[Shogunator800]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis

I don't get all the symptoms as listed above but experience it every now and then when I'm either sleep deprived or stressed out from work/life.

Basically, to me it just feels like I am about to wake up yet not fully awaken from the REM sleep. As I feel that I am able to quickly wake up, it sort of feels like something magically saps the energy/movement from me and I feel as though I had been reduced to a drug like state and it can cause you to basically feel like you're being held down (in my case just feels like ridiculously strong gravity) and some people hear things and stuff like that but I'm still more half-asleep than I am awake. I also get that annoying rumbling in the ear sensation that is often experienced while I'm trying to lift my head and get up with very little success.

The first time I got it was maybe 7 years ago, and I've only experienced it less than half a dozen times since then. It happens to about 6% of the population now and then and I've also read that people on Xanax or certain types of Anti-depressant medication can get it from that, which I am glad I don't take any of.

Just thought I'd ask Sherdoggers and see if anybody has experienced the same thing or maybe has experienced it with and was kind of freaked out by not knowing what it was.

[JackDempsey]

Yes. The scary thing about this is that the more you think of it the more likely you are of getting it. Forget that you ever heard of it.

It's like an infection or a flu. I got it by reading, told of it to another guy and he got it, and it spread like that. "Old hag syndrome" or somthing like that.

I'll probably get it tonight since I just wrote about it.

Weird feeling.

[jahred]

'the hag' as it's known in NL. there are actually a pile of old threads about sleep paralysis kicking around here somewhere if you want to do some extra reading on it.

i've experienced it once, but not in the usual spooky sense that i had read about in the past. the standard 'symptoms' are that of being unable to move, sensing a presence in the room, and feeling like something is sitting on you.. and it's usually associated with having an old woman sitting on your chest or something of that nature. you also usually get it while lying on your back (supposedly).

in my case, i was lying on my stomach and i thought my little sister had ran into my room and jumped on me to wake me up. i then tried to say "yoooooooooooo" but had no luck, because i couldn't move/speak. anyway i think i keyed in to the fact that i was experiencing sleep paralysis and just kind of rode with it until it wore off.

[Dolomite]

Yep – they used to call them (maybe still do) “Night Terrors”.

I'd be in bed and I would think there was someone standing at the foot of my bed wanting to do me harm and I couldn't move my arm to the loaded 1911 in the gun safe underneath my bed stand (lol).

Used to get them, did some reading on the subject, don't have them any more.

Now when it happens - I simply assign it to my laziness of not wanting to get out of bed.

People that really get freaked out by it (think it's the Devil or something) should give a shrink a call.

[Marsupial]

Although this is gonna sound like an inherently joking piece of advice I do mean it in all seriousness.

If you wake up with Night Terrors that don't involve sleep paralysis but, rather, involve just waking up in the middle of the night feeling inexplicably anxious and scared don't lie there wallowing in the weird irrational fear. Get up, turn on a light, fix yourself with some porn and get busy cracking one off.

Seriously, I've experienced it a few time; waking up in the middle of the night and feeling terrible, like my whole life was fucked (as if I was going to jail or somebody I loved had just died). It was weird shit because I would still be half-asleep and couldn't think straight, otherwise I would have realised it was just some strange spazz-out in my head.
Anyway, the last time it happened I kinda realised it wasn't a rational or legit feeling so I just thought, fuck it, sprung out of bed and slipped a porn into the DVD player.

Serious fwappage = the best medicine.

[fanattic]

i had one where the devil was walking towards me, but i didn't feel anything on my chest or anything like that, and only had it once.

(i don't believe in the devil)

my brother says it's aliens when he has it

[Marsupial]

I have realised I was dreaming during a dream and tried to wake myself up only to "pull out" of the dream but still be lying there semi-concious but unable to open my eyes.

Trapped inside your own head.

A little scary but it was almost like I had to concentrate really hard and "open" an extra set of eyelids.
Happened to me once or twice in my early teens.

[kvolcom]

ive never had anything like that, ever. im the opposite. if i hear sounds or some sort of external stimuli i move pretty quick, even finding my way to the door or light switch in a trashed room without stepping on anything in the complete dark. its weird but i always feel alert and ready to move when i wake up.

[fanattic]

Originally Posted by kvolcom

ive never had anything like that, ever. im the opposite. if i hear sounds or some sort of external stimuli i move pretty quick, even finding my way to the door or light switch in a trashed room without stepping on anything in the complete dark. its weird but i always feel alert and ready to move when i wake up.

sleep paralysis is a kind of dream, where your mind wakes up but the body doesn't, cause when you sleep your body releases neurotransmitters that keep your body from acting out your dreams, sometimes though you become out of sync briefly and you have a sleep paralysis dream, so what sucks is even if you're alert normally you won't be able to move or do anything about it

[Sonny]

I've posted about that horrible reoccurring nightmare I get along with sleep paralysis before.