Comments on: The Grim Sleeper: Five Disorders That Make For Scary Slumbering

By: Neal

Neal — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 22:01:00 +0000

I suffer from both insomnia and sleep paralysis. The insomia I have learned to deal with, but the sleep paralysis still freaks me out even though I know what’s happening. It happens all of the time whenever I try to take a nap, less often at night. I always hear noises and sense people which just freaks me out even more. As a child I had night teerrors from 4-6 and would sleep walk. Thank goodness I grew out of those!

By: harold

harold — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:48:00 +0000

I have a friend who was having trouble sleeping in early December. To remedy this, he to an Ambien. You may have noticed during the commercials for this medication the disclaimer that “certain complex behaviors may take place while not fully awake followed by no recollection of the activity”. There is a reason for this. My friend decorated his entire home in a gaudy- yet festive- Yuletide theme. He put streamers over his bed in such a way that he has yet to figure out how he did it without a ladder. His significant other, woke up in the middle of the night to this activity and was afraid to wake him up. The next morning, he awoke and asked who had decorated the house.

By: Heather Dawn

Heather Dawn — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:44:00 +0000

Oh, and Doc and Schmooz…I have the dream after dream after dream thing too. I just thought it was part of the hallucinations. I usually wake up into the same dream over and over. I walk out of my room and hear someone whistling the same tune or whatever. I too usually realize it’s a dream when I see someone sitting on the ceiling, or a zebra sitting on my couch or something bizarre like that.

My doctor gave me Lunesta a while back to see if it would help me stay asleep better, but it compounded the hallucinations. I saw my cat jump off of my vanity, felt her jump into the bed, crawl over me and curl up next to me, purring…I could see, hear and feel her. Problem was…I had gotten rid of my cat 3 years prior. It took forever for me to wake up from that one.

By: Heather Dawn

Heather Dawn — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 19:03:00 +0000

It’s so nice to know (although I feel sorry for ya’) that other folks suffer from Sleep Paralysis/Hypnogogic Hallucinations too. It happens to me at least once or twice a week. Whenever I describe it to people they look at me like I’m completely nuts.

Even after my doctor explained what was going on physiologically, it was still hard to get past that “someone’s in the room” feeling. I mean, sometimes you can hear them or see them moving out of the corner of your eye. Even knowing that it’s not real doesn’t really squelch the panic.

I have noticed that it happens more frequently when I’m lying on my back than any other time.

By: Colby

Colby — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 18:37:00 +0000

It’s important to remember to not wake these people up (except for the last, apparently). My crappy roommate a couple years back is a perfect example.

He’d come and go at all hours of the night, often keeping me up ridiculously late when I had class early the next morning. Now, I’m not prone to too many sleep disorders, but I definitely tend to sleep walk when I’m sleep deprived or under stress.

One time, Kyle came in at about two in the morning and was walking around the room, when I sat up and started walking around too. I was just picking things up from the floor and mumbling, and he had no idea what was going on. According to him, he walked over, grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me awake.

Doing this tends to overstimulate the amygdala, causing an intense emotional response. In my case, this was aggression. All I remember is waking up standing over Kyle, who was half-conscious and bleeding from his nose and upper lip.

The moral: don’t be a crappy roommate!

By: Cheezy

Cheezy — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:27:00 +0000

I’ve only experienced sleep paralysis while trying to wake up from nightmares. The first few times it happened I was scared to death because I could open my eyes enough to see everything around me but could not move. Over time I learned that is I just completely relax my body and then concentrate on moving my right index finger or toes then I can go from there and start moving other parts of my body enough to wake myself up.

By: Kaitlyn

Kaitlyn — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 16:34:00 +0000

I am not sure if this is the same thing as sleep paralysis but i oftentimes wake up (i know i am fully awake) and cannot open my eyes. it is as if my eyelids are glued shut. i panic everytime. it’s hard to know how long they stay this way because it seems like forever (but it may just seem that way since i am in a panic). I can move the rest of my body. it’s only my eyes. Anyone else have this???

By: Jen

Jen — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 16:24:00 +0000

When my brother was about 3 years old he suffered from sleep terrors. He would be screaming and sobbing uncontrollably, visibly terrified and panicked. My mom would try to wake him up but never could. So she would end up trying to hold him (sometimes he would thrash around like he was trying to fight someone or something off of him). The whole time my mom would be crying too because it was painful to see him so frightened and not be able to help. Fortunately he never remembered the episodes.

By: Amdela

Amdela — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 13:03:00 +0000

Heliodus – dreaming/speaking in Japanese is a great sign, it means you’re getting really comfortable in the language.

Luke – same things happens to me, I’m so used to it, I wait for the sensation every nite before I fall asleep.

Insomnia has always been a HUGE problem for me, it’s not unusual for me to get about an hour sleep a nite for weeks on end. Boo – urns. For the last two years tho, it’s been pretty much gone…

By: Heliodus

Heliodus — Tue, 13 May 2008 06:42:44 +0000

This is a really interesting article! I find it fascinating to read about the different sleep conditions, because I suffer from a lot of them.

Firstly, I snore. That may not be amazing in itself, but the list goes on – I drool, and I sleep with my eyes slightly open (and I have chronic dry eye. Go figure). Also, I talk in my sleep – my family tells me that often times, it’s incoherent, but there are times when they can have full on conversations with me, and I would honestly have no recollection of it whatsoever.
There was this one instance (when I was a child) when my Dad was leaving the house for work, he went to go kiss me goodbye, and I sat straight up, screaming, “FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!” It scared the crap out of him, lol. My poor father.
Lately, because I’m learning Japanese, my sister has told me that I would now talk in Japanese in my sleep. Sometimes I would dream in Japanese as well. It’s a very interesting experience…

I have experienced that “continuous dreaming” as some other people have posted, and also sleep paralysis, and it is a very terrifying experience. Another thing that plagues me is that whenever I take a nap, either face down (while on a desk) or stomach down, I almost ALWAYS have just one big twitch (actually, more like a jerk) in my body that would force me awake. Like, violently.

Does anyone else experience the same thing?