Sleep Disorders Community

My entire life I have been plagued by Nightmares, when I was young I used to wake up screaming at least a couple times a week, as an adult I have nightmares almost every night. These Nightmares have varied throughout my life, when I was a child I would remember them, I would wake up screaming, sweating and in tears. My parent finally got to the point where they would just ignore my screams because it was so common. The nightmares seemed to go away when I was a teenager, to be replaced with talking in my sleep.
As an adult my problems have gotten exponentially worse. I have a great deal of trouble getting to sleep, when I lie down to go to sleep my mind races, and I cant stop thinking. When I do finally close my eyes I am gripped with fear and any tiny sound causes me to sit bolt upright, heart racing in fear, sometimes I feel like something is standing over me as I sleep and I have to open my eyes. I do not watch scary movies or television shows, so I don't know where this fear comes from. When I do finally get to sleep I normally have vivid nightmares, mostly involving people I know. This is all so normal to me I stopped paying attention to it, however, recently I got married and my husband has discovered a new disturbing symptom of my nightmares. He says that a couple times a week I will sit bolt upright in bed screaming bloody murder and that it often takes him 10 minutes to calm me down. I have absolutely no recollection of these episodes and normally on the nights he says this happens I do not recall having a nightmare. This bothers me because of the fact that I have no knowledge of what is happening to me in these episodes, and no recollection of waking up.
Has anyone else had this happen to them? The nightmares I have learned to live with, however I am afraid that when we have children my nightly screaming will frighten them and cause them problems. Any thoughts on what could be going on would be greatly welcome.