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For those of you who have dreams about your ex, how do you shake that feeling and go on with your day?

A few times in the last couple weeks, I've had a dream about my ex with BPD. Not the post-traumatic type violent nightmares that I had during the breakup (those left me almost too shaken to function). Just regular dreams - I commonly have vivid dreams about all sorts of everyday things, work, etc. The past two mornings between snooze alarms I dreamed that I was waking up next to her and she was stroking my hair or offering to go make me tea because my throat hurt... .the kind that it sucks to wake up and realize it's not real.

All of these times though, the dream has stuck with me all day. I think about the dream, generally think about her a lot more, and it feels like the feeling of the dream stays in my gut and colors my mood all day. I've even had some brief contact with her over text message lately (arranging logistics after some of her mail got forwarded accidentally to me), and that doesn't affect me nearly as much as these dreams do.

I'd just really like to be able to reclaim my day after a dream like that and not have it hanging over my head all day. Does anyone else experience this?

This can be an opportunity TA.  Detaching takes some work, but the best kind, and once we get a clear vision of what our future life looks like, that life of our dreams that we get to build, and we make that vision bright and clear it becomes compelling enough to pull us towards it.  And then, when we wake up from one of those dreams, it can be fun to see how fast we can get back to that vision, which only makes it stronger with repetition.

Me, I had frequent full-color dreams, the strong ones, with my ex in them for maybe 9 months after I left her, my belief being that that was my brain rewiring itself to make sense of the new reality, and one day, they stopped entirely, rewiring done, haven't dreamt of her in a long time.  But point is it was a challenge initially, I didn't need that sht in my life anymore, but with time and practice I got better at getting back to where I wanted to go.  And getting pissed off helps too, like NO, you do not get to invade my future like you did my past, I WILL take my life back; get very insistent that your life is now yours, your vision yours.  Take care of you!

For me, I find that vivid dreams sometimes put me into an emotional flashback mode.  I do not always consciously realize this is happening, but instead I just feel emotionally 'in a different place in time.' 

As I am starting to realize more often when it is that I feel emotionally flashbacked, I can practice mindfulness.  The best thing to pull me out of such a mode is cardio exercise of some sort such as bike riding.  It feels like the chemical affect of exercise creates such a positive endorphin experience that washes away flashback mode.  The physical exertion and attention to my surroundings is grounding.

I have been in NC for 9 months now. Things are going great now, I have met a new girl and I have neutral feelings for my exBPD. However, I did had some dreams about my exBPD before the holidays. In these dreams she was crying a lot and it looked like she wanted me to contact her because she missed me. An another day I dreamt that one of her pet birds died. It just happened all out of a sudden.

I have accepted the fact that it is over between me and my exBPD and that I will never talk to her/see her, getting back to her is just impossible even if I wanted to I could never do so.

I have no idea what caused these dreams but they look very realistic. Whenever I wake up I do think about it and ask myself so many questions. Does she really miss me? Does she really wants me back? Does she really still cry about the breakup even after 9 months? Does she even know I'm in a new relationship? How would she react if she new about my new girlfriend?

These thoughts only last for a while in my mind before I figure out that it's just an another meaningless dream.

What Sunfl0wer wrote is so true especially the part about exercising.

Thanks for the recommendations everyone! Exercising makes me pissed off so I can implement both of those suggestions at the same time