Sleep Paralysis, Lucid Dreaming & Hallucinations.

[Tony_P]

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Frequently, shortly after falling asleep, I will wake back up, but cannot move. I am totally conscious and aware that I am trying to move. This was very scary at first, but it has happened so many times that I'm pretty comfortable in dealing with the situation.

I think I can wiggle my toes during my struggle to move the rest of my body, but this might be something I am imagining (my mind plays several tricks on me as I will explain below). I have no clue as to how long I lay and struggle to move the rest of my body. After wiggling my toes for a while, my body will wake and I can sit up. On a few occasions I have went back to sleep immediately, only to repeat the entire process again and again throughout the night.

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There was a really good thread about sleep paralysis in either SMP or psych a while back. I get sleep paralysis too, and it's scary as hell the first couple of times.

[ridedc]

Every once in a while I will get sleep paralysis. Unfortunately, I can't seem to calm down and I get really panicky. I always try my hardest to move, or wake up (because most times I know I am sleeping), and this causes me to get extremely anxious. It's such an uncomfortable feeling.

Not only do I get sleep paralysis, but there are two major recurring things that happen in my dreams. The first is that I always move or act sluggishly in my dreams, especially during times when I need to react quickly. For instance, in dreams where I have to run away from something/someone, I end up running away extremely slowly, as if I'm slightly paralyzed. This also happens in dreams where I am in a fight, where my punches are extremely slow, and again, I feel like there is something wrong with me because I am moving so slowly.

Another thing that happens in my dreams, although not so often, is that I imagine myself shrinking (or everything else growing). But it's not a "cool" feeling, or nice sensation. Instead, I get a feeling of extreme anxiety, as if I am really confused about what's going on. It's as if I try to understand why everything is not normal sized, but trying to understand it eventually starts to scare me.

When most of these things happen to me in my dreams, I can usually deduce that I am actually dreaming, but can't get myself to wake up. Sometimes I'll try weird stuff in my dreams to get myself to wake up, but instead, it leads to more trippy things that I don't expect.

[Bjo2001]

I had always wondered what the phenomenon I experienced was and recently figured out it was sleep paralysis when I read an article about it on cnn.com.

For me, right as I am about to fall asleep - think of someone sitting and the head finally tilts down and their eyes close - right as that happens it's like I jar myslef and half wake back up, now unable to move. I can see around my room for the most part, for instance in college I could make out my roommate at his desk. This is always acompanied by sort of hallucinations where I am being attacked by shadows or dark figures that are rushing at me or flying at me. Ocassionally I will feel like I am floating or moving around. I think that I generally wake up pretty quickly, although I guess I can't be sure, but that's how it seems.

This started for me when I was 16, Im 24 now. It used to happen most nights but now it is pretty infrequent. It is definetely trigered by sleeping weird hours, being tired, and maybe drinking/partying. In general if it happens it will be on a Sunday, as I have been up late going out Friday and Saturday night and disrupted by regular work week sleep schedule.

It was rather terrifying at first but I actually got pretty used to it. As stupid as this sounds, I would find my self talking [censored] to the shadows, if you will, once I realized that they couldn't hurt me. I will say that it is amazing how sometimes I felt like I could actually experience a physical sensation from these things though. One time it was even somewhat pleasurable. But in general they just rush at me and I wake up.

I don't really have any advice for you. Just my experience. One thing the article did say was that if you sleep on your back it is 5 times as likely to happen. Link below:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/LIVING/perso...per/index.html

[chumofchance]

Wow, this is a freaky thread... I sleep with my eyes halfway open in general, although it doesn't seem to affect my dreams very much. People just tell me I look dead when I'm sleeping [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

One weird recurring theme in my dreams is that one of my legs is often debilitatingly shorter than the other, and I end up being more or less paralyzed. It's an incredibly unpleasant feeling and I wake up from these dreams feeling really anxious. In real life my right leg is like half an inch shorter than the left (not a big deal but I was a competitive soccer player in high school and it gave me some hip problems, etc.), so I guess I think about it more than I thought...

[traz]

do you guy experience sleep paralysis with your eyes open and aware of your surroundings?

I think I get it from time to time, but I'm never fully conscious. I'm aware that I'm lying in bed half asleep, I'm aware that I can't move my body, but I'm not really awake...if that makes sense.

[Bjo2001]

That's what it's like for me. I am half awake. I can make out things in my room, but it's not like it looks as clear as if I was standing there and my eyes are fully open.

[toss]

Had a lucid dream a few days ago. Been a couple of years since I had one so I made an effort to have one. Slept for around 8 hours then I woke up. I dreamed I was running around a building under construction then into a huge mostly empty mall. For some reason large restrooms keep popping up in my dreams. Eventually I made my way to some kind of cafeteria-like restaurant with an Asian flair. Thats the most I can remember from my first dream. I woke up and tried to remember if I had dreamed. The dream slowly surfaced and I came to realize it wasn't lucid. I was a little disappointed. I went back to sleep with the intent to have a lucid dream.

A one-story (probably) house that's been lived in. Painted wooden exterior (don't know which color), dimly lit kitchen with messy counter tops, not too much space to move around. Somehow I realized I was dreaming. I looked at my hands because I read somewhere that they would usually be distorted in some way. I only had four fingers. All my fingers seemed to be shorter and my hands were reversed. It could've been my thumbs that were missing. My next thought was to look at myself in the mirror and lo and behold there was a mirror on the wall. Didn't see it there before. The mirror or the wall. It was difficult at first trying to see myself in the mirror. My angle of viewing kept changing and all I saw were glimpse. I finally succeeded and saw myself in the mirror. I had a smile that stretched almost from ear to ear. My pupils were dark and covered most of my eyes. My hair was longer stopping about half an inch above my eyes. Now that I've used a mirror it was time to test gravity. I went out to the grassy backyard. The sun was cool and dim. An small old dead tree stood in the yard just like the one at my old house. I jumped pretty high. Not high enough to get onto the roof of the house, but pretty high compared to the real world. I spent a few moments jumping around until my dream started getting fuzzy as I got too far from the house. Maybe my mind can't create a large environment when I'm lucid dreaming. I went back to the house and there was 4 or 5 cakes in a row on a rectangular table. I don't what kind, I think it was chocolate. I'm lactose intolerant so I better eat all this dream cake and I did. Turns out you don't get full when you're dream eating. Then I went into the kitchen and there was a pizza with loads of melty cheese on top. I ate it messily with my fingers. That's as much as I can remember from that dream.

[4thstreetpete]

Wow, this is a thread I've been looking for. Interesting topic so thanks OP for making this thread.

I've never experience lucid dreaming that I always hear people talk about but I used to get sleep paralysis a LOT. I'm curious though for the people who is getting this sleep paralysis, were any of you doing any drugs at the time? I never had it happen to me at any time during my life but then between the ages of 18 to about 25 I was doing quite a bit of drugs. This also included going to a lot of after hours parties throughout the week so my sleep schedule was all messed up.

After a time I started getting this sleep paralysis NIGHTLY during this phase in my life. I'm serious, there were very few nights where I woke up and didn't experience this. When it did happen it was the scariest thing I have ever experienced.

I still remembered the first time it happened to me. I woke up one night and I was fully awake. I could hear everything going around me, I just couldn't move at all. I was fully conscious and I couldn't get my eyelids to open. I couldn't move my fingers or wiggle my toes. My heart was beating a million beats per minute as I was seriously panicking as I really didn't know what was happening to me. I really thought I was paralyzed. After what seemed like an eternity I finally was able to open up my eyelids and move. Needless to say I was freaking out.

This went on for a while and I soon started hearing about sleep paralysis. Now either my sleep schedule is back to normal or that I've remained sober for a while now I don't get it anymore. I think it happened to me once last year after a while now but I've gotten so used to it that it doesn't bother me anymore. I haven't got it since. Definately a very unpleasant experience.

[AMT]

Completely serious question here,

would a wet dream be considered a lucid dream?

I've experienced a number of near death experiences during dreams as well. The strangest variation I've had is not actually seeing me die or going through it, but having a lengthy dream visualizing everyone in my life and their reaction to my death. Crazy stuff.

[daveT]

I would suggest reading Fire in the Brain. It is about Hallucinations and attempts to explain the groundwork for why they occur. The author describes a visit from a succubus.

I simply do not have normal dreams. I only have nightmares. This has happened ever since I was a child. I have always floated between insomnia and hypersomnia. I have a very hard time falling asleep and waking up. I am not a morning person: it can take me four or more hours to "wake up." I remember in school, that the first four to six hours of my morning was a blank, and my grades displayed this.

Your OP sent chills down my spine. I can relate to all of it, except the sleep paralysis. I still wake up at times to find my arm stuck in my blanket when I find myself defenseless in my dream, or I wake up talking, or I wake up with a jump, or a scream in my throat.

I have died several times in my sleep. I have woken up to put my hand to my head and felt blood that was not there.

I don't think that what we are experiencing is normal if it happens constantly.