Sudden Deafness Falling Asleep

Lets be real, sleeping is weird.

We do it every night, just like plants and their rest phase during darkness. Moreover, there are documented things like lucid dreaming, sleep paralysis, the "bang" sounds, spooky hat man occurrences, etc.

Another one that I became acutely aware of is sudden deafness as im falling asleep.

I noticed it for the first time last year when I was sharing a hotel room with my buddy.

I was in bed, eyes closed. He was across the room typing away on his lap top and the TV was on.

Suddenly, everything went completely silent, but I was still awake and conscious.

Startled, I opened my eyes, and like a freakin vinyl record restarting, the sound came back in.

It was like reality resetting.

Since then Ive experienced this a handful of times.



Have any of you had this experience?


It is very bizarre, like the temporal lobes of one's cerebrum just...shut off.

I think its a normal part of falling asleep. Im sure it serves some sort of function

Tell you whats weird; hypnogogic jerks, when you're falling asleep, bodys really relaxed and BAM! You violently jerk

I met a guy once he woke up paralyzed from the neck down. He was older when I met him and had regained ability to use arms legs walk but he was ultra hunchback messed up for life from it.

I have wild experiences sleeping every night but have never experienced that. My dreams are so realistic when I wake up I'm seriously surprised often. I can do this weird thing when I'm dreaming and I think it's a bad dream I shake like cray and wake up

originally posted by: 5ofineed5aladder
I have wild experiences sleeping every night but have never experienced that. My dreams are so realistic when I wake up I'm seriously surprised often. I can do this weird thing when I'm dreaming and I think it's a bad dream I shake like cray and wake up

I do the same thing ✌

a reply to: Kalixi

Im sure youre right, but it would seem that our ability to hear somewhat kicks back in during sleep because alarm clocks and other sounds can wake us.

The jerking body movements while falling asleep...that reminds me. The morning after my buddy and I spent the night at that hotel when i discovered this phenomenon, on the drive back, my buddy was passing out in the passenger seat and started jerking about in a way it looked like he was intermittently humping the air 😂😂😂😂

originally posted by: Kalixi
I think its a normal part of falling asleep. Im sure it serves some sort of function

Tell you whats weird; hypnogogic jerks, when you're falling asleep, bodys really relaxed and BAM! You violently jerk

is that the same as myoclonic jerks?

I used to experience that all the time when attempting to induce WILD (wake induced lucid dream). It was a good indicator I was getting close to a body asleep mind awake state.

a reply to: TinySickTears

My memorys fuzzy from high school psych. According to wikipedia myocyclonic jerks affect a certain part of the brain causing you to seize before falling asleep. They seem to come under the same umbrella

a reply to: CreationBro

This may sound macabre but your hearing being first to go on the way to sleep is juxtaposed with death where hearing is the last sense to go. Sleep is sometimes compared to semi death but you are not behaving the way science says. Anyway found your phenomena interesting. Even tried a search with no results.

Like other's I hear audible voices outside my head on falling asleep or waking. Since childhood I have heard my name called when wide awake and everyone would say they didn't call me.

a reply to: CreationBro

I've noticed this many times napping with T.V. or a video. At some point -- but with my eyes closed -- I notice that someone turned off the TV, or it is silent. I nap some more and at some point I hear the same show or the same plot as before in the background -- nobody ever turned off the broadcast.

Tibetan yoga recognizes this phenomena too. At some point while falling asleep your ear nerves shut off -- before or after your eyes, tongue and other sensations do so.

originally posted by: liveandlearn
a reply to: CreationBro

This may sound macabre but your hearing being first to go on the way to sleep is juxtaposed with death where hearing is the last sense to go. Sleep is sometimes compared to semi death but you are not behaving the way science says. Anyway found your phenomena interesting. Even tried a search with no results.

Like other's I hear audible voices outside my head on falling asleep or waking. Since childhood I have heard my name called when wide awake and everyone would say they didn't call me.

Interesting you should say that.

I told my friend about this phenomenon before I posted this and he said that "you die when you sleep."

Strange as well because I regularly have dreams where deceased friends and family visit me.

a reply to: CreationBro

i can reproduce that experience at will, next time your pretty tired before bed, take a shower, sit down in the shower, close your eyes and relax, when you hit that moment all the water coming down on you vanishes, you dont hear it, you dont feel it, the shock of the shower vanishing brings you right back, repeat as many times as you wish. its surreal.

I have had my hearing shut down like that sometimes. It may do it all the time, but it probably happens when I fall asleep so I don't know it. Our brains have filtering systems that allow us to acclimate to the environment. They allow people to hear others when standing around equipment or in a noisy environment, shutting down certain frequencies. I read that quite a few years ago. It is the ignore function, the way that kids ignore what we say but can hear us when you call them for cake even if the stereo is blaring.

That occasional sensation of dropping through the floor is a trip.

a reply to: CreationBro

Me three.

I lucid dream every night...

But it is odd, the scenario is set when it begins, some are wonderful experiences, but others..

Well others can be horrific, and Its not like you don't have infinite choices, they just don't matter, I've been shanked and shot And began the warm wet bleed out process so many times I have become detached enough to call it a process..

But with out fail, in these moments that too real reality can be rejected and shook off .

Sometimes with more effort than others..

Respectfully,
~ meathead

a reply to: Mike Stivic

The bad ones are like they are designed to make you deal with failure..
Like a kobayashi maru test I haven't found a way to captain Kirk myself out of...

Just restart the test..

Respectfully,
~ meathead

originally posted by: CreationBro
Another one that I became acutely aware of is sudden deafness as im falling asleep.

It is very bizarre, like the temporal lobes of one's cerebrum just...shut off.

And that's what happens (sort off), the thalamus is responsible for switching off our sensory world when we sleep: we don't hear or smell like when we are awake. However, we are not completely cut off from the real world, hence we wake up when there is enough stimuli for our brains to react.

Don't forget the body needs energy whilst we sleep (to basically restore and repair ourselves) hence our hearts slow down, we breath deeper and slower, relax our muscles and eventually shut down our hearing too. Human biology is incredible.