Sleep paralysis / waking dream / associated phenomena

[emski]

Hello!

I wasn't sure where to post this, since it's not a bipolar thing necessarily but I couldn't decide where else to put it so here it is.

'Sleep paralysis'

It's a strange phenomenon that I have experienced on and off since I was 7. My first experience of it included a very vivid hallunication of Jesus nailed to the cross in the window of my room.

It can happen on going to sleep and on waking or can disrupt and induce waking during mid sleep - I experience it mostly on sleep onset. It's hard to explain. It's like I am aware that I am drifting of to sleep - like sleep has half set in. I think certain parts of sleep onset prematurely which results in major muscle paralysis. At that moment I will experience strange phenomena like vivid hallucinations, very often a person in the room, or will feel like there is somebody on top of me trying to suffocate me. As I am paralysed I cannot move and there is a very real sense of panic and doom. I also am usually aware that I am trying to scream or make noise to alert help but am unable to. I have on occasion had such bad attacks that I hallucinated an entire situation of the paralysis taking place in an entirely different location.

I experience it worse when I am acutely unwell with debilitating exacerbation of my inability to get sleep. At the moment I don't experience it often - only if I am agitated, stressed or upset - and I can generally rationalise as what it is when I am stable. My medication also mostly prevents it currently.

It's a recognised phenomenon, but I don't think it is classified as a formal sleep disorder.

Anyone ever experienced anything similar?

 

[Apotheosis]

I get the same - Hypnagogia & sleep paralysis; as well as nightmares, lucid dreaming, & night terrors (wake up with heart going like a train & shaking). have experienced it all since a kid.

Regularly feels like people are in the room - & convinced that people have jumped on the bed on top of me; often hitting me, ect; unable to move.

Have seen all kinds of things coming out of sleep.

Often randomly wake up; wide awake; & often woken up with noise - the neighbours love slamming doors, & banging around at all hours of the night.

 

[Lady Summer Isles]

Me too, didn't relise that was the name for it. I was going to put a post on about out of body experiences. I used to get them a lot when i was a child and also had one when I was having my first child by Cesarian Section where I was above the operating table and could feel and hear what the surgeons were doing and saying. I did tell some of the nurses afterwards and no-one believed me at first until I told them what had beed discussed and they checked it out with the surgeons who said it was true. They said I hadn't been fully anaesthetized and apologised. I haven't had many as an adult but did experience one the other night. I don't mind the out of body stuff but I don't like the paralysis where I can't move.

 

[skyblue]

Sleep Paralysis -I get this too Emski, it's horrible. I feel like something is holding me down and not letting me wake up. Most times, I can see my body, arms and legs and I'm trying to move them, but it's impossible. I also try and shout in attempt to wake myself, but it doesn't work.

I've noticed that I only get this when I oversleep. I've also read on the net somewhere that this is the cause, but I suppose it can be different for everybody.

 

[bluebell24]

Hi there,

I get this too; only rarely now but in my late teens and going through a lot of stress it was really bad, always nightmares that would bring on the paralysis and got to the point I was scared of going to sleep. It just seemed to pass though, I suppose as the stress passed too.

I've met a lot of people who've experienced this too; no correlation to any mental health issues really from what I can make out though.

 

[emski]

Some of us experience it then - interesting!

Bluebell - I know what you mean about fearing sleep - hypnophobia - I dread going to bed even if I am tired and desire sleep - I just have this feeling of dread the minute I get under the covers...

 

[>.<]

I get this a lot, when I'm worried or upset usually. I hear people in my room and see stuff on my bed. The worst one is when someone strangles me, and I try to move and I cant, try to scream and I cant, and about a second before I run out of air I wake up

 

[AuroraBlues]

I have this quite often....

Things jumping on my bed, hearing voices and loud noises, being held down by unseen forces, seeing people standing over me.

For me it usually happens on the onset of sleep, or if i wake up and drift off again.

Two of the most recent experiences are still quite fresh in my mind.

I was staying at my folks on a blow up bed and i started sinking into the floor (trainspotting stylie) and was being pushed and held down by little impish creatures. I couldn't move, i felt fully awake and screamed out to my mum a few times. To which she replied in an angry 'WHAT!!?'
I asked her when she got up if she actually heard me screaming out and did she reply and she said no, but did mention i always used to have horrible nightmares as a kid and was always screaming out in my sleep, which i don't remember.

Another time, i think i must of woken up and drifted off again. I was on my back with my arms above my head on the pillow and the next thing i know, this thing, what i can only decribe as a demon.. Was coming through my headboard and trying to pull me through into it.

It's a pretty scary experience as it feels so real.

I find it happens most when i'm highly anxious when going to sleep

I actually make a habit of not sleeping on my back when i go to sleep because i feel more vulnerable to it.

 

[emski]

Definitely going to sleep on my back I have found makes it worse, esp. for the sinking / levitating / and also feeling really miniscule tiny with a massive heavy duvet over me (my brothers used to get this too when they were kids -seems I'm the only one for whom it has persisted)

Strange things