When I was younger. It's been several years since I've had it happen though. Thankfully. When it first started occurring it was the most terrifying thing I had ever experienced. I eventually researched it and was able to realize what was happening, although is remained pretty scary every time. Don't miss it at all.
Some entity was sitting on my back drilling into the back of neck. I awoke from the dream, in my dream. Went back to sleep in my dream and had the same dream. Woke again but realized I was in a dream. Had to go back to sleep and wake up again several times to wake up irl.
So sleep paralysis, nested dreaming and lucid dreaming all wound up into one, a pretty trippy mindfuck.
I did and wrote a year long research paper about it. Â
The reason for sleep paralysis is to prevent sleep walking or other injuries that can occur by body movement during sleep. It's part of the body's natural defenses. It occurs in everyone to some extent. Some people never notice it.
It can be frightening as you enter a waking state. Many describe it as a sensation of being pushed or held down or even as a person sitting on your chest. But now that you know what it is, the fear should subside.
Used to take great effort but now I'm able to do it more or less on command. Also learned that going right back to sleep after breaking out of it can put me right back in that state. Helps to stay awake for a minute or two and move around a bit.
I actually wake myself up screaming
My wife is like wtf
But I just say bad dream and fall back asleep
I have woke up from nightmares and gone back to sleep into same nightmare. Now I actually shake out the cobwebs a few minutes to make sure I don’t do that
I have been having sleep paralysis since I was 5. I started getting it more frequently since my 20’s. It really sucks. I was relieved when I finally found out what it was called, and that I wasn’t alone or “crazy”. I find that Valium, Klonopin, Xanax like medications (Benzodiazepines) help. I make sure I tell my significant other, now my wife, to push me really hard and do whatever it takes to make sure I wake up ASAP if I’m twitching trying to get her attention while having one of those frightening attacks. The one thing that helps me go back to deep sleep if no one is around to help me or if I can’t shake myself out of that episode is keep repeating a prayer (our Father etc.).
Sleepwalks. He's sharing a huge barn loft on my sister's property with us this weekend and last night he was out on the deck alerting us to the people he thought he saw walking around the yard after midnight. He was downstairs, upstairs, and looking at the lights.
Sound asleep the entire time. Really freaky but good for relentless ball busting this morning.
I did tons of research on this as part of a NSF grant Â
Your empathy, knowledge, and input on this matter is just...wonderful. Keep eating your delicious food and wine, I’m just happy for you that you are not experiencing this as often as some people. We should all just eat well and drink enough wine, maybe that’s the cure for even more disease processes. Contact the CDC and NIH.
And the other poster about ghosts, just lol. Its nice that you spent so much time researching for absolutely a ridiculous finding. I wonder if you are mocking people that suffer with sleep paralysis. I wonder how you’d feel if someone was rubbing salt on your wound if you were experiencing such a condition. We all will have some kind of health problem to deal with someday. I hope others are just as compassionate to you.
So sleep paralysis, nested dreaming and lucid dreaming all wound up into one, a pretty trippy mindfuck.
The Nightmare by Henry Fuseli (1781)
It's been explored in literature throughout the world, even Shakespeare wrote about it (see The Queen Mab speech for reference).
It can be frightening as you enter a waking state. Many describe it as a sensation of being pushed or held down or even as a person sitting on your chest. But now that you know what it is, the fear should subside.
Haven't had it in a long time now.
My wife is like wtf
But I just say bad dream and fall back asleep
I have woke up from nightmares and gone back to sleep into same nightmare. Now I actually shake out the cobwebs a few minutes to make sure I don’t do that
I got it sleeping on my side this week
Don’t eat too close to bed time. It’s not an old wives tale. If I eat a bunch of shit and go right to bed I am at higher risk.
I may have experienced it once, can't really recall, but it was as a kid before I discovered good food and wine.
Sound asleep the entire time. Really freaky but good for relentless ball busting this morning.
+1
And the other poster about ghosts, just lol. Its nice that you spent so much time researching for absolutely a ridiculous finding. I wonder if you are mocking people that suffer with sleep paralysis. I wonder how you’d feel if someone was rubbing salt on your wound if you were experiencing such a condition. We all will have some kind of health problem to deal with someday. I hope others are just as compassionate to you.