won’t come back, but what if there’s more going on under the surface? What if our nervous system is capable of rewiring itself in ways we don’t fully understand yet?

This experience has given me a completely new perspective on my own body. Even though I lost sensation and voluntary control below my injury, my brain and spinal cord are still interacting in surprising ways.

Maybe science doesn’t have all the answers yet—but my body is proving that there’s more happening beneath the surface than we might think.