Sleep Paralysis

[Celebrindal]

Tonight, I experienced an episode of Sleep Paralysis. Before I continue, if you don't know much about it (I didn't until just a few minutes ago), here are the wikipedia links. Sleep Paralysis & Hypnagogia

It was about 6pm (I work 3rd shift) and I was in a deep sleep, dreaming vividly as I recall. Something about a conversation I was having with someone about Stephen king writing Child's play (I know he didn't) triggered the Sleep Paralysis. I opened my eyes and the room was dark, aside from the glow of the LED light of my PC, which gave off shadows to a standing oscillating fan next to the bed. My girlfriend was at the hair salon, so all of the lights of our apartment were off.

From the door to the bedroom, I heard little pitter patter footsteps running to the opposite side I was facing, while laying on the bed. Now, I cannot move at all. I tried. All I could do is blink rapidly. Unbelievable fear set in. I was so afraid, that I thought that the fear was what was not allowing me to move. I called my girlfriend's name. It came out very low, so I tried a little louder. All of a sudden, someone started talking into my right ear (ear that's facing up). It sounded like a friend of mine who is stationed in Hawaii at the moment. He was repeating something I can not remember now, over and over.

So I shut my eyes. I tried to tell myself this was a dream, but it just was not working. I opened them up again and starting yelling my girlfriend's name a few times... thinking she just might be home. She wasn't. Then the voice started talking into my ear again, telling me she wasn't home, then repeating to me the words it said before, over and over. More unbelievable terror struck me. I have never been so afraid in my life. I mean, I could actually feel the air pushing against my ear when this person talked. I managed to jump up and run into the living room (1 bedroom apt), turning on the light and I saw my girlfriend standing in the kitchen, with pajamas on, facing away from me. I turned on the kitchen light and tried to turn her around and then I woke up.

I still had the fear, but my body could move now. I slowly looked around the dark bedroom and got up to turn on the light. It was all a fucking dream.

Never in my life, be it in the real world or in any dream have I been as scared as I was this evening. I've been through a lot of horrible violent things in my life including seeing people die in front of me, been shot at, attacked with knives, broken bottles etc. and fought for my life.. but I've never been afraid like this. The lack of adrenaline and the helplessness I felt scared the living shit out of me, I actually curled up in a ball on the bed afterwards.

It was fuckin' freaky. Annnywayy. I just needed to get all that off my chest. Does anyone have any similar experiences with this shit? Is there any way to fight against it, so I don't have to spend so long trying to get out of it next time it happens?

[Arbitrary]

I have it happen to me all the time. It pretty much sucks. Before I read that wikipedia link I had just thought they were just dreams. I had a hypothesis that it was something going wrong just as dream mode was kicking in but that seemed more complicated than just being a freaky dream.

I usually just try and move with all my willpower until I wake up. I'll even have the illusion of the pain of strained muscles.

Every now and then I'll have back to back to back episodes all in the same sleep period. Those are absolutely terrible.

[Kiroy]

I experience this about once every month or two because I have a goofy sleep schedule due to my job. It usually happens when I either start falling asleep for a nap, or waking up from one. The fear is there every time, but it's not as bad as when it first started happening. I problem is not thinking clearly when in the paralysis. Wiki says the brain is fully awake, but it's still in that way slow thinking groggy stage for me, so I don't know wtf is going on each time.

I actually thought they were a sort of dream - like sometimes when I'm just starting to fall asleep I'll have 'mini-dreams' in which I'm riding a bike, or snowboarding, then BAM!!, I hit a tree and my whole body spasms and wakes me up. That sucks too.

I don't have any advice except to say that it sucks each and every time.

[dak]

I don't get sleep paralysis but I do get that thing where you lay on your arm and cut off the blood circulation so when you wanna roll over or whatever you need to use your other arm to fling it around.

Gotta admit I like it though, makes for a outstanding middle of the night "stranger".

[Sabolin]

I've had this happen to me exactly once, I forget when but it was quite a while ago. When I 'woke up' in this sleep paralysis state I felt that someone was in the house and was going to kill me and my entire family while we slept. I had the most absolute feeling of terror and dread and couldn't move to save anyone, and I could see this person or thing in my mind moving up the stairs in my house into my parents room first to kill them (even though my door was closed and the stairs are on the other side of the house). When I tried to call out all that came out was a very low, almost a whisper, sound of what I was trying to say.

I started being able to move but it was like I was being held down, or moving in some very thick fluid that was pushing me back so hard (note: I've had dreams like this, where I need to fight but can't move my arms fast enough to punch, or run but can't move my legs fast enough to actually run, but they aren't nightmares or sleep paralysis in this sense).

Eventually I fully woke up in a cold sweat and thought it was just a nightmare. I had to get up and move around a bit to calm down. The next day I started searching around and found out beta infoz about sleep paralysis and the like.

edit-

In terms of hypnagogic hallucinations, I get them very frequently. Most of the time it's seeing the room I'm sleeping in in shades of grey while my eyes are closed and the room is pitch black, or hearing voices usually calling my name. Usually I have some semblance of control over what the voices are saying and when they say it, but never what the voice itself sounds like. Wierd shit.

[Soygen]

This used to happen to me quite often when I was taking Extacy regularly(ie: my girlfriend at the time and I were taking shitloads ). I don't mean it would happen while on E, but in the days following a weekend-long bender. I haven't taken E in about 6 years and it pretty much never happens now.

Made for some very scarey experiences until I read up on it. Then I just kind of dealt with them.

[Dis]

Has happened to me before, same basic premise. Something is threatening my life, or I am trapped, but I cant move. It feels like something heavy is holding me down, very scary sometimes. Sometimes I cognicant enough to realize I am dreaming, but sometimes I am not. Not sure why this is.

[Lyenae]

Evolutionary inheritance. People used to sleep high in trees. You work the rest out.

[Kiroy]

Originally Posted by Lyenae

Evolutionary inheritance. People used to sleep high in trees. You work the rest out.

Wiki's example of a leftover reflex from keeping us from essentially sleep walking makes a bit more sense.

[Avellon]

I remember seeing a show about sleep on CNN. One of the parts had to do with people who had a problem with their mind and never entered sleep paralysis during the proper times, so they'd be acting out things in their dreams.

One example was a guy who kicked the shit out of his wife in bed without realising it because he was dreaming of kicking a neighbor out of his bed.

I think sleep paralysis must have a lot to do with keeping us from acting out what we are dreaming.

[Ronne]

Originally Posted by dak

I don't get sleep paralysis but I do get that thing where you lay on your arm and cut off the blood circulation so when you wanna roll over or whatever you need to use your other arm to fling it around.

Gotta admit I like it though, makes for a outstanding middle of the night "stranger".

Man, I scared myself to death like that once. My arm flopped on top of me and cold and lifeless one morning and I freaked out~

[Cuppycake]

Man, I've never had one of these but it sounds absolutely terrifying. *knocks on wood*

About the whole falling asleep on your arm thing..my mom does that all the time. She wakes up and her arm is numb for like 10 minutes. But a couple months ago, she literally lost all movement in her hand when she woke up. She woke up, went into the bathroom and tried to grab her toothbrush and her hand wouldn't move. It wasn't tingly or anything, it just was impossible to control. Few hours later it was still 'dead' so she went to the doctor. They did a bunch of scans and told her that she pinched a nerve while she was sleeping. It actually took 7 weeks for her to be able to move her hand. She had to wear a brace on her hand for almost 2 months! So..don't sleep on your arms =P

[Zeste]

Has been happening to me most of my life.

In neuropsych, we studied this sort of thing. There are a few different types of Hypnagogic sleep disorders.

For me, it's not *usually* scary, but it can be. Usually it's when I nap during the day, I try to wake up, but I can't. And I keep dreaming that I wake up and finally am awake, but then all of a sudden I'm still paralyzed, so I think I wake up again, but I'm not.

It's the standard "okay I finally woke up from that bad dream, but oh no, I'm still in a dream!!"

Yeah. I try to avoid sleeping during the day. It usually ends with my finally willing myself truly awake with a bodywide jerk and yell.

Sucks.

EDIT: Oh also, this is gonna really sound weird, but in this dream-like states, I've also experienced feelings and emotions that I have never been able to replicate in the waking world. I am not saying they're like ultra-super sad or something, it's just an emotion, a whole feeling of "being" that I've never had in the real world. I dunno, but my brain can only do it in these hypnagogic states.

Oh, and I've never done any drugs, so it's not that.

[Rhaze]

I believe i had one of these about 2 weeks had a dream something bad was happening to me, and I could see myself thirdperson style and I kept trying to call for my parents but it kept comming out as a low moan type deal. I then woke up and didn't move for 2 minutes because i was like wtf.

I also sometimes have dreams where someones hand tightens around my neck and i literally feel something tighten on my neck then i wake up.

[dumdee777]

Does sleep paralysis always involve fear? I'm not sure if I get this or not. I am partially awake, and I try my hardest to move my body, but I can't. It's never scary for me though, but just annoying when I'm trying to sleep, and I'm straining my body to move to wake up or something.