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There are all kinds of urban legends and uninformed speculations about the peculiar phenomenon of sleepwalking, and whether or not somnambulists should be woken up whilst engaging in those vespertinal semi-conscious perambulations. This blogger has even heard — in the context of campfire stories and internet rumors — that waking someone from a sleepwalk can kill them. In fact, according to Scientific American, the opposite is true: sleepwalks can often be dangerous in and of themselves, and it’s best to wake walkers and soothingly lead them back to bed, however jarring it is for them. (Kids are at especially high risk for somnambulism, so keep an eye on your 11- and 12-year-olds’ sleeping habits.) Much scarier than being woken from a sleepwalk, however, is what sleepwalkers can do to themselves or others without knowing it:
“Sleepwalkers can harm themselves and others, and even kill themselves and others, and they can engage in highly complex behaviors such as driving long distances, and hurt others with sleep aggression and violence,” says sleep disorder specialist Carlos Schenck. “So there are a number of ways that sleepwalkers can be dangerous to themselves and others during their episodes.” For example, he notes, Sandy, a slender female in her teens, tore her bedroom door off the hinges one night. She was unable to replicate that strength when awake. And a young man frantically drove to his parent’s house 10 miles away. He woke to the sound of his own fists beating on their front door. In dramatic cases like these, doctors will prescribe benzodiazepines to ease a patient’s nighttime activity.
I’ve had some wicked dreams in my life, and have been known to dream about being in school and wake up with my hand raised, but that’s as close to sleepwalking as I’ve come. How about you? Any interesting sleepwalk experiences, dangerous or otherwise?
Photo by Smith Eliot.
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I woke up covered in band-aids after a dream about bug bites.
posted by Ms. Kiki on 5-17-2007 at 11:41 am
i once woke up at 3 am shivering because my comforter was nowhere to be found. i searched my entire room for it and tried to go back to sleep. about an hour later, still unable to go back to sleep, i headed to the restroom–and i found my comforter…in the bathtub.
posted by kay on 5-17-2007 at 12:32 pm
My boyfriend has a condition called Sleep paralysis. It’s when your body and mind are out of whack during sleep. Your body thinks you are having REM sleep so is paralysed but your mind is 1/2 awake. You can not move a muscle and are powerless but are aware (sort of) of your surroundings. Still sort of dreaming, often my boyfriend has hallucinations of the window opening and he feels like someone is taking him (by floating) out the window! it’s quite scary when he comes out of it franticly!
As a matter of fact ther are many cultural references of this disorder from centuries ago from a ghost sitting on yoru chest to more modern beliefs like alien abductions!
check google and see the Wikipedia article about it. it’s pretty interresting stuff.
posted by joo on 5-17-2007 at 12:38 pm
One time I dreamed about eating a giant marshmallow. When I woke up…
MY PILLOW WAS MISSING!
posted by Scott from Cincy on 5-17-2007 at 12:38 pm
My husband had to wake our son up as he had walked into our room and was getting ready to urinate on my husband’s head.
posted by Laina on 5-17-2007 at 12:41 pm
My dad told me a story of me sleepwalking. He said that it was about 10pm and I was about 11 years old. I marched angrily down the stairs where my dad was suprised to see me upset. He asked what was wrong but I just mumbled and pushed him out of the way. I went into the living room where mom was watching a late-night movie and I sat on the couch, put my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands and sat there seriously pissed off. Eventually, mom figured out I was sleepwalking, so she closed my eyelids for me and, gently, pushed me into a laying postion. I woke up the next morning with all kinds of questions as to why I was on the couch?!
posted by Rebecka on 5-17-2007 at 12:45 pm
In a famous family story, my grandpa (while sound asleep) went into his parents’ bedroom, took out his dad’s favorite pajamas from a drawer, went to the kitchen, placed the pjs in a roasting pan, put them in the oven, and turned it on. My great-grandma watched the whole procedure just to see what he would do next, but she woke him up before he managed to start a fire.
posted by Lebetho on 5-17-2007 at 12:48 pm
I have a habit of sleep walking that started up after I graduated from college. The most unnerving thing I have done was one night I got up, went to my apartment door, unlocked and opened it before returning to bed. I woke up to find the door to my apartment standing wide open.
posted by Karen on 5-17-2007 at 12:55 pm
One night as my husband and I sat watching TV, we heard one of the kids walking around upstairs. I went to the stairs to see who it was just in time to see my young son begin to pee through the stairway spindles. He really had to go and there was nothing I could do to stop him. Another time, we heard him get up and this time we ran upstairs – just in case. We were too late. He had opened the door of my nightstand and was standing there going full blast all over its contents. Needless to say, we started waking him up for a trip to the bathroom every night.
posted by Mary on 5-17-2007 at 1:33 pm
I believe I was about 12 or 13 when I fell asleep in my parent’s home, and woke up standing in the driveway with my mother honking the horn of her car. I have no idea how I got out there or why.
posted by George on 5-17-2007 at 1:36 pm
When I was in the Boy Scouts in Northern New Hampshire I wandered away from my tent in the middle of the night. I woke up in the forest not knowing where I was, barefoot. Fortunately I could see a light and headed towards it. Turned out to be the shower house near a different campsite. In the morning I found what woke me up. A deep gash in the bottom of my foot. I can recall the dream I was having as well. I was walking through those very same woods, but all the trees had blue glowing runes at shoulder height.
posted by Jeremy on 5-17-2007 at 1:40 pm
There are two famous family stories about me sleep-walking. The first happened when I was pretty young, about four or so. I had gotten up to use the restroom, but missed the doorway and walked right into the wall. I hit the wall pretty hard, as it woke up my mother, who was asleep in the next room. She woke up to see me standing in front of the wall. She was concerned about the force of the hit, so sat me down and held ice to my forehead. I didn’t wake up during this whole process. Or go to the bathroom, apparently.
The other time happened when I was older, probably around 10 or so. This time I just got up, went out the front door, and tried to open my dad’s car. Thankfully, it was locked. Dad heard me open the front door, and ran outside and brought me back into the house.
Both times, my mother would ask me the next morning, “do you know what you did last night?!” Which was pretty unnerving to a little kid who didn’t think she had done anything wrong!
posted by Christine on 5-17-2007 at 2:04 pm
My older son (and maybe my younger son too) has night terrors which are related to sleep walking. Usually it manifests itself as a terrifying nightmare, where he screams unintelligably. Sometime he walks out of his bedroom or into our room. But he is not awake. As a matter of fact if you wake him he will deny that he had a nightmare. We find that it’s better not to wake them. If you do they get very agitated and have a hard time falling back to sleep. Usually I just sit or lie with them (not touching them which upsets them) and talking occasionally in a soothing voice. I do this to keep them from harming themselves. Within 5 minutes they fall back asleep. They have no recollection of the incident the next morning.
posted by Stew on 5-17-2007 at 2:07 pm
My older brother was a sleepwalker when he was a boy. At the age of 6 he very famously got out of bed, put on his cowboy boots, cowboy hat and plastic six-shooter and wandered downstairs and out the front door in the middle of the night. My mother found him standing in the middle of the driveway staring out into the distance. When questioned, he had no idea how he got there.
posted by Jessie on 5-17-2007 at 2:42 pm
Once I had been watching a movie at my friend’s house very late at night and we both fell asleep on the couch. Apparently, I crawled onto the foot of her parent’s bed, mumbled “mmm, it’s so warm” and passed out again. Her dad went to sleep on the couch and her mother went up to a bedroom upstairs.
I was very confused the next morning.
posted by Amy on 5-17-2007 at 2:46 pm
At 25 I walked out of my apartment, leaving the door wide open. I then walked down a flight of stairs, knocked on my friends apartment door had a full blown conversation about ghosts and then just stopped talking, got up and walked back upstairs and went to bed. I also did not close the door after myself. Good thing my neighbor was a pal.
I have walked in my sleep since I was two. Once I was found running around on the roof of our house with our dog Buzz keeping me from jumping off the roof. After that my Mom used to to tie me to my crib by the ankle with pantyhose (per Doc’s orders).
Hmmm I still walk in my sleep and do some strange and amazing thing I am told…. go figure.
posted by Kare on 5-17-2007 at 2:47 pm
Ransom:
That topic is only mildly interesting to me,
but your sesquipedalian dexterity is laudable.
Keep that up in your posts.
posted by n2y2 on 5-17-2007 at 3:22 pm
According to my parents I had two sleepwalking incidents, that they woke up for. The first, I was about 6 and had wandered in the bathroom where I was just walking in circles banging into everything. Since the bathroom was right by my parents’ room, it woke them up. I don’t remember that one at all. The second was a little scary. I was 8 and I apparently got out of my loft bed (climbed down the stairs)went to the coat closet and put on my coat and walked out the front door into the frount yard. My dad found me standing at the front of our yard, which was right on a very busy street. YIKES!
posted by Jennifer on 5-17-2007 at 3:23 pm
One night I was spending the night at my grandmas and I was sharing a bed with my mom. And I started to grin and then I broke out into full laughter. I remeber grinning and trying to hold back a smile but, apparently I laughed for 10 minutes and rolled over and went back to sleep.
But my brother takes the prize for weird sleeping problems. One night my mom came to check on him and he popped up and asked if my dad knew where he was. And the proceeded to try to strangle my mom (he was in the top bunk.)
posted by Rachel on 5-17-2007 at 3:39 pm
I sleptwalked as a child. I recall that I once woke up during an overnight at my grandmother’s house, quite dizzy and standing upright, both arms outstretched; fully asleep I had been spinning myself in a circle in the center of the room.
posted by Karl on 5-17-2007 at 5:43 pm
Also, I still occasionally talk in my sleep. I’m a volunteer sign interpreter — when I’ve dreamt that I was speaking to a deaf acquaintance, I’ve been told that I’ve signed in my sleep.
posted by Karl on 5-17-2007 at 5:49 pm
I am a sleep walker. I have woken up in many a strange part of the house. The most dangerous thing I ever did was “sleep shop” on Amazon once. I was quite surprised when I got e mail notification that I had placed an order at 3:15am. I liked what I had ordered in my sleep though and decided to not cancel the order. I did turn the “one touch shopping” option off on my Amazon profile however.
posted by Cynthia on 5-17-2007 at 7:03 pm
I’ve needed glasses since age 9 or so. My mom and dad have worn glasses as long as I can remember, too.
One night (I think I was 11 or so), I got up from my bed, walked into the bathroom my family shared, picked up my mom’s glasses, put them on, and went back to my bed. When I woke up the next morning, things were much, much blurrier than usual and my mom was freaking out about her glasses going missing.
posted by katie on 5-17-2007 at 7:05 pm
I once sleep walked to the bathroom and took a leak, with perfect aim, which is weird, ‘cos my eyes were closed.
posted by Matt on 5-17-2007 at 7:55 pm
Occasionally I will wake up, usually when other people are in the house awake, and open my eyes but be unable to move any part of my body other than eyes or mouth. After about 30 seconds of effort I can usually croak out a word, usually “help,” because at this point I think I’m paralyzed, then I will instantly snap out of it and can move again. It has happened twice in the past 2 months.
posted by kyle on 5-17-2007 at 10:04 pm
I don’t know if it is genetic–or if it has been studied–but my mother, myself, and my oldest daughter have all had periods of time where we have walked in our sleep many nights. And on at least one occasion, for each one of us, having to pee was part of the process. Go figure. :)
posted by cmk on 5-17-2007 at 11:25 pm
About 10 years ago, when my sister was in high school, my parents woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of my sister leaving her room and going into the dining room. When she got there, she proceeded to go over to one of our dining room chairs and pull down her pajama pants and sit down. They managed to stop her right before she had a chance to urinate all over the chair.
And according to my parents, a few times when I was 11 or 12, I would wake up screaming and babbling incoherently until my dad led me down the hall into the bathroom. Afterwards, I’d come out and toddle my way back into my bedroom and fall back asleep like nothing ever happened. I have absolutely no memory of this and would start thinking I was crazy when they told me about it in the morning.
posted by heather on 5-18-2007 at 1:03 am
At summer camp when I was 13, I freaked my roommate out by sleep-walking. We were in a dorm room setting, so it was just 2 of us in a room, and she must have woken up in the middle of the night and not found me there… I don’t remember any of it, but I walked all the way down a hallway, opened a really havy door, and fell back asleep (in a really uncomfortable position) on a footstool. I woke up, somewhat confused, and started walking back to my room, only to find that everyone was freaking out looking for me.
I have also woken up in weird positions before. I woke up once, when I was in college, standing up on my bed. I logically put my hand on the ceiling to stabilize myself- not realizing that the ceiling fan was on… Not a good feeling.
posted by greenstrawberries on 5-18-2007 at 3:27 am
Once in college, my boyfriend was sleeping over in my dorm room. There was a rattling fan clipped on my bed’s footboard. In the middle of the night, I woke to see him standing up and striking out at the fan (thankfully missing it).
I asked, “what are you doing?”
“I have to tighten this burette.”
Confused, I asked why there would be a burette in my room. He looked at me like I was completely stupid and answered,
“For doing TITRATIONS!”
He had many sleep walking/talking incidents, but that was the only one to involve chemistry.
posted by andiscandis on 5-18-2007 at 6:50 am
A few years ago abroad, I was sleeping in a pull-out bed in th emain living area, where the door was.
I dreams about going to the bathroom, and, in the middle of the night, I went to the main door and tried to open it, thinking it was the toilet.
D:
To think what would have happenned.
posted by Wernie on 5-18-2007 at 7:27 am
My little brother used to have very involved sleepwalking incidents when we were younger. He would appear to be awake and it seemed that he was acting out some type of nightmare. One incident involved him taking all of the pillows and cushions from the living room furniture and stomping on them repeatedly.
Another time, he was convinced my mother was a monster. He screamed at her and ran from her. He even went into the kitchen, opened the silverware drawer, and pulled out a steak knife. Fortunately, we were able to take the knife away. We couldn’t wake him or calm him. My mom had to hold him down until he eventually became still.
He never woke up during these incidents and never remembered them.
posted by Laura on 5-18-2007 at 9:45 am
Once, I woke up to find out I had left my bedroom, walked down two flights of stairs to our basement and had turned on the lights and t.v.. I woke up watching latenight cable.
posted by Michael on 5-18-2007 at 10:18 am
My younger brother use to sleepwalk only when he was away from home. One summer we were staying at my grandparent’s house and I was still up watching TV. I looked over at my brother and saw him sit up, put on his glasses and shoes. Then he stood up and made his bed and walked towards the back door. At the time, they were doing construction on the house and there weren’t any stairs leading down to the deck. So I ran up and caught him by the back of the shirt just before he stepped out. He went back to bed and still to this day, he doesn’t remember anything about it.
posted by Nicole on 5-18-2007 at 12:11 pm
When I was In my teens I apparently went hunting in my sleep,walking down a mile and a half hunting trail through the swamp in the dead of night,in the middle of winter.
posted by thomas on 5-18-2007 at 4:07 pm
When my brother was about 9 or 10, he got up one night, got my dad and took him downstairs to our bathroom. Mike then proceeded to sit down and explain to Dad that he needed to build a room just like this because Dad was going to die soon and Mike wanted a place to come and visit him. He went on and on about it, refusing to let Dad take him back to bed unti he promised to build the room. The next morning Mike didn’t remember any of it, but Dad said it had made him really nervous.
posted by Lisa on 5-18-2007 at 8:18 pm
When my brother was still a newborn, my dad had brought him downstairs eaaarly early early in the morning for a diaper change. I (sleepwalking) come downstairs, sit down on the couch and go into a trance. My dad asks me to run back upstairs and bring some diapers down. So I go upstairs, to my room, grab a pair of my underwear, come back downstairs and hand them to him. He looked at me all confused (that’s the only thing i remember) and I asked him for a glass of water. He got me the water, i sat down with it and started shaking violently. I stood up, held the glass up to my mouth and poured all the water on the floor. Then I went back to bed. Hah, go me.
posted by Sam on 5-18-2007 at 10:34 pm
One of my friends hass a younger sister who used to sleepwalk. The only story I really remember about her was when she was about 8, I think. She had a small rocking chair in her room (doll-sized small, not small child- sized small) and several times got up out of bed, took the beany baby off of it, and stood on the seat. That’s all, just stood.
Go figure.
posted by Pointy-Hatted Geek on 5-20-2007 at 7:04 pm
My sleepwalking incidents were never very memorable or interesting, but the reason they stopped was. I was diagnosed with hypoglycemia in 7th grade. As soon as we got my blood sugar under control, I stopped sleepwalking and my allergies got considerably better.
To this day, if I over do it on sugar, my allergies get bad and I don’t sleep well.
posted by Tru on 5-21-2007 at 11:46 am
My friend had a two crazy experiences while he was sleep walking. The first time he slep walked we had all figured out that in the middle of the night he got up and made a huge bag filled with ravioli in his sleep the next time he woke up in teh middle of tha night staring out of his window holding a machette shivering with fear. both experiences are crazy in my book
posted by logan on 9-17-2007 at 10:59 pm
I have had a few episodes of sleep-walking, sleep-eating and sleep paralysis. The latter is terrifying and once had a mormom room-mate call her bishops to annoint oil on me LOL. But by far the funniest sleep walking episode was when I was about 10 and I went to the bathroom in the clothes hamper and threw my undies in the toilet… I awoke to see them flushing away hehe!
posted by Oops on 9-18-2007 at 4:34 am
I used to sleep walk a lot as a kid, my parents would always ask me if I remembered what I did the night before.
One time when I was about 12 I apparently went to the bathroom got in the tub and turned on the water. My mother awoke and asked what I was doing. I replied I was “cold so cold”.
Then once when I was in college I was visiting a friends little brother and I awoke in a stairwell. Took me a little while to figure out where i was since I wasnt livng in a dorm at the time. Boy did that suck no glasses, phone or pants on. All without a clue as to which of the 6 floors of the dorm I was crashing in.
posted by Scott on 9-18-2007 at 7:07 am
When I was younger I used to apparently sit up and yell for my mom. She would come in with me until I layed back down. Also, I often used to awake sitting up. I have no idea why.
posted by Hoo Ha on 9-18-2007 at 10:11 am
When my brother was little, he used to sleepwalk and wind up underneath a pile of his stuff (blankets, clothes, etc) in the hall. One time he scared my sister by making a noise while under that stuff while she was stepping over it.
Also, I had an experience a while ago. I had a dream about monsters and I went to punch one of them. I was awakened by my girlfriend yelling at me. It seems I tapped her in the face in my sleep. Fortunately, it wasn’t a hard tap and we both laugh about it to this day.
posted by Jack on 9-18-2007 at 1:17 pm
When I was a kid, I would sleepwalk into the kitchen and get American cheese. I would take it out of the wrapper and break it into pieces and put it around my sister’s bed and in her closet. I also woke up with a half-eaten banana in the kitchen. I woke up last Tuesday morning to find the oven on at 450 °, and I had moved a bunch of stuff around in the kitchen. Having the oven on bothered me, but I figured that it was better than leaving the house, which I didn’t do (this time); and there wasn’t any food in the oven. I was on my way out and didn’t give it too much more thought.
So when we got home, I was going to make a White Russian, and I went into the kitchen. The vodka wasn’t in the freezer, and I started really looking around to figure out what I had done. It took my husband and me about an hour to figure the whole thing out.
I had gotten up and gone into the spare bedroom where I got the big pot (the one I use for the low country boil and spaghetti) and brought it downstairs to the kitchen.
I turned the oven on to 450°. I cleared out a crystal bowl and put the parmesan potatoes I had made for dinner in it and left it on the stove. I moved some cheesecloth and a stack of things onto my spice shelf, along with moving a small box and balancing it on top of some dishes. I filled the pot with about 2 inches of water and vodka and added some parmesan to it–parmesan vodka-water soup. Yummy. Every cooking ingredient I touched was laid on it’s side and moved down one row–the vodka was moved from the freezer door to the door of the refrigerator on its side, as was the parmesan cheese. Also, the vegetable oil was moved down a shelf and laid on its side. There’s more, but the general gist of things is that I was apparently very busy Monday night, and I was really tired Tuesday. I apparently spent some time on my project; and most of the vodka was in my “soup”. Crap.
posted by Kat on 9-18-2007 at 1:17 pm
I have suffered from somnambulance since I was a kid, but the scariest thing to happen was when I was 18, I was dreaming that my sister was in labor, and woke up in my car, in the driver’s seat, with the car started and in gear. The emergency brake was on and the sound of it grinding as I tried to back out of the driveway was what woke me.
posted by Rachel on 9-18-2007 at 1:18 pm
I used to call my cousin on the phone in the early mornings and make plans with him… He would get so miffed as I would forget all about it when I actually did wake up and skip out on our planned adventures. One other adventure, I dreamed I was luke skywalker and vader was coming for me, but I couldn’t move, couldn’t do nothing, not even the force could get me moving again!!! Just barely able to squawk out “Help me Leigha!!”
posted by MJ on 9-19-2007 at 12:43 am
I once was visiting my aunt and we fell asleep in my cousin’s bunk-beds. At 3 am, my uncle came in and started trying to talk to us because he heard us talking when he got home from his shift. He told us about it the next morning, all irritated because we just ignored him. Neither of us had any memory of it, apparently we just continued our conversation in our sleep.
I’ve had sleep paralysis too, but I was in the semi-sleeping semi-conscious state, and it terrified me, because I had a paranormal hallucination/dream along with it.
I’ve woken up once to find contents from my pantry relocated to my bedroom closet, and once when staying at a friend’s house, she woke up in the middle of the night to hear me banging around in the kitchen. I was trying to use her trashcan as a toilet.
And this is all just in my teens and adulthood.
When I was a kid, I once woke up wrestling the pocket door of the bathroom open. On the other side of the door was my mom’s roommate who apparently also had to use the bathroom at the exact same time. I never did get over that embarrassment, although it was never mentioned again!
posted by Mary on 9-19-2007 at 7:01 am
I’ve no interesting sleep walking problem, that I know of anyways. But I do have a tendency to do things in my sleep.
The most memorable being falling asleep in my shorts, as normal, then waking up at my usual time. Between passing out and coming to I had managed to get fully dressed for school (even tied my shoes.) I had stripped my bed, even my pillows, and folded all my linen, placing it all into a nice neat stack across the room.
I woke up a very confused 14 year old.
I think its just a more intense instance of my “Wake up late” dreams, where I wake up, look at the clock and swear that it says 9:15 am instead of the 2:15 am actually displayed. I usually figure that out about halfway through my shave.
posted by Vlachen on 9-19-2007 at 7:28 am
My mom has some pretty weird stories about me but one of the funniest was that when I was about 5 years old I was caught sleepwalking and I went to the downstairs bathroom and was peeing in a trash can and went staight back to bed.
posted by Amanda on 9-19-2007 at 7:47 am
I like the one where the guy punched his girlfriend in the face in his sleep hahah.
One time at my grandparents’ house, when I was 9, I sleepwalked to the bathroom and started pissing in the trashcan. The same year, I tried pissed in the bathroom sink. I don’t remember either, my dad woke both times and moved me to in front of the toilet.
posted by TMo on 9-19-2007 at 7:58 am
My older sister talks in her sleep. As a child, I would here her in the next room talking to someone. If you timed it right, you could jump in on the conversation.
As for myself, I would sleepwalk into the backyard and play with the dog. It finally freaked my parents out to the point that they started tying me to my bed at night. Maybe that is why I am so good with untying knots?
posted by AJ on 9-19-2007 at 3:05 pm
I have torn pictures off the walls (literally ripping the paper backing) and recently, I awoke to find I was wearing a completely different shirt from what I had put on the night before and the shirt was from way in the back of my closet! I have had sleep paralysis and sleep eating at different points of my life too, and have been told some of it is a result of medications. I also have very vivid dreams that I occasionly can control!
posted by Anners on 9-19-2007 at 6:47 pm
In the beginning of my first year at university only this past month i woke up not being able to move or breathe. I was so scared because i felt and heard nothing. none of my senses worked. i couldnt even yell for help. i wanted to cry, but it was only another thing i couldnt do. i wanted to breathe but i couldnt inhale for some reason. i was so scared the only thing on me that could move were my eyes and i kept looking around to see what my options were for help.
i passed out mostly from lack of oxygen. my room mates found me and someone had to end up giving me cpr. i woke up that evening like nothing happened.
i have to tell you, it was actually pretty scary. and now im doing a project on sleep walking and i read about sleep paralysis and apnea and i know i have them but i think its all due to stres… never carry such a big load on your shoulders. your body will try to help you by telling you something.
posted by Kayket on 11-4-2007 at 11:21 pm
I am a chronic sleepwalker, so here are a couple of stories about me:
1. A few years ago, when I first began sleepwalking, my parents told me in the morning that I had been up in the night, observing my mom read the newspaper, and then I proceeded to throw a couple of pillows at my father before returning to bed, pillowless.
2.One time my parents woke up early in the morning to find me in the corner of the garage, bawling my head off.
3. Last year, I got up, took a shower, and got ready for school AT THREE O’ CLOCK IN THE MORNING… I came out of my bathroom to find my father standing there, in his pajamas, wondering what I was doing taking a shower at this time of the morning. The best part is that I argued with him for several minutes about the fact that I was going to be late for school…
4. A few weeks ago I woke up, diligently checking e-mails-I even had perfect posture!
posted by jenn on 11-7-2007 at 12:51 pm
I read this and just had to comment! My mom is a notorious sleepwalker. Once, when I was a senior in high school, and my dad was away on business, my mom woke me up at about 2 a.m. She whispered that there was a man in our house and said we had to go check it out.
I got out of bed and realized she was holding a very large pistol (pointed at the ceiling, detective-style). She kept “seeing” him and telling me to get behind her. I was afraid to wake her up, so I just convinced her that I saw him run away, and she went back to bed. I didn’t sleep the rest of the night, of course, wondering if she might mistake one of my brothers (or me) for the man she thought was in our house.
BTW, she’s also famous for kicking the glass out of her bedroom window and pulling her sister (across broken glass) out the window to “safety” when she was 12.
She also drove us 45 miles once on the Interstate, totally asleep. She woke up when we were getting off the exit ramp. We didn’t even know she was asleep! I was very young, but I remember getting the heebie-jeebies!
One thing is for sure, life with my mom has never been dull!!
posted by Jena on 11-7-2007 at 1:16 pm
Oops, I left the best part out. I called my mom to tell her about this post, and she reminded me that when she was very young she would sleepwalk out of the house and down the street to the neighbors’ house. These were the days when no one locked their doors. She would go into the neighbors’ house, use their restroom, and then leave. The neighbors suspected something was going on, and they finally caught her at it. They started locking their doors and I guess she just stopped trying to get in. Weird, huh? I guess they had softer T.P.
posted by Jena on 11-7-2007 at 1:21 pm
One time my friend’s little brother woke up, opened up the fridge, got out a pack of frozen chicken, and went to bed with it.
posted by Mal on 11-7-2007 at 10:17 pm
My grandfather was a sleepwalker, and once dreamt that he was on a sinking ship with his wife and four daughters, and they were freezing to death. So he goes into the living room and chops up two chairs with an axe before they can stop him. He thought he was chopping firewood. Yikes. In the Navy, he had crewmates tie him to his bed so he wouldn’t walk off the edge.
Also, when my sister was six, she sleepwalked to the trash can and stood there all night. Just looking at the trashcan. I think that’s just great.
posted by Sarah on 12-28-2007 at 10:52 am
My younger daughter sleepwalks. She’s almost 8. She gets up, ostensibly to use the rest room- and we often find her lying on the bathroom floor, with pillow and comforter. Sometimes she tries to open my closet door thinking it is the potty. She also has come into my room at night, and said bizarre things, then gone back to bed.
Sometimes she smiles and waves at me- like bye bye. She is an odd child. – oh yeah, she sleeps with her eyes open quite a bit.
posted by qt314159265 on 12-28-2007 at 11:23 am
I never knew why I’d wake up naked with a stranger in my bed…oh wait, I was just drunk not sleep walking.
posted by Hari_Knuts on 12-28-2007 at 12:06 pm
My brother is 7 years younger than me and he has been sleepwalking since he could walk. When he was a kid the sleepwalking typically consisted of him going on missions or fighting monsters. The most recent bout of his sleepwalking that I was witness to took place at a huge party at my house. He fell asleep (passed out) on my couch. When I tried to wake him and move him to a bed he jumped up and was really hostile. I tried to wake him gently, but he was quickly becoming violent. After he pushed me I dumped a cooler of water on him. Even that didn’t wake him up.
posted by J.C. on 12-28-2007 at 12:16 pm
at least one of my brothers and my grandma share the sleeptalking trait with me. mostly i mumble gibberish, but sometimes i give my husband old phone messages or remind him to do something he did weeks before. he just says “okay, sweetie” and i go back to sleep. sometimes he has a really hard time not laughing. it’s mostly when i’m really overtired.
my little brother and older brother shared a room and rickety bunk bed when we were all young. my little brother watched the movie “tremors” with my older brothers and had nightmares from it. it turned into night terrors when my older brother who is evil discovered a lovely trick: he would get up in the middle of the night and, since he was on the top bunk, would start shaking the bed and yelling “the tremors are coming!” over and over again. my little brother would start screaming and pee all over the bed. after that happened a few times my mom went in to check on him because she heard soft crying. he was sitting on the foot of the bed closest to the door totally asleep, crying. she asked what was wrong and he said he had to pee so bad but the tremors would get him if he stepped on the carpet. totally asleep.
he stopped all that after my evil brother got sent to military school in another state, but he would still lash out violently at anyone who tried to wake him up. we learned quick to stand out of his reach if we were going to try it. poor kid.
posted by lindsay m on 12-28-2007 at 12:20 pm
Once when I was about 10 or 11 I remember waking up because I was freezing. I found that at some point during the night my Pooh Bear nightgown had disappeared. Being so young I panicked, thinking that someone had snuck into my room and had stolen my nightgown. I remember getting out of bed to look out the window to see if the thief’s latter was still there. It wasn’t, but my nightgown was there in the clothes hamper next to the window. I still to this day have no idea what happened.
I haven’t had any more incidents of “sleep striping” and I don’t sleepwalk, but apparently I do talk in my sleep, most often after I’ve had a couple of beers.
posted by Grace on 12-28-2007 at 2:07 pm
i thought sleepwalking was more common among males, but many of these posts are from females.
interesting.
maybe men don’t like talking about their sleepwalk stories…
posted by the creature on 12-28-2007 at 2:16 pm
I have sleep walked and sleep talked ever since I was a little girl.
Once when I was about six I was sharing a bed with my cousin at my aunt and uncle’s. I woke her and everyone else up in the middle of the night screaming, “The bears are coming! The bears are coming!” BTW, my uncle snores REALLY loud.
Another time when I was in my twenties, I dreamed that I was supposed to shine a light out my window to signal the aliens. I woke up the next morning with my bedside goose-necked lamp turned on and pointing out the window. I had even carefully moved the curtains out of the way.
Now I really annoy my husband by frequently playing with the alarm clock in the middle of the night. When he asks me what I am doing I reply with things like, “I am looking for the start time,” or “Where are the other people’s times?” He especially didn’t like it when the alarm clock went off in the hotel room when we were on vacation. He didn’t buy my line, “Maybe the maid set it.”
posted by Joanna on 12-28-2007 at 3:11 pm
I don’t have many sleep walking stories but I had a good friend in high school who did. The most interesting one involved her walking out to the living room, putting her blankets in her mom’s arms and saying, “Watch the baby, I need to go hunting.”
She remembers nothing.
I’m also mildly suprised no one mentioned comedian Mike Birbiglia. His sleep walking is so bad that he has to sleep in a sleeping bag. One time he walked out of a second floor window in a hotel, and had no idea what happened to him or why he did it!
posted by Sarah on 12-28-2007 at 3:24 pm
I have REM Behavior Disorder and I have been told it is rare over the age of 13. Most people are paralyzed during REM sleep, I am not. I have done a number of crazy things in my sleep all my life, but when I called the police in my sleep, it was time to do something. My sleep doctor felt I was a danger to others in this state and prescribed Clonzepam. I will be on it for the rest of my life.
My sleep disorder is tied to a traumatic event in my childhood, which included violence and murder in my home.
Unfortunately, my brain still thinks it has to be on alert at all times, even in REM Sleep. If I’d thought that policeman was an intruder, I’d probably be sitting in jail right now.
I no longer do crazy things in the middle of the night and no longer scare people with my weird behaviors. It’s very nice to finally be able to sleep a whole night through and not wake up worried about what I did the night before. (Once I put my daughter in the bathtub, thinking a tornado was coming). Typical for this sleep disorder.
posted by Melissa on 12-28-2007 at 6:11 pm
When I was Six, I woke up for a sound sleep hanging from the guard rail of my bunkbed. It was strange because I woke up dangling by one arm and as soon as I realized what I was doing I yelled for my sister on the bottom bunk to run and get a chair so I could get down.
posted by Kelly on 12-28-2007 at 7:35 pm
I only remember sleepwalking once in my whole life, but I made it count. When I was 12 I was dreaming that I was camping. Next thing I know, I’m standing in the middle of our driveway. Unfortunately, the locks on our doors were such that you could open the doors without unlocking them. I stood out there for half an hour trying to figure out how to get back into the house without waking my parents. Finally I sucked it up and knocked on the door. My dad answered and was equally confused about how I had gotten out there. I made up a lame story about checking on the dogs. After lying in bed for about an hour, I came to the conclusion that I had been sleepwalking. For about a week afterward, my parents put a chair in front of the door before bedtime, but I’ve never done it again.
I still have the sleep paralysis from time to time, but if I just relax for a minute I can talk myself out of it. It used to scare the crap out of me when I was a kid. I swore it was ghosts.
posted by Jill on 12-28-2007 at 9:14 pm
My father was an avid Heiniken beer drinker. He would drink no other brand.
One night, my stepmother awoke to find my dad standing over her, foaming at the mouth. She tried to talk to him and ask him what was wrong, but he didn’t seem to hear her. It didn’t take her long to realize he was sleep-walking.
It turned out that he had gotten up in his sleep and walked into the kitchen. Seeing a bottle of green Palmolive dishwashing liquid sitting by the sink, he thought it was his familiar green bottle of Heiniken beer, and had removed the lid easy as you please and took a big swig.
You see…he wasn’t foaming at the mouth…he was sudsing at the mouth.
My dad passed away this past May, but we’ll always remember the story of that night.
posted by Linda on 12-29-2007 at 12:21 am
People say you should never wake a sleepwalker, but dont worry if you are one. i once slepwalked to my front door and i opend it then my mum came down and woke me up.. im fine, just wake them up before they…errr whtevaa
posted by Emma on 12-29-2007 at 1:04 pm
Twice on July fourth, at age eleven and at age twelve, I sleptwalk through my house, repeating: “I’ve got to light the candles.”
posted by JM on 12-30-2007 at 12:14 am
I had a bout of sleepwalking that scared the beejasus out of me. One time, apparently (I don’t remember it) I got up during a freezing rain storm and stood half naked and barefoot on the outside step until someone came and got me. Another time I was standing on the bed. I was dreaming I was out walking and walked right off the end of the bed. I hit the closet door, bounced off, smashed into the dresser and landed in a crumpled heap on the floor. I was badly bruised and it took months to heal. I never did remember the fall, just the jarring wake up to a lot of pain.
posted by Braveheart on 12-30-2007 at 2:43 am
Once when I was living with my friend”s family, I was reading one night while my friend was sleeping across the room. She frequently talked in her sleep and sometimes you could have a conversation with her. We were currently studying Shakespeare in school and had just been roller-skating that night at a rink called Moulton’s. Suddenly she sat straight up in her bed looked over at me and querily said “et tu Molt-ay”?. I laughingly replied “what?” and she told me to “just shut-up, Liz.” Also, she frequently dreamed she was falling and would literally fall out of bed screaming the whole way down. This was almost a nightly event. For myself, I talk gibberish and laugh in my sleep.
posted by Elizabeth on 12-30-2007 at 9:53 am
I had a roommate once that was a terrible sleepwalker. We lived in an apartment that had a sliding glass backdoor that led to the balcony. The balcony had a wooden staircase leading to the ground floor towards the parking area. One night we saw her go to bed and the next morning when we went to get into the car we found her asleep on the balcony in her pajamas.
Another night she was the only one at home and had been asleep in the living room on the couch. A friend had stopped by for a visit and let herself in the backdoor (we told her to as we were on our way home). Our roomate sat straight up and glared at the friend and started running toward her. The friend ran outside and down the steps. Nikcole (our roommate) chased her outside and got halfway down the steps before waking up and called out to the friend and asked where she was going, saying that we should be home any minute. She went back inside and fell back asleep. We got home shortly after and heard the story from our friend. We explained that Nikcole was a sleepwalker, but she never came to our place again if she knew we weren’t going to be there first.
posted by sara on 12-30-2007 at 7:51 pm
Wow, I had no idea sleep walking was so prevolent! I’m a sleep talker myself and have found that most people just talk back when they hear me.
It was always the most fun when I was younger & at sleep overs. Supposedly, I can’t lie when I sleep talk and my best friend (since 5th grade!)has held it against me ever since I told her I liked her ex!
posted by Jessica on 12-31-2007 at 10:46 am
i have both been caught sleep walking and also developed sleep paralysis (which i’m now growing out of thankfully).
my best sleep walking episode was in my great aunt’s house, wherein i stepped over my 2 sleeping sisters, went up 2 flights of stairs and was heading down the hallway when my aunt stopped me, asked me a few questions and then watched me walk back down the 2 flights of stairs, step over my still sleeping sisters and crawl back into my “bed” on the couch. i woke up none the wiser.
another time, i got up, snuck into my parent’s bedroom and stole a ring i didn’t even know my dad owned from his jewelry box. i was 9 and extremely scared to wake up and find myself wearing an unfamiliar man’s ring.
posted by tami on 1-2-2008 at 11:23 am
My husband is a sleeptalker, but I am an AVID sleeptalker. I will carry on conversations, but my continual eye rolling and telling the other person to “shut up” usually gives me away.
My husband woke me up one night to tell me how awesome it would be to put a trailer in the living room.
My most memorable experience happened one night when my husband watched me sit up and start rubbing my hand up and down my bedside lamp. When he asked what was wrong, I said, “It’s gonna bend!” He replied with, “What do you mean?” I remember being really frustrated and using hand motions to illustrate as I yelled, “Bend! It’s gonna BEND!” He reassured me that I would not remember this in the morning and told me to go back to sleep.
I have also unscrewed the little on/off switch on my lamp and set it on my nightstand. On another occasion, I sat up, pointed at the ceiling and yelled, “What is THAT?!”
My cat and I will BOTH sleep with our eyes AND our mouths wide open.
Good times.
posted by Pearl on 1-2-2008 at 3:32 pm
Just now i woke up, to find my new shoes filled with water, just the shoe like to weird cups of water. i bet i did that on my sleep but i was really drunk too, any ideas?
posted by Araquen on 1-20-2008 at 3:01 pm
I sleepwalked as a child, and once I went downstairs, to the toilet, and then back towards the stairs. Instead of going up, I opened the front door and walked out of the house. Luckily my mom was around to take me back to bed.
Another time I woke up in the pitch black. I was standing up, and I had no idea where I was. I was only about 11, and I burst out crying because I was so scared. I shared a room with my brother, and he started yelling at me because I woke him. I felt my way back to my bed and sat on it, only to realise it was my brother’s! I started crying again until he got out of bed and put the light on!
posted by Lyra on 3-11-2008 at 5:03 am
When I was a kid I used to sleepwalk. My mother has several stories about me coming downstairs saying crazy things and trying to use the bathroom in the kitchen.
I only remember waking from two bouts wondering where I was and how I had gotten there. One time I was standing on my bed trying to climb the wall. Another time I was startled awake by dogs barking. I was in our neighbors driveway wearing just a t shirt and briefs. They had turned on their porch light, the dogs were barking at me, and my parents and several neighbors had come out.
After that my dad put screen door latches out of my reach on the inside of our doors, and my mom made me wear pajamas to bed.
posted by steve on 12-25-2008 at 10:24 pm
When I was a kid, I woke up in the middle of the night to find that the stuffed doll I was holding was on the floor. I didn’t think much of it and went back to sleep but when I woke up again, I was holding the doll.
Another time, I apparently walked into my mother’s bedroom, turned on the light and went to the bathroom. I stood there for a while and walked out heading to my own room. When my mom yelled at me to turn off the lights, I turned back, turned them off and went back to bed.
posted by Rawrrawrrawr on 1-21-2009 at 4:48 pm
[By bathroom I meant that there was a bathroom in my mom's room and that I just stood in it. xP I just wanted to make that clear.]
posted by Rawrrawrrawr on 1-21-2009 at 5:36 pm
I used to sleep walk as a kid, apparently one of the first times I went to the bathroom and was sitting there crying when mum walked in and when she asked what was wrong I said I wanted to use the computer. My parents always used to just agree with anything I said and lead me back to bed.
Over the years though it is almost like I have gotten better at acting normal while asleep, people used to be able to tell, but the most recent occasions my parents couldnt tell that I was sleepwalking and held a whole conversation with me about how they were going out. I woke up very confused on the toilet with my brother asking where they were. I’d been having a dream about trains and I kept telling him they had ‘gone on’.
Luckily it has stopped happening that badly, but I still sit up and stare at anyone who comes into my room at night. I used to be very good at going down bunk bed ladders fortunately as I was on the top bunk.
a common theme with people here seems to be overtiredness or unfamiliar places, anyone else see that?
posted by Lizzy J on 1-24-2009 at 9:04 pm