night terrors

choille

The sleep paralysis is really freaky. I've had that a few times, but not lately - thankfully as it is so scary.
I had one with an old lady hovering over me holding a wreath/flowers.
That is an actual thing that has a name in some cultures - old hag or something.
The tripping /falling sensation is one I've had in the past also

saintly_2

god that sounds frightening!!!

choille

It was incredibly frightening. Thing is I was sure I was awake, but couldn't move, couldn't wake my OH or anything.

morg_monster

I get sleep paralysis and night terrors so thought i'd share!

The sleep paralysis I used to get a lot, as a teenager. Now I only get it on mornings when my OH isn't in bed with me, and I'm having a lie-in. If he's in bed with me his moving about stops me sleeping so deeply and I don't have them. If I set an alarm of any kind it wakes me up enough to stop it. But if I haven't set an alarm, and I'm in bed on my own, I drift in and out of sleep and always end up paralysed. It has happened so often it doesn't freak me out anymore and i just lie there until I fully wake up or go back to sleep.

Night terrors... it's not quite the right word for me, hallucinations is more accurate and sometimes they are scary, sometimes not. I was always quite a chatty sleeper as a teenager. When i started going out with OH and we started sharing a bed I was always sitting up in bed, pointing or shouting at something, or doing a quick scream. No idea if I did it before then as had no-one to tell me! He was always more freaked out than I was, I usually just woke up and he'd tell me what I did, and then I'd go straight back to sleep and he'd be left there totally awake!! Mine are always related somehow to the room I'm in - so they aren't really dreams, definitely more hallucinations.

Things I have dreamed about...
...my OH jumping / diving off the top of the curtain pole (it was when there was an ad on TV with a guy diving off the top of the hoover dam?!) - I stood up in bed and tried to hang off the pole to stop him!
... spiders, lizards, creepy crawlies coming over the wall and bed
... hands coming out of the wall towards me
... people in the bedroom or outside the door (though I have managed to minimise this by making sure there are no clothes or anything hanging up out of the cupboard).
... patterns creeping over the wall
... knitting coming out of the wall?!!!!

My OH occasionally talks in his sleep too and the funniest one was when I sat up and said "there's someone in the cupboard" and he just said in his sleep "don't worry, it's just Stu..."

I don't have any tips really. I haven't had many recently, and when I do, I always realise they're not real much more quickly these days. So I might sit up in bed suddenly, but then realise what's happening before I let out a shout or scream. I certainly used to get them more when during exam periods etc. But i'm not sure if it was stress, as I didn't get them in the leadup to our wedding or moving house. I thnk it might have been my brain just being overactive with all the revising etc.

anyway... you're not alone (tho yours sound worse than mine!) and hopefully they will change over time. and your OH WILL get used to them!

toniq

Hi,

I have researched night terrors heavily as my ds suffered from a very severe form of them, I also along my research found alot of stuff regarding adults, I liased for many months with a retired chap in oxford who wrote many papers on the subject, in my quest for help.

Feel free to pm me anytime xxxxx