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I will occasionally get sleep paralysis and am wondering if anyone else in the CWE community also experiences it from time to time?
Basically, when you hit REM sleep, your body releases a series of chemicals to prevent you from acting out your dreams. When your mind awakens, you’re body stops producing the chemicals so you can move. For people with sleep paralysis, sometime when your mind begins to awaken but your body doesn’t stop producing the chemicals. Thus you’re awake but you can’t move your body.
Here is the Wikipedia article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis
I was a teenager when it first happened. I dreamt I was drowning. I remember trying to get up and move my body but it felt like lead. I started to panic because I couldn’t breathe (I might have been face down in the pillow). Finally after exerting all my mental strength. I was able to role on my side, gasp for air and move my body.
It’s probably happens to me once or twice a year, always upon awakening. I feel trapped in my body in a half awake, hazy mental state. My arms and legs feel as though sandbags are holding them down. All I want to do is move, but feel as though I’m buried. I try to stay calm as a feeling of panic sets in. It takes an enormous amount of effort to toss myself awake. Sometime I contemplate whether it’s better to give up and try to fall back asleep.
Now mind you, this usually happens before a much needed early morning bathroom break. When I come back to bed, I always pause a minute or so, debating whether I truly want to go back to sleep. In the end, sleep always wins.
I asked my epileptologist and he said they have not found correlation with epilepsy. He also said his wife gets it from time to time.
If you read the history and folklore section in the link, you will see our present day term “nightmare” came from sleep paralysis, hence the Incubi and Mares reference in the title.
Basically, when you hit REM sleep, your body releases a series of chemicals to prevent you from acting out your dreams. When your mind awakens, you’re body stops producing the chemicals so you can move. For people with sleep paralysis, sometime when your mind begins to awaken but your body doesn’t stop producing the chemicals. Thus you’re awake but you can’t move your body.
Here is the Wikipedia article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis
I was a teenager when it first happened. I dreamt I was drowning. I remember trying to get up and move my body but it felt like lead. I started to panic because I couldn’t breathe (I might have been face down in the pillow). Finally after exerting all my mental strength. I was able to role on my side, gasp for air and move my body.
It’s probably happens to me once or twice a year, always upon awakening. I feel trapped in my body in a half awake, hazy mental state. My arms and legs feel as though sandbags are holding them down. All I want to do is move, but feel as though I’m buried. I try to stay calm as a feeling of panic sets in. It takes an enormous amount of effort to toss myself awake. Sometime I contemplate whether it’s better to give up and try to fall back asleep.
Now mind you, this usually happens before a much needed early morning bathroom break. When I come back to bed, I always pause a minute or so, debating whether I truly want to go back to sleep. In the end, sleep always wins.
I asked my epileptologist and he said they have not found correlation with epilepsy. He also said his wife gets it from time to time.
If you read the history and folklore section in the link, you will see our present day term “nightmare” came from sleep paralysis, hence the Incubi and Mares reference in the title.
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