I don't feel cheated in the least -- and this is probably why intercutting to the Bridge doesn't bother me --- because the dream has such a profound,
lasting effect on Picard. Ultimately, the nature of the experience (true out of body, dream, hallucination, artificial memory) doesn't matter because the experience itself is so visceral, so real that, for Picard, it *was* real -- regardless of what transpired during his experience.
To live an entire lifetime in the span of minutes is truly profound and, personally, I'm glad it wasn't given some perfunctory "reveal" at the end of the episode as a dream (think of the series finale to Newhart). Establishing its true nature early on with various returns to the bridge allows the audience to focus on the experience Picard is having, rather than spending time wondering about the nature of the experience.
Think about it ... life is so often filled with choices, and Picard chose a life of relative solitude as an explorer. And yet, through the Probe, he gets something he did not (and we would not) have: the chance to live a completely different life (in this case, a more domestic, but no less fulfilling one). Which is better? No one can really say. But Picard, at least, is able to experience both. And the journey is deeply moving. Knowing that it is happening within the span of minutes on the bridge merely reinforces that fact.
For me at least.
