A prisoner in my own body
This is what it’s like to have sleep paralysis, Jennifer Hassan writes, and it’s not pleasant.
The first time sleep paralysis struck me was in the winter of 2012.
My grandfather had recently died and I was spending time at my grandmother’s house. After 60 years of marriage, she wasn’t used to being alone or to the sadness an empty home can bring.
Determined to help, I moved into her spare bedroom for a few days. As night came, I tucked her into bed and turned out the light — a task she had done for me on countless occasions growing up. I lay down in the next bedroom and listened to her muffled sobs.
I woke up a few hours later, feeling cold. As I went to pull the blankets up around me, I realized I couldn’t move. I began to panic. What was happening to me? Why was my body paralyzed? I tried to lift my arms: Nothing. My head was cemented to the pillow, my body embedded, frozen.
Then the pressure came, pushing against my chest. The more I panicked, the harder it became to breathe. Like something out of a bad horror movie, I tried to scream, but no words came out. Unable to move my eyes, I had no option but to stare upward into the darkness. I couldn’t see anyone else, but for some reason it felt as if I had company.
There was a hidden presence and it was tormenting me, refusing to let me go. After what felt like hours but was probably just a few minutes, I was able to move again. Shaking, I switched on the bedroom light and sat upright in bed until morning came.
It was not a nightmare. I’d had nightmares before, but this? This was different. This actually happened while I was awake.
Deep down, I was certain I had been conscious, fully present, just immobilized for what felt like an eternity.
Some suggested perhaps grief was playing a factor. I didn’t want to arrange a doctor’s appointment — it seemed unnecessary — so I turned to Google.
Soon enough, I was reading stories from people who knew exactly what I was talking about. Relieved, I realized we weren’t all unstable or dreaming or joking:
We were suffering from sleep paralysis.
Sleep paralysis occurs when the mind wakes up but the body remains asleep. This causes temporary immobility and, in many cases, intense hallucinations. For some people the paralysis lasts seconds, for others several minutes.
Adrian Williams, a professor of sleep medicine at King’s College London and a member of the medical team at the London Sleep Centre, says sleep paralysis is a “normal phenomenon that is not dangerous but is distressing.”
As we sleep, our bodies alternate between REM (rapid eye movement) sleep and NREM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep. During the REM stage, our brains are highly active. This is when our most elaborate dreams occur.
“During dreaming sleep, the body is paralyzed to prevent us from acting out our dreams. Occasionally the body gets confused and the brain wakes yet the paralysis persists,” Williams said.
Episodes are almost always accompanied by a feeling of intense pressure on the chest. Naturally, the inability to breathe rouses feelings of panic and despair. “Because of the paralysis, the only breathing muscle that is working is the diaphragm. There’s often a sense of inadequate breathing because the chest muscles are not working,” Williams said.
About half of the population has experienced sleep paralysis, he said. Some will notice it frequently, others just once or twice.
Relatively few seek treatment. The London centre sees only about one sleep paralysis patient every month.
“By the time a person goes to see a doctor, the paralysis is usually happening often,” Williams said.
“Often patients do not know they’re suffering with sleep paralysis, which is why they come.”
Sleep paralysis is commonly linked with narcolepsy, a rare condition that affects the brain’s ability to regulate the sleep-wake cycle. Williams estimates twothirds of narcoleptics also have sleep paralysis.
The National Health Service says sleep paralysis can be triggered by anxiety, stress or depression —which may explain why my first encounter came during a time of grief. Those with irregular sleeping patterns are more at risk than others of experiencing the disorder while falling into or waking up from sleep.
“There is no antibiotic to make sleep paralysis go away,” Williams said. “The first thing to do is to focus on making sleep better in a behavioural way.”
Williams said the condition can be passed through generations but is not gender-related.
Many cultures have blamed sleep paralysis on the underworld and mysterious creatures such as the “old hag ” and the “devil in the room.”
Henry Fuseli’s 1781 painting The Nightmare is frequently associated with the disorder: He depicts a sleeping woman sprawled helplessly on a bed as an ogre sits on her chest.
In Thailand, some believe breathing difficulties at night are caused by the Phi Am spirit — a ghost that sits on your chest and crushes you. Guam has legends of the Taotaomona, a forest vampire spirit that seeks to protect Earth. Those who disrespect the island, the stories say, will be strangled in their sleep.
Sleep paralysis occurs more commonly when sleeping on the back and Williams suggests the problem may by avoided by sleeping on the side. Episodes can be interrupted by touch, he said, so a bed partner may be able to intervene.
When sleep paralysis is happening frequently and efforts to correct it have not been successful, he said, antidepressants are sometimes prescribed, not necessarily because the patient is depressed but in an attempt to suppress REM sleep.
Since that night in 2012, I have experienced sleep paralysis at least 10 times. Once it struck three times in a single night. It’s terrifying and it’s exhausting.
Now I avoid caffeine before bed and listen to relaxation music while falling asleep.
During dreaming sleep, the body is paralyzed to prevent us from acting out our dreams. Occasionally the body gets confused and the brain wakes yet the paralysis persists.