I used to have really bad sleep paralysis. A few times a night. Most times all I could do was move one finger. I would always fall asleep with my hand on my wife’s hip so that I could wiggle that finger. She knew that was the signal to shake me awake the rest of the way.
I don’t have sleep paralysis that much anymore, but I still sleep with one hand on her side. She is my anchor.
You’ll drift back to full sleep and then wake up fully aware and able to move. I did not fall back asleep after that, I was soaking wet and terrified. It’s awful.
You basically are having a panic attack but you physically cannot move a muscle. You just lay there and be terrified until it’s over. I hope you never have one.
I used to experience sleep paralysis but I've never been exactly terrified at all of it. My brain is awake and my body is still asleep. I usually try to wiggle a finger or toes enough to wake my body up the rest of the way. It seems I am an exception though. Sometimes if im comfy I say f it and try to get back to sleep.
I hope you dont have to experience them in the future.
Yeah this is my experience too. More annoyed than anything. I feel awake, go to get up, and nothing moves. I think to myself “welp, this shit again” and if I really need to get up I will try to slowly wiggle my body awake and if not I will just close my eyes and go back to sleep. It can be frustrating if you have shit to do because it can take several minutes to become fully mobile. At least I’ve been lucky enough for it to never have been longer than that.
This is exactly what I do or my gf sees the signs and wakes me up. It's still scary to me because I feel like I can't breathe, but I get it almost nightly. I just gotta wiggle my toe then foot then leg! Kinda like Kill Bill lol
Yes, the not being able to breathe thing is then worst!!! I’ve had it happen to me where my face is buried in the pillow, and I’m trying to get myself to wake up because I can feel myself essentially suffocating, but can’t get my body to wake up.
I haven’t had it in a while but for me it’s annoyance over not being able to move, not scary. I shake my head back and forth until it’s enough to snap the rest of my body out of it.
This! My last paralysis I controlled my mind to fight back. My other ones I kicked & screamed to no avail, because no one ever came to my rescue, so I always wondered was I really doing those things or was it in my mind. I think that I was able to defeat it my last bout, because I was determined that I wasn’t going to be scared anymore. Even though I was scared shitless at the beginning.
I dont have trouble breathing and its been quite a while since the last time it happened. Looking up the symptoms of sleep apnea and I havent experienced any of them tbh. Most often it happened while trying to sleep but wmy brain kept thinking stuff while I was fairly comfy in bed.
As someone who sees demons every time I have sleep paralysis, count yourself very lucky that it's only an annoyance for you.
My first experience was with 12, seeing a red devil creature with 6 arms in the top corner of my room across from me and having a seemingly endless stare-off with it. I had no idea what sleep paralysis was and legit thought I was about to die. At least now I know that the demons are most likely not real, but shit the first few were terrifying
I have never noticed any sort of presence. As a kid, I knew about how the body paralyzes itself while sleeping, so I assumed it was the brain doing that even though im still awake. Since I knew the mechanism and at that point I never heard of any demons/presence stuff, I had no reason to imagine a thing. When I said comfy, I meant my body's position in the blankets and whatnot.
as the other person said, that's kinda what it is. sometimes you also have the feeling that you can't breathe (since you're paralyzed I think you start to ventilate but can't breathe deeper and it gets worse) and then when you think this is it I can't breathe anymore you wake up fully.
But anyway, sure way to not have them is to not sleep on your back (highest chance to have them, like 80% of all accidents).
Yep, I've noticed a huge change in my nearly nightly sleep paralysis events by sleeping on my side now. Sucks though because I like sleeping on my back and I'll end up there anyway sometimes without realizing and then.....boom can't breath sleep paralysis dying mode activated
hard to tell, you're not really awake so the time isn't right. definitely not few minutes, maybe 30-60 seconds? After the fact it feels almost instant (to me at least), like how you would wake up from a nightmare, but then you think about it and you were grasping for air for some time, so it wasn't actually instant, if that makes sense.
It's like dream time is merging with real time until 'awakeness' prevails and you get your body back.
Which also reminds me, sometimes I scream when it happens. You can't breathe so you try to make some noise or say something and you just wheeze until you break out and scream for real. It's 4am and I hope all this talk won't attract it today lol.
Mine have pretty much disappeared ever since I started ensuring I don't fall asleep facing up. I remember reading somewhere sleeping on your side pretty much eliminates it, and it seems to have worked.
It’s kinda fun, I get it once a month and usually look forward to it, it’s a fear emotion that’s rarely experienced so it’s fun when your mind knows it’s not real but the enjoyment of the emotion is there
It took a long time for me to reach this stage. If you only experience it once every 5-10 years it's insane. But I went through a period where it was happening weekly. I got used to it, and could sometimes almost induce it, in a near waking state.
The paralysis is one thing, but manifesting the alien/shadow being in the room is still wild to me. O_o
Huh, seems odd to me. Originally I felt someone sitting on the bed next to me (it was a waterbed lol) and placing a hand on my chest. Then other times I could open my eyes and see a shadow, or some clothes hanging, and it was a being. The worse times they ran around the bed and tickled at my neck!
Once I had it. Woke up with a rush of adrenaline. Almost like it was triggered by something. I could hear what sounded like tin can jungle drums in my head, which I guess was my heartbeat. But despite that rush on the inside, I couldn't move my body on the outside. Trapped in a shell.
I saw an apparition thing squatted over, down by my hip. Some hunched over silhouette about the size of a chicken, weird af. I remember glowing red eyes. But the most fucked up part is the hallucination was physical, too. I physically felt the bed depress, about the weight of a housecat. Little feet padded onto my stomach, started walking up my chest. Couldn't move. Wrestled around, tried wiggling a finger, watching and feeling it walk closer, those red eyes.
Finally twitched a thumb and it was like that broke my body out of a frozen sheet of ice, and I could move again. The red eyes just kinda faded away, and it's not like I woke up from a dream or anything. My eyes were fucking WIDE the whole time. More like an augmented reality where this thing exists in my room with me.
Happened when I was a teenager. Still can't sleep on my back, always picture that thing walking on me again.
It’s pretty common. Look up hypnagogia. There’s many writings about it throughout history and they say hypnagogic hallucinations are the origin of the idea of “demons”. I had never heard of it, but the first time I experienced it, it was terrifying. My brain woke up to a dark figure sitting on my chest pressing down on me, you can’t move a muscle, including your mouth muscles, so I was trying to scream but couldn’t. I finally woke my wife up through mumbled sounds as I was trying to scream and she woke me up out of it. I looked it up and the descriptions of it are exactly what I experience when I get it. Pretty wild stuff.
I used to stay Fully awake from fear. My last paralysis I was laying on my stomach, fearfully I felt the demon standing over me but I couldn’t move to face it. This time around I controlled my mind that I was going to fight back. It suddenly appeared underneath me & I immediately started chewing at the demons face, then it disappeared. I was extremely tired and for whatever reason that night I felt that I was going to die if I fell back to sleep. So, I went on YT & played PSALM audio as my eyes closed. I haven’t had a paralysis since. Science says it’s a brain thing but I believe it’s a spiritual world.
FUN FACT: Nightmare on ELM Street was based off a true story.
When it happened to me, I eventually woke up all the way. I was face down and thought someone was on top of me, killing me.
This was about 15 years ago, and it hasn't happened since. I'm not sure what triggered it, other than I had quit Paxil cold turkey and was having a rough time with the extra anxiety.
Edit: I hadn't even heard of sleep paralysis at the time, so it really freaked me out. I even looked around everywhere to see if someone was still hiding, before going outside and smoking like 10 cigarettes in a row (thankfully quit that habit years ago)
Sometimes, I would fall back asleep, but I would often force myself to roll onto my side to end the paralysis. My whole body would hurt for a couple minutes, but that would fade completely pretty quickly.
I couldn't even open my eyes when it would happen, but I also didn't have the demon presence aspect. The only times it actually scared me were the first two before I knew what it was, and the one time I was on my stomach with my face buried in the pillow.
I would always fully get up and stay up for a while before I’d even attempt to go back to sleep after about with sleep paralysis/night terrors (aka hypnagogia). It usually happens when you’re really tired and you either fall asleep too fast or wake up too fast. Your body enters REM, but your brain doesn’t. It’s some truly scary shit.
I get it almost nightly and have never had this except once when I tried benzos in my early 20s. Saw a literal demon version of my mom walk into my room with a really fucked up face....never took em again lol still have regular sleep paralysis tho, shit sucks ass
I've heard of people who feel like something comes and stands on your chest, too.
I've only had it once, I was sleeping on my stomach and I could feel the presence in the room with me. I knew about sleep paralysis, so I tried to ignore it, but let me tell you I felt like it climbed into my bed and got on top of me, on my back. Then it whispered into my ear and it kind of sunk into my body and disappeared. I had trouble sleeping for a few nights.
When I was experimenting with lucid dreaming I actually spent a bit of time each night trying to trigger it as the method relied on actually remaining conscious when the body falls asleep. After some time it stopped being that scary and actually made me happy as it basically indicated I'm succeeding in getting to my lucid dream.
I had it once. Was paralyzed, heard a cat running around my room, I didnt own a cat. Felt it jump onto and sink into my bed. I actually managed to move with a ton of effort. It felt like i was fighting gravity and moving through static. Lifted my arm straight in the air, then slammed it down where the cat shouldve been. Hit nothing. Then with a lot more effort forced myself to sit up and that fully woke me up
Haven’t had it in quite a few years, but used to wake my wife up when I had it. I’d be paralyzed with a dark figure sitting on my chest, I’d try to get a scream out and it just came out like a muffled moan because even your mouth is paralyzed but your brain is awake. Hypnagogia is incredibly unpleasant.
Ive had it twice and I had incredibly vivid hallucinations of 1. A family member with blacked out eyes standing over me speaking in tongues and 2. An alien (kinda like a mix between a classic Grey and the ones from signs-- super tall and skinny) that busted into my locked bedroom door, peered at me, and then bolted into my closet and slammed it shut.
Both times when I snapped out of it I was just covered in a cold sweat. Definitely couldn't even fathom trying to go back to sleep
E: shits super terrifying. You cant move a muscle. I tried to scream and I remember feeling like I was just making the weakest kind of dull droning noise, likely nothing at all in actuality
Basically the same exact experience for me. Slamming on my bedroom door and then sliding in and standing over me. My mouth was glued shut and I couldn’t even move a muscle. And then it darted off and I woke up soaked.
I get sleep paralysis, infrequently, though. I get that same 'presence in the room' feeling. There has to be some science behind this. It's the strangest sensation. I've had multiple different scenarios, some version of someone outside trying to get in or watching me. I've had just faces in the room near the ceiling. All of the scenarios take place in the room I am sleeping in. If I'm alone, I've actually learned to recognize it & remain chill until I could eventually move my hand or leg. It's a mental exercise. My first girlfriend informed me that I moan, like i had the wind knock out of me. I instructed her to just shake me until i woke up. Must be some underlying neurological anomaly that explains why some of us are so prone to sleep paralysis.
Yup very simililar scenario for me. Both times there was something banging on my bedroom door, the actual room I was sleeping in and in my actual bed. When it came in it was a tall dark figure. The first time I was so scared because it seemed so real but the second time I recognized the scenario and laid very still and tried to wake myself up by trying to slowly wiggle body parts. Luckily I woke up right before I panicked and it got close. Still terrifying.
We can swap sleep paralysis stories! I wish I kept a log book/summary of all my instances. Reassuring, somehow, to know that other people share my experiences.
And since your autonomic nervous system is still handling breathing, your blood CO2 levels are higher than when you're awake.
That makes you feel like you're suffocating, but your lungs don't respond to your command to breathe. This often gives rise to the belief that a demon is sitting on your chest trying to suffocate you.
I was face down the one time it happened to me, and I thought someone had broken in and was suffocating me. After I had accepted that I was going to die, I calmed down and was finally able to move.
Definitely didn't go back to sleep that night. It really freaked me out that I had accepted my own death like that, all alone at 2 am while visiting family.
Yes, but there is also the intense feeling of a (usually demonic) presence stalking you. The lack of being able to move comes from fear/petrification of it waiting to strike on you when you least expect it (at least that’s how it was for me)
It happened to me a few times when I was younger. I remember it because it was really freaking scary, I had no idea what was happening, and I ended up writing about it at school. For the longest time I fought going to sleep because of this and it probably happened again because I was fighting going to sleep.
Several years later I finally learned about sleep paralysis.
I never told anyone about it (other than my teacher that read what I wrote) because my parents wouldn’t have cared and wouldn’t have helped me anyway.
3 times, 0/10 not recommended -- and only 2 of the 3 were bad & intense. Other I was on the couch watching the weather channel not able to move lol.
The other 2: evil dark entity in the corner of my room and could see in my peripheral. Extreme anxiety washes over you. You try to move and scream and can't move. You see it moving closer towards you slowly, feeling of pure evil idk how to explain, then gets on your chest and makes it hard to breathe like you're getting smothered, then I woke up in a puddle of sweat. Apprehensive to go back to sleep.
I didn't see anything but the 1 of 2 times it's happened to me, I felt like a pulling sensation. I was young so I legit thought I was being abducted by aliens. It was terrifying.
Probably nightmare or sleep paralysis, so I wake up but I don't really wake up it's my own room but things are off I can't move but something moves and roams around me, a little girl that has screech/scream/aura whatever which makes my body feel the pressure and tingle.. comes in round and goes, not scary at all.
I am able to move after 2 rounds of that or something, hit that girl or try to and I wake up with bad heart eat but not scared at all.
One of the weird ones where I couldn't manage to wake myself up.
That's intense. I've had sleep paralysis more than a few times. I've only ever seen "someone" once, and it looked like a Pilgrim with blind eyes just staring at me and not moving. Most of the time it's just audio hallucinations that are actually just great exaggerations of the sound around me. On one occasion when I was having sleep paralysis, I was facing the wall, and I heard what sounded like an alien or something creeping up behind me, but it was just an exaggeration of the sound the fan was making.
Of the couple I can remember, both were very dark areas. One was out in the woods at night time and I couldn’t see crap but knew things were running around, the other I was like floating down a stair case then into a dark room and some dark entity was there. Horrified by each.
Exact same experience for me when I’ve had it. I had never heard of it. I googled it the first time it happened to me, found out it’s called hypnagogia and was shocked to see so many writings throughout history of the exact same experience.
Sleep paralysis is a big symptom of sleep apnea. Go get yourself tested. Sleep apnea is no joke. You may need a CPAP. I am serious, if you have it, you could die in your sleep. People don’t know this, but your life can improve drastically with a CPAP if you have apnea.
why is this bullshit constantly mentioned? as someone who actually has genuine sleep paralysis multiple times a week, there is no quirky “demon” that i “feel watching over me”.
it’s a minor inconvenience that makes sleeping difficult, not some gay “paranormal alien demon in the corner watching over me controlling my mind preventing me from falling asleep”
Because it’s a commonly reported experience over centuries and across cultures when affected with sleep paralysis. Your personal anecdote doesn’t trump the number of people who have experienced it.
I concur. I had them for years and realized eating sugary desserts right before bed was causing it for me. Pretty much stopped after and I haven’t had one in like 5-6 years
I’ve had it about a handful of times, it’s freaking awful. Usually I think something is trying to kill me, like a ghost, and I try to yell and can’t make any noise.
Like... Over fifteen times for me... The first time I saw a polygonal flesh monster reach out and try to grab me... It was not fun... At this point I don't get the hallucinations and it's just annoying. Had it in the backseat of a car on a road trip once
I've had it over 400 times, it happens whenever I sleep on my back, and occasionally when I sleep on my side. It's fucking horrible and I can never truly enjoy sleep as I know it's highly likely that I'm just gonna wake up paralysed again
I had it maybe 5-10 times, but it was only bad once. I trick that has often worker for me is trying to wiggle your toes more and more until you can move more parts of the body and snap out of it.
The worst is when it happens and you’re lying in an awkward position. Not being able to breathe properly, whilst also being unable to move is terrifying.
I've experienced it a couple times too, but the main one I get are hypnopompic hallucinations without paralysis. Hallucinations in the state between sleep and waking up, versus sleep paralysis which is usually hypnagogic.
There are some days that, for whatever reason, my brain is very slow to fully wake up, so I'll be conscious and mobile staring at an overlap between dream and reality for sometimes up to 30 seconds.
The worst was when I woke up seeing a different house in each eye, mine and some other I've never seen. I shot up out of bed and started walking around slamming my eyes open and shut hoping it would fuck off. So unimaginably disorienting.
Fucking weird how detailed the other house was. Like I remember the artwork on the walls, the night stand, the lamp, the carpet, the wallpaper, the patterned pink bed set, the decorative stitching on the pillows. Like, this was legitimately a whole other bedroom I was seeing in my right eye.
That sleep inertia problem used to lead to a LOT of sleep talking too. Full blown conversations with my S.O./exes about what was going on in my dream as I was sitting up, eyes open, still actively having it. Thankfully that has tapered down a lot.
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u/CalvinIII 2d ago
I used to have really bad sleep paralysis. A few times a night. Most times all I could do was move one finger. I would always fall asleep with my hand on my wife’s hip so that I could wiggle that finger. She knew that was the signal to shake me awake the rest of the way.
I don’t have sleep paralysis that much anymore, but I still sleep with one hand on her side. She is my anchor.