Sleep paralysis
 

Hi,

I woke up this morning around 5.30am, quite unusual for me actually but there you go. I have a laptop on a chair next to my bed and upon waking I turn the screen on every morning to see who's online, check my accounts, and browse the web for a while. Put simply, once I'm awake - I'm awake.

Having gotten bored of browsing and with nobody online I put some music on and laid back down, waiting for the sound of someone pinging me. At some point, around 11.30am by now, I rolled over to be face down and almost instantly something pretty freakish happened - I felt something push me down into the bed. I could hear someone go to the bathroom outside my door and I could still hear the music playing on the laptop, I was certainly awake and later found someone was in the bathroom at that time - I was fully aware of my surroundings.

Having since read other postings on sleep paralysis the events I experienced have a very similar context. I felt like something was sat on me, and I definately felt a presence in the room. I felt like I was being pushed down into the mattress and I couldn't move a muscle. I could open and close my eyes, even look around the room, but I couldn't physically move. Towards the end I was shaking a little, possibly a reflex action from trying to fight whatever seemed to be holding me, and after maybe about a minute of paralysis I could finally sit up and relax.

However, I also seemed to experience different effects to others. Most reports I've read explain the sound of buzzing in your ears, yet all I could hear was a very loud gusty wind with the sound of my music in the background, and somebody moving around outside my door (heading to the bathroom as I explained earlier). They also explain a feeling of static rushing up and down your body, some claiming this is our neurological system giving false readings as we try to force our limbs to move, but again I just felt the wind - To me it felt as though I was being forced into the mattress by a very powerful gusty wind I couldn't fight, and whatever was causing this wind was somehow on me.

I also experienced a somewhat unusual feeling of being unwanted, as if this 'spirit' wanted me out yet was holding me down, and oddly I was relatively calm throughout. The first second or so I felt an immense panic of an unfriendly presense holding a power over me, but given I've had lucid dreams before I quickly concluded I was somewhere between both a conscious and sleeping state, and all I had to do was awake properly. Towards the end as I started shaking I then felt almost worried I was having some form of a fit, or panic attack, yet again I remained calm.

Once awake I could see I was covered in goose bumps and my hair was on end, both of which faded within a few seconds. This would surely suggest the cold gusty wind wasn't entirely in my mind. Whats more I also noticed a physical hole on the center knuckle of my right hand, around 1-2mm wide, sort of like a needle mark. This 'hole' had completely vanished when I checked again around 10 minutes later, having already shown it off once.

Being a very scientifically centered person with no belief in any afterlife or religion, and a very scientifically explained sceptical approach to paranormal activity, my own personal conclusion is that I somehow, without actually falling asleep or attempting to, ended up in a state similar to that of lucid sleeping, which I have known myself to experience in the past. However I also, almost unwillingly, believe I wasn't simply hallucinating. I believe in and have experienced a 6th sense in animals, I know and understand that they sense things us humans are incapable of, whether this is related to anything paranormal or not. Rather than hallucinating a presense that wasn't actually there, I believe this state of mind opened my senses to activity we cannot detect in a fully conscious state. That said, I'm also positively certain that I was fully awake, that I hadn't been asleep or begun to drift off.

I'm very interested in opinions, views, and most importantly - alternative conclusions to this event.

Thanks.

Sleep paralysis itself is perfectly normal, though waking up during it is less common. It's what keeps people from acting out their dreams (talking in their sleep, sleep walking, etc). About a decade ago I woke up and couldn't move. I didn't know anything about sleep paralysis at the time, but since my body was completely immobile I simply went back to sleep and didn't worry about it.

It just happened to me again but under way less paranormal conditions.

With thoughts of yesterdays events on my mind I went to bed partially intrigued by whether I could enter this state again, and partially frightened that I would. Each time I began to drift off I became scared that I'd wind up in this state, then realise I'm scared and no longer drifting off, and then be too worried to open my eyes in case I found I was already in this state.

Low and behold I started a dream. It's uncommon for me to remember dreams but I remember being sat on the floor as a kid, my parents and sister watching me as I removed some kind of bandage from my ankle. I'm no good with blood and I guess it looked pretty bad because I started shaking, an early sign of panic attack. At this point I for some reason decided to pretend I was in this paralysis state. I sort of hugged the floor, crawling along for a couple of seconds pretending I couldn't move much. At this point I remember them walking towards me, and that was it, I actually was in this state of paralysis. However in contradiction to my earlier event, this time I was fully aware of being asleep. I wasn't having this in the real world, I was having it in a dream. I was dreaming that I was in a state of paralysis.

At this point I realised the shaking and paralysis were real, even though I was in a dream and I couldn't open my eyes, the event itself was real. I had no experience of wind or any presence in the room this time, and I was in no way aware of conscousness.

Within a few more seconds i woke up to find once again my hair on end and a cold feeling.

This event was definately a dream. I link it in no way to paranormal activity, I simply conclude that my thoughts of the occurance the previous morning together with my lust for finding this state again, somehow allowed me to enter from a sleep. I dreamed my way in.

That said, if I can enter the state of mind and experience events with the firm understanding that this is a sleeping behaviour, then surely I must accept that the additional events and senses I had earlier were not of the state itself, but were of actual presence. I was in the same state of paralysis I've just experienced again, but instead of being asleep, where I should have been, I was wide awake and could use this state to sense something my normal conscious senses cannot detect. I must accept I sensed a real presence in the room, a real 'being'.

This is beyond a joke now.

I just had another similar to this mornings. I fell asleep perfectly normal, and I remember something about a horse running around me and then suddenly I realised I was paralysed.

The speed of what was happening seemed to be linked with how fast I was breathing - each of these times it seemed to speed up really fast at some point, I guess as I breath faster starting to panic.

I managed to come out of it pretty quick by slowing my breathing right down and putting myself back in sync, giving a normal speed and not trying to fight the fact that I couldn't move. Then I woke up.

I've also noticed that when I do get up my hands feel numb for a second or two.

I'm 21 and have never experienced this in my life, yet over a period of 3 days I've had one somewhat paranormal experience during an awake and aware state, followed by 2 very similar states where I seem to be aware of my paralysis mid sleep.

I'm beginning to wonder if I have a more serious problem, something medical maybe? I'm worried this could effect me either psychologically or physically, and I can see myself becoming afraid of sleep.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

I personnally don't think this would be a reason for worry unless you have other symptoms.

The reason I'm confident about it is that I've experienced the same kind of situation frequently when I was younger. What I found out was that the more I stressed about it happening, the more it happened.

As you mentionned, when you try to calm down and slow your breathing, you get out of it. So the real solution is for you to rationalize the situation and accept that you may sometimes experience this paralysis but keep in mind it will go away on its own and it's not dangerous.

The actual paralysis I understand, and I've grown to accept that I have some weird ability to realise and react to being paralysed in my sleep. I can also understand some of the effects that appear to be linked.

However I'm more concerned over my paranormal experience, especially given I've since had similar occurrences and been aware that I'm asleep and dreaming, where the paranormal event I was fully aware of being awake, I'm positive I wasn't dreaming. I appear to have gotten into the same state your body naturally enters during sleep, but without actually being asleep, and while in this state I experienced senses and events that purhaps are there but our normal awakened state cannot sense. I'm being speculative of course, but from a scientific point of view this does seem plausable.

I'm also concerned medically, as upon waking I noticed my veins were thicker and my hands slightly numb, yet my heart rate seemed normal. Purhaps suggesting a dangerous blood pressure?

Don't worry about your veins coming out, that's also very normal. It is probably stress related.

About your point that your perceptions are more accute in this state, that's a fact. I would qualify it more as a transe state than sleep though. The reason we perceive things more clearly in this state is because we're less susceptible to distractions which would decrease our focus.

For your "paranormal experience", you should just take it easy. You seem to stress to much about it. I do believe in the existence of paranormal phenomenon, but most experiences considered paranormal are often easily explained by science.

I get the impression that what bothers you the most is some kind of fear of having something having control over you. That's definately understandable also. Yet you need to do something about it. For example, you could plan potential solutions to the "threat".

Also, if you consider this threat to be paranormal, thus accept it's existence, you could also use the paranormal activity for your protection! For instance you could visualize an absorbing shield around you. It would absorb the bad energies sent to you, and give you strenght to strike the adversary.