Bizarro dreams from the sleep deprived

I don't know what's been wrong with me, but my dreams have been increasingly troubling lately--and they have troubled me so greatly that the quantity of hours no longer matters in the quality of my sleep. I know I'm under stress, but the lack of sleep certainly does not help in my stress level.

Over the past few days, I've had the following dreams:

1. Unable to find Robert
I don't remember great details about the dream, but I do know that I was at the university (or something like it), and I was trying desperately to find Robert. In the dream, he had an office either in the same building as mine or in the library. At first, I was on the elevator in my building to find his office, and I had these numbers repeating themselves erratically in my mind. Four of those numbers are actually my office number, which doesn't surprise me. Regardless of how hard I looked, I could not find Robert in my building. So, off I went to the library. Just like Disney World, my university had a monorail system that attached central buildings to one another, which included my building to the library. I hopped the monorail to the library, sure I could find him there. I took the monorail from one floor to the next as it wound up and through the library like a snake. When we got to the top floor and I still hadn't found Robert, I had a sudden true panic attack which woke me up. One I felt as I awoke.

2. Strangling the eight-legged monster
Robert and I were in my parents' home, and it was just the two of us. I was getting the impression that he and I had just arrived before everyone else, but that we were going to leave and meet them somewhere. As we were leaving our luggage in our separate rooms (because this dream was apparently a real-time, pre-wedding dream), I noticed something dark scurry past me in my periphery. I felt suddenly angry and annoyed, but I couldn't figure out why. I went downstairs to meet with Robert and to tell him about what I saw, when I saw the thing peeking out at me from behind the couch. I went to the kitchen to grab a paper towel (I guess because I thought it was a bug and that I was going to squish it), but when I returned it had disappeared again. Robert kept swearing that he hadn't seen anything and that he didn't know what I was talking about. At this point, I was in a frenzy and couldn't calm myself down until I had killed this creature. Robert told me it was okay but that we were going to be late, so I grabbed my coat and purse and started to walk toward the door...when it popped out from behind the couch again. I cursed, threw my stuff on it, and then went for a shoe. When I turned around, I could see it clearer, and it had scurried closer to me. It was a little black, furry, eight-legged creature. Not so much spider-like as feline, actually. I knew the only way to kill it was to strangle it because it was too big to squish. I grabbed it by its spindly neck, felt my thumbs press into its windpipe, and watched as its eyes began to well up while it stared up at me. There was no doubt that this creature was pure evil, but it looked pitiful as I strangled it. I realized it was still struggling to inhale, so I pressed my fingers over its nose as well to speed along the process. Right before I woke up, its eyes rolled back in its head, and I guess I killed it. I awoke with a pounding heart and with tears in my eyes.

3. Aural hallucinations on the bus
Today, as I was on the bus back to Robert's home (where I park my car because he's so much closer to the bus stop than I am), I nodded off. My ride takes about fifteen minutes, so I really shouldn't have nodded off...but I did. I never fully fell asleep, but instead had little spurts of vivid dreams. I hate when I dream like that because it truly disturbs me. The vivid dreams today were focused entirely on the aural. Everything I dreamt about was screaming, loud and jarring noises, incessant pounding. The bus ride itself was very quiet and smooth because I was one of only four people on the whole bus. When I arrived at Robert's, I was unexpectedly exhausted and developing quite a large and painful headache. Despite that we haven't spent a great deal of time with each other this week, I simply couldn't stay...I had just enough energy to get myself home. I hadn't eaten anything all day, and I was starting to feel very dizzy, on top of the imposing headache. By the time I got home, I felt so sick that I nearly couldn't prepare my dinner. I managed to feed myself sufficiently, passed out, had a few more vivid dreams (which I've subsequently forgotten), and am now feeling much better than I was this afternoon.

What I'd like to know, though, is what is going on in my subconscious to give me such disturbing dreams.