How likely are you to experience sleep paralysis?
Waking up in the dead of night, unable to move a muscle, you are gripped by an overwhelming sense of fear as you feel a presence suppressing your body. As you open your mouth to scream for help, you lay there – mouth wide open, unable to elicit any sound. Sound familiar?
This eerie phenomenon is known as sleep paralysis. It usually manifests when there is an awakening of consciousness while your body remains immobile, unable to move a single muscle. During paralysis, you may experience vivid hallucinations, which are commonly mistaken for parts of dreams. Its unpredictable nature can evoke terror and anxiety.
“Sleep paralysis episodes can be several seconds to several minutes long,” says Dr. Yelena Tumashova, a sleep medicine physician at Advocate Health Care. “They often occur when you are about to fall asleep or wake up. Sleep paralysis itself is not harmful but there often are underlying health concerns that trigger the disorder.”
Sleep paralysis can happen to anyone — even those who typically experience normal sleep patterns. In fact, about 20% of people will experience an episode in their lifetime, according to the Sleep Foundation.
“It’s important to note that sleep paralysis can be one of the signs of a rare neurological disorder called narcolepsy,” Dr. Tumashova says. “If you suspect you might have the disorder, ask your doctor to refer you to a sleep specialist for proper diagnosis.”
While there is no proven causation between specific risk factors and sleep paralysis, research studies have identified several factors that are associated with the condition:
- Poor sleep
- Stress
- Excessive alcohol intake
- Traumatic experiences
- Anxiety disorders
- Family history of sleep paralysis
- Sleep disorders
As of right now, there isn’t treatment to manage ongoing episodes of this condition. However, improving your sleep hygiene may help.
Dr. Tumashova recommends the following:
- Maintaining a consistent sleep and wake schedule – even on the weekends
- Limiting exposure to light and noise while getting ready for bed
- Decreasing your alcohol and caffeine intake
- Discontinuing use of electronic devices to allow your brain to decompress without any external stimulation
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health enews staff is a group of experienced writers from our Advocate Health Care and Aurora Health Care sites, which also includes freelance or intern writers.
I suffered from this for much of my life. Only now, as I’m older, are the episodes few and far between. It’s an absolutely terrifying experience. Not just that you can’t move… but the horror movie hallucinations will leave you feeling like monsters are real, and in your room.
I have suffered through this terrible sleep disorder since I was a child of 11 or 12 years old. I would wake up and feel terrified that something was in our house. I could hear the rocking chair rocking. I would try to scream for my dad and I couldn’t open my mouth and couldn’t get any sound out. As an adult, I know what sleep paralysis is and I understand it. It doesn’t make it easier to deal with it though. The hallucinations seem so real at the time.
I, too, have struggled with sleep paralysis since I was a child. I have sometimes been able to hear actual conversations around me, but unable to respond. If I know someone is with me, I have struggled to make some sound, trying to get someone to shake or touch me so I could snap out of it. I cannot just relax and wait, and break out of it, forcefully. If anyone is around they are started by the way I just woke up. I have had the hallucinations, too. It is very frightening and I wonder if, when I am older, I will have enough strength to “break out of it”. I have described the condition to doctors and asked them about it, before I knew there was a name for it. None of them knew anything about it and kind of laughed it off, saying that’s strange.
Demonic entities seek many ways to harm and drive people to suffer.
Always so horrifying!! Since I was a little girl this has affected me. No one ever believed me either through my childhood years and told me they are just “bad dreams”! I hope my children never have to experience them. I always ask my guardian angel and God to help me while I go through the paralysis which seems to help. I too believe they are demonic in nature.
I experienced them in my 20’s. I am now 58 and haven’t had any for a very long time. I also could sense that there was a evil presence that was trying to get me. It always felt so real and extremely terrifying. I felt like there was something evil trying to possess me. I would say prayers to try to get the Being to go away. As I got older they seemed to come on fewer and now I can’t remember the last time that I experienced one. Its kinda good to know that I wasn’t the only one to suffer through these nightmares!
My daughter and I suffer from sleep paralysis. I remember, lying next to my husband and trying to get his attention to wake me. Then the hallucinations started, I was being wheeled off on a gurney, I couldn’t see the faces of the ones wheeling me, however I could feel the evilness. I was screaming at this point. My husband said he saw me slightly move and started trying to awake me. He said, he came close to slapping me, because he was shaking me so hard, and it wasn’t working. I will never forget that feeling. I still suffer from sleep paralysis; however I try to remain as calm as possible, and I start praying.
I have experienced sleep paralysis. More often than not, it was while I was taking a nap in a room where someone was watching television. I would become semi-conscious, could hear the television, but when I would try to get up or ask for help, nothing happened. It was a scary situation. Sometimes it would happen when I took something like Benadryl or Sinutab. It never happened in bed, that I can recall.
I have episodes of sleep paralysis every so often, and while I don’t experience hallucinations during it, I can’t feel myself breathe, so I have a sensation of being suffocated. It’s very distressing, but the only fix is to remain calm and let myself slip back into real sleep so I can wake up later properly.
My husband knows to wake me up if I make even the slightest sound. Sleeping on the back makes it more likely to occur. I don’t do that anymore, at least not on purpose. I’ll take the chance on whatever wrinkles.
I experienced them practically all my life and called them a dream inside a dream. When I had them I would immediately identify as that and would close my eyes and actually fall back to sleep. It worked.