Anyone get sleep paralysis?

[barefoot]

Good luck at the sleep lab @lullaby19 and I’d be really interested in hearing what they say/suggest if you feel like sharing here afterwards.

I’m seeing a sleep specialist in a few weeks for my night terrors and this thread has made me realise that there is more going on for me than night terrors and that I should probably mention the hallucinations and sleep paralysis as separate things too instead of me just lumping it all together in my mind.

 

[Gamereign555]

I've experienced sleep paralysis twice that i can actually remember. I've had frequent nightmares...

Stories about this has been told for a very long time. It is in the legends. There is always a monster of some sort and there is always some smothering something to do with the bed. I just read one legend that names the monster “ The old hag “. She sits on top of our chests in our sleep and tries to smother us.

 

[Deleted member 541]

Just had my first episode EVER of this last night. The nightmare was more scary than not being able to move or scream though. Really hope this doesn’t happen again.... sleep hasn’t been easy for months now.....

 

[New]

@She Cat I am so sorry. It is SO scary, isn’t it? I hope you don’t have anymore of these.

 

[Deleted member 541]

@Faith Andrews So far so good. And YES, it’s scary!!!!

 

[Gamereign555]

@She Cat I am so sorry. It is SO scary, isn’t it? I hope you don’t have anym...

It’s funny because when I think of this, I recall of the lucid dreams and things I’ve done in my life. Such as swimming underwater and exploring because I can breeze or flying or leaping around with tall bounds and floating. These nightmares are more like lucid nightmares to me.

 

[shawn]

I've experienced sleep paralysis twice that i can actually remember. I've had frequent nightmares si...

I am a police officer too, 11 years. I have experienced these for the last 2 years. Coincidentally I was also shot at twice in the same time frame. In mine, i am fully functional but im being attacked by something, different objects. I do fight back and scream commands which the wife will tell me to calm down im dreaming. After about 20 seconds I come to and realize its not real. I really do believe its coming from being shot at. I have had reoccurring nightmares of this but when the hallucinations happen I do feel comforted by fighting back and not letting it control me or get me. Fight back, scream, do whatever it takes as we've been trained. These occurrences do not happen as much as they have in the past but the only difference is my wife sleeps with my firearm next to her and in the case of an actual emergency she will give me my sidearm. We figure better safe than sorry. Sad thing is if we, police officers, go for help there's a good chance we will be determined not fit for duty, ending in being jobless. Not sure where to go but this is a start.

 

[Sweetleaf]

I get sleep paralysis pretty often. It comes and goes, sometimes I'll have it more frequently

It's like that for me, too. I get it fairly often, sometimes less, sometimes more.

Sometimes my dreams will lead into it. Last time I had it happen, I was having a dream featuring my abuser. He was having me do things, I wanted to go but I started losing control over my body, feeling suffocated, and then I woke up and realized I was having sleep paralysis, and tried to move and talk until I snapped out of it and took a few deep breaths. At most, when I'm in that state, I can get my vocal cords to make some noise, but instead of words it's just a weak moan. It's happened so much I don't freak out as much as I used to, it's just an uncomfortable experience, but I don't go into panic so much anymore because I know it will end.

I don't hallucinate anything when it happens, thankfully. I'm just not able to move or control my breathing.

 

[abg1202]

I get sleep paralysis all the time. The first time I remember having it I was 17. At first it was just episodes where I would wake up and not be able to move. It was scary, but I learned quickly that if I moved a finger or toe I could pull myself out of it. When I was 23 I started having hallucinations with it. At first it was just hearing things, I would hear footsteps or voices, but it quickly progressed to seeing and feeling things. It went from maybe a couple times a year to monthly then weekly and sometimes every day at this point. It's just gotten progressively worse. I've felt things bump into my bed, my whole bed will shake. I've felt things pull the covers off from the bottom of my bed. I've felt hands grab my arms and legs, throat and body. I've felt something crawl up from the bottom of my bed over me, I've felt something climb over me and lay next to me, I can physically feel the weight of a being next to me. I've seen things open doors and walk around my room and stand over me. It's horrible. Sometimes I get so scared and panicked while trying to pull myself out of it that my whole body will fly off the bed. I've had it almost every night since January of this year. I get so anxious going to bed because I'm scared that it will happen and what will happen if it does, and anxiety triggers triggers the sleep paralysis and once it happens I don't go back to sleep so I'm sleep deprived and it's just a vicious cycle that I can't seem to break. I'm not big on opening up and talking about things, but when I do people think I'm freaking crazy! I have a few friends who have had it a couple times in their lives so they kinda know what I'm talking about and even they have a hard time understanding. Not really looking for suggestions or anything, just thought it would be nice to talk about it with people who truly understand.

 

[Neverthesame]

Only had this happen a couple of times, but yeah... It sucks. Lol

Scared the hell out of me the first time. Scoured the web looking for what I'd experienced, discovered what it was.

The second time wasn't any more pleasant, though it was much easier to calm down afterwards knowing that a massive black entity didn't fill my bedroom and sit on me.
Still gave me the willies for a bit though.

 

[Squizooza]

Hope it's not too late to reply to this thread.

I get sleep paralysis where I have a nightmare within a nightmare within a nightmare within a nightmare... I can't wake up or move at all and I want to shout for my husband but I can't speak at all. The first time I 'wake up' within the nightmare I think that I'm really awake and in my bedroom. Everything seems normal at first.. .then things start to go weird and another round of the same nightmare starts ...
I usually get out of it by wiggling a finger until I can move my whole hand. If I'm lucky, some part of my mind will be aware that I'm stuck in a nightmare and will give the rest of my mind an order like "Leave this dreamworld!".


It's usually the same dream, as well: I'm in my flat, only it's not my flat, and either of these two things happens: a) my parents (who traumatized me) follow me around everywhere until I beat my mother to death, b) a burglar or random people walk around the flat as if it was theirs/ the walls between 'my' flat and the neighbours' have been removed. (I've never been burgled, but I'm very hypervigilant and 'intruders' are my public enemy number 1, so this makes sense).

 

[Strangelongtrip]

I just had this happen to me today. It was terrifying. It happens ALL the time, hallucinations and sleep paralysis, and I always have the same emotions experienced during my trauma (helplessness, panic, fear, shame, betrayal). I always hallucinate that there’s a man coming into whatever room I’m in but I can’t move or scream, and he’s coming towards me to hurt me and I can’t do anything about it.

Usually it’s at night and when my room is pitch black and I just see a huge looming shadow. Today it happened during the day time it was so vivid he was wearing an orangey yellow shirt and he had a pot belly. He looked like that serial killer from Mind Hunter I think his name was Kepler. I would fall in and out of sleep and see a girl who wasn’t me being sexually assaultsd then back to the man in the room. I was only asleep for an hour but it felt like at least four. I have mainly emotionally flashbacky nightmares but I’ve also had rape specific nightmares, some over and over.

I also some nights only sleep for 4 hours or less, then wake up at around 4am with my heart racing and unable to get back to sleep. This’ll last about a week before I get back to normal. I won’t take Nyquil or the like ever again because it made the sleep hallucinations horrific and I couldn’t wake up. A light on or a TV on or a podcast on at night helps. So do sound machines.