Nov '18
I recently watched a documentary on YouTube discussing sleep paralysis. It's pretty creepy how so many people from different parts of the world tend to see the same things.
My grandmother told me about a time when she had it happen to her. She claimed that when she woke up, unable to move, that she saw an old woman crawling back and forth just outside her bedroom door. She was a treasure trove of scary stories. I miss her.
Anyway, I've never experienced sleep paralysis myself, but the morbid part of me is just curious enough to want to.
Have any of you ever had that happen to you? Did you see anything?
My grandmother told me about a time when she had it happen to her. She claimed that when she woke up, unable to move, that she saw an old woman crawling back and forth just outside her bedroom door. She was a treasure trove of scary stories. I miss her.
Anyway, I've never experienced sleep paralysis myself, but the morbid part of me is just curious enough to want to.
Have any of you ever had that happen to you? Did you see anything?
The first few times this happened, there were no visual assosiations. The last time, however, a series of images appearered that were clearly not actually present because I could still see them when I closed my eyes. It was three images, one following after the other and they all seemed to be drifting towards me but never appeared to change location is space...if that makes sense. They weren't detailed images at all. They were the outline of a human figure, an open eye and a series of numbers, all of them white and transparent.
Each time was identical in sensation except for the images I saw the last time it occurred. I would just wake up as usual but when I went to move I couldn't. Then I would flush, feeling warm all over. I'm not sure if that was due to fright from the realization I was paralyzed, or if it is an effect of the sleep parylisis itself but it was probably the former.
Scared and confused I focused on one arm, I can't remember which at this time but I'm right handed so probably my right arm. I tried again to move it, to throw the blanket off me which felt like it was begining to be drawn tighter over my chest. It seemed so tight that I beleived I was being pulled down into my mattress. There was no pain assosiated with that sensation though.
I couldn't tell you exactly how long this would last but it wasn't long, likely not even over a minute. But I can tell you that not being able to move anything but your eyes while it feels like you're being pressed through your mattress seemed to last quite a lot longer.
It is an interesting phenomenon but is largely understood. It's basically you waking up during REM sleep before your brain relenquished voluntary control back over to your body. If your brain didn't inhibit motion during sleep, you would act out your dreams and that probably wouldn't be a good thing.This could also account for the things people see during this state because you are in a state inbetween sleep and wakefulness...but I'm not sure if that bit is fully understood.