Sleep paralysis experience last night

Well I had my first sleep paralysis experience last night, and it was incredibly disturbing.

I began drifting off at about 1AM and must've started dreaming soon after. In the dream, I encountered some 'man' who I couldn't look at. Whenever I attempted to look at his face it would distort; his face looked as though it had been inverted. I kept repeating to myself "What's causing this?" until I eventually said to the man in question, "It's you isn't it?!" With that the figure moved in on me and grabbed my head. He pulled my head right up to his (which was still distorted) and started chanting something. Absolutely terrified now, I awoke lying face down on my pillow. It was pitch black and I was completely paralysed. My girlfriend was asleep next to me and I was trying to speak or shout, but all I could manage was a faint "mmm mmm!" Seconds later I broke out of the paralysis, sweating and breathing heavily. The effort it took to break out was unbelievable. I had to sit up in bed to readjust to my surroundings. It was 3AM and I was in a state of shock. I felt as though something strange had been done to me.

The strangest thing was the bruise I found on my hand when I woke up this morning. I recall trying to fight this character off in the dream, maybe I hit it then? Just above my knuckles on my left hand is a black bruise and graze. What a bizarre night...!

Here's something from the book Exploring teh World of Lucid Dreaming by Stephan LaBerge. Hope it helpes.

About sleeping paralysis, and about presence of evil or some sort of entity.

During REM sleep, as you will recall from chapter 2, all the voluntary muscles of your body are almost completely paralyzed, except for the muscles that move your eyes and those with which you breathe. REM sleep is a psychophysiological state involving the cooperative activity of a number of distinct special-purpose brain systems. For example, independent neural systems cause muscular paralysis, blockade of sensory input, and cortical
activation. When these three systems are working together, your brain will be in the state of REM sleep. and you will probably be dreaming.

Sometimes the REM systems don’t turn on or off at the same time. For example, you may awaken partially from REM sleep, before the paralysis system turns off, so that your body is still paralyzed even though you are otherwise awake. Sleep paralysis, as this condition is called, can occur while people are falling asleep (rarely) or waking up (more frequently). If you don’t know what’s happening, your first experience with sleep paralysis can terrifying. People typically struggle in a fruitless effort re or to fully wake up. In fact, such emotional panic reactions are completely counterproductive; they are likely to stimulate the limbic (emotional) areas of the brain and cause the REM state to persist.

The fact is, sleep paralysis is harmless. Sometimes when it happens to you, you feel as if you are suffocating or in the presence of a nameless evil. But this is just the way your half-dreaming brain interprets these abnormal conditions: something terrible must be happening! The medieval stories of incubus attacks (malevolent spirits believed to descend upon and have sex with sleeping women) probably derived from fantastically over-interpreted experiences of sleep paralysis. The next time you experience sleep paralysis, simply remember to relax. 11 yourself that you are in the same state now as you are several hours every night during REM sleep. It will ) you no harm and will pass in a few minutes. Sleep paralysis is not only nothing to be frightened of, it can be something to be sought after and cultivated. Whenever you experience sleep paralysis you are on the threshold REM sleep. You have, as it were, one foot in the dream state and one in the waking state. Just step over and you’re in the world of lucid dreams. In the following exercises we sent several techniques for taking that step.

[edit on 20-3-2007 by yanchek]

I posted some of my sleep paralysis experiences in another forum last night, although this forum seems more appropriate.

Well surprise surprise, it happened again! I took about an hour and a half nap in the evening. This incident happened in the last few seconds as I was coming out of sleep.

My breathing was more labored, fast rather than feeling constricted. Someone was casually remarking about their cat and his "condition". I don't know exactly what was going on but the cat was very agitated, not mean, but jumping all around and meowing loudly. The cat had some type of other creature attached to it's belly, like a spider or something, as if it was some parasite or symbiotic relationship.

So of course the cat has to keep coming at me with this thing. Usually in this type of recurring scenario I'm somewhat immobile or otherwise having a terrible time keeping away as spiders, bats, mice and other little squirmies are trying to get at me.

Sleep Paralysis

Sleep Paralysis is more of an annoyance to me, I usually wiggle my toe and come out it pretty quickly then fall back to sleep.

One night I had 5 different sleep paralysis episodes, I dont know why I kept waking up, but I'd wiggle my toe move around a bit then go back to sleep.

Now I had said in another post that I've never seen any ghosts or aliens etc in a sleep paralysis episode but getting to think about it I remeber a shadow of a real fat guy was there once, didnt say or do anything so I was probably still halfway in dream state because once my toe wiggle trick worked he was gone.

This is just my opinion and I'm not discounting anyone else's theories because I'm no authority on the subject but I think when you get scared when your in sleep paralysis mode your dream makes up monsters and other such things.

But who know's maybe thats what the monsers want you to think?

Originally posted by Miishgoos


This is just my opinion and I'm not discounting anyone else's theories because I'm no authority on the subject but I think when you get scared when your in sleep paralysis mode your dream makes up monsters and other such things.

But who knows maybe thats what the monsters want you to think?

(There appear to be alot of sleep paralysis threads around ATS.)

I agree with you somewhat on that point, perhaps the brain interprets these things as demons, aliens, and other primal fears. My continuing question is why? Why should I dream about a demon lying on top of me? I'd rather dream that I'm immobile and being smothered by a gorgeous female!

Sometimes the same incident has sinister hallucinations, other times I endure the SP just as an uncomfortable physical event.

Hey guys...

Had two recent bouts of sleep paralysis on consequitive nights... and a lucid dream.
Okay firstly, wanna state i've just had a jaw operation and spent a few nights in hospital and was obviously drugged up to the eyeballs on various pain killers and antibiotics, i was still very aware of 'waking' to these experiences.
The first experience, I can remember very little about, as i say i was pretty out of it but i know it happened as i got that familiar buzzing and rushing sound, but last night i was recovering at the family home and for the first time in a couple of nights i was having a supposed good nights sleep... when two things occured.

Firstly, I had another strong experience, strongest in a long time... I awoke with the buzz, looked around the room which was quite dark besides the outside garden light spilling through the window.
I then had that realisation that i couldn't move and with that thought came a fright.

In my peripheral vision, i saw a black wolf rush at me from the darkest corner of the room, It overwhelmed me, both mentally and physically and it gripped the BACK of my head in its jaws and started pressing down.

I felt... not a head ache as such, more a pressure and a weird sound like i'd suddenly plunged into a swimming pool.... that under water echo sound, and the room got very dark...

Instantly though and to my credit, I pulled out of it. Forced myself to move by just thinking 'No!' and i rushed back out of that feeling and I rolled over.

I should have been alarmed, but i needed sleep and i finally drifted off, i think a fe minutes later.

THEN... and this is the strange bit.

I had a very lucid dream, that Britain had entered some sort of martial law. As i was in a terraced house in what looked like a council estate with some friends. I for some reason opened the front door and looked onto the street and i saw about five or six armoured riot police vans had pulled into the are and police and dogs got out.

Then people were rounded up and we were taken to a football stadium and forced to sit in the middle, whilst armed police watched us from where the fans usually sit. There were hundreds of us, but i managed to sit with my friends... I even remember and this is the ONLY time i have ever remembered the jist of a conversation from any dream in my life...

In a nutshell, the conversation was between me and a male police officer who had took off his helmet to wipe his face, i think i saw for the first time, the human side of these armed guards and i basically said something along the lines of... 'may aswell shoot me now'

and asked me why... and i explained that i wasn't prepared to suffer in the places they were gonna take me, and the look of confusion on his face was so real (as though he had no idea about any further instructions) and i think i remember saying to him, that soon it'll be your own family here and not me and i was trying to talk him out of his orders and that's when i awoke...

Not saying it has any significance to anything, as i truthfully admit, i've been loaded up on pain killers and stuff, but the sleep paralysis was so real, but i was aware enough and strong enough to back out of it almost immediately.

AND the dream was VERY real... smells, textures on carpets and walls and clear faces and unexpected surroundings but very close to home and like i say, it's the first ever time i remember a conversation with anyone...

Strange...

[edit on 14-10-2008 by mr-lizard]

i experiance sleep paralysis week to week i would say, and this moring i woke up and had sp kick in.. i actully tryed to have a lucid dream so i tryed to stay in sp... thing is i think i was not very deep in it... one time i was really deep in sp but to o afraid to try to push to a lucid dream... but i hear noises first like buzzing and then i heard one of my track coaches say hey carl.. and it echoed and i awoke... so... the next time im in deep sp should i push through it?