I had my first episode of sleep paralysis the other night following an instance where I was taken advantage of. I’m so scared to sleep, it felt like yet again I didn’t have control of my body even though I was in there. Does anybody have any advice?

I’m 49 years old and have been experiencing what they call in my culture, the witch riding your back at night. It’s happened as long as I can remember. Some call it sleep paralysis. Once I fall asleep feel a presence holding me down. I’ve even had dialogue with it/them, but I can’t understand the language. Sometimes I can feel it coming and when I try to wake up, it moves quickly to hold me down. Once it’s done with me, I awaken and I feel drained. I’m tired of it sapping my energy. Does anyone have this experience? Does anyone have any advice? When I was a Christian, I tried praying it away. That didn’t work. I even have ministers pray and lay hand on me; nothing helped.

Has any one else had a dream with an out of body experience that then suddenly changed to your experience/pov and this change happened with a always getting louder whoosh sound effect?

I had a dream/experience like this after going to sleep after I had took Hydrocodone for my wisdom teeth removal surgery. I also happened to be on vacation at the time making the dream even weirder as this was the first night I was in this house.

So the dream started with what I could see was the entire room and I had the perspective of the upper corner think like a camera looking at a room. I could see every detail of the room including my body and my siblings who were in the same room but everything was dark. Then there was a whooshing sound and suddenly I was in my body laying on my side and could see from this perspective. This was when I had sleep parylasis I wanted to move but couldn't. A void like dark entity with 3 spiraling arms appeared and kept getting closer to my face until it phased into my head and the wooshing sound was heard again. After the sound I was back to reality and could my body.

Okay, so recently I've been experiencing some pretty weird things. It's been going on for around 3 years, but I've just never really bothered asking what it could be until now.
Basically, sometimes when I fall asleep, I wake up in this weird state. I'm almost fully conscious and can move, but I see these hallucinations, and they're usually extremely scary.
The ones I remember the most are:
1-This is by far the worst one. I had just watched the Parasyte anime with my sisters, then went to sleep. I don't usually get scared by blood and gore, so I didn't think anything of it. But when I fell asleep, I woke up and saw myself still lying down on the bed, except my features started morphing like the parasites from the anime, and my eyes and mouth started stretching towards me. I started screaming and headed to the edge of my bed (a bunk bed), but when I turned, I saw my sisters doing the same thing at the edge of my bed from BOTH sides. I stood up and started having a literal panic attack. I was screaming, shaking, and crying. But then suddenly, I snapped out of it, and my sisters were holding my hand and yelling that it wasn't real.
2-I saw a giant, tall black figure with bulging white eyes standing at my door. So naturally, I started screaming and ran to the foot of my bed. It started walking closer and stood in front of my bed, so I jumped off and ran out screaming (I sleep on a bunk bed, so that wasn't fun). But yeah, I ran to the kitchen screaming and crying, and my mom was terrified. Then, when I went back, no one was there.
3-This is lowkey kinda funny, but it scared the heck out of me in the moment. I saw a bunch of small Patricks (yes, the ones from SpongeBob) crawling all over me. When I freaked out and jumped up, they started climbing up my leg. I was hysterically screaming, but as soon as my sister started telling me that it wasn't real, they disappeared.

Honorable mentions:

1-I see a bunch of ants, spiders, and lizards crawling around, but as soon as my sisters yell that it isn't real, I snap out of it.

2-Today was my LAST straw when I woke up to find a bunch of giant bugs eating my legs and crawling all over me. I screamed so loud that my parents ran in, and I couldn't stop shaking for like 5 minutes afterwards.

3-Idk if this is related, but one time I was woken up by my cousin in the middle of the night and told to wait downstairs in the living room. I got up pretty dazed and followed her down, then ended up passing out on the couch while waiting. I was woken up by my mom, who had gone downstairs to pray Fajr. Turns out my cousin wasn't even in the house... The person I saw had black features that I couldn't make out at the time, but I just assumed it was her.

But yeah, I seriously don't know what this could possibly be. Being in a religious household, everyone keeps saying it's jinn in the stuffed animals I keep on my bed.
Idk about that, though... Any thoughts?

(If this looks familiar it's because it is essentially a comment that I left in another thread here recently that seemed worth sharing and talking about. I would be interested in hearing if anyone else has been able to, for lack of a better word, "fight" back or even straight up defy the paralysis while STILL sharing the same perceived space as whatever the phenomenon may or may not be.)

"All it took for me was one time being unaffected by the paralysis but still facing whatever entity I thought was there and literally raising my arms for a fight and (I guess lucid dreaming?) that I tackled it into my corner display stand. The structure came crashing down upon us dramatically, glass broke and wood splintered all over the floor but when I stood up there was nothing there. The figure was faceless and formless aside from the silhouette outlines of its vaguely humanoid shape. But I distinctly remember the change in body language to a sort of surprise and shock as I charged it with everything I had.

And it was TALL, so much taller than I expected. It's head and neck was turned to the side so that it wasn't scraping the ceiling and its arms were also very long and thin. Finally and to me most interestingly despite the above: it had a distinctly metallic silver rod in its right hand which (at least in the context of the dream or whatever was happening) my gut or intuition told me that was how they put us in the paralytic state. It was a device. Not a power of their own inherent projection.

And this in that context revealed to me how weak the phenomenon really is and exactly WHY the only time they/it can seemingly take advantage of us is when we are asleep or in between states, because we are actually the ones with the power. This was years ago and prior to that I was plagued by terrible SP experiences for a very long time but I have not had a single one or a worry about it ever since. Cheekily, I like to think they know I'm not worth the effort anymore. Life is strange.

(Hopefully I don't eat my words now)"

I’ve been having them for over 20 years but just now I may have had my craziest sleep paralysis yet. Well the craziest I can remember bc they can get so fucking bizarre.

Like usual I could feel someone come into the room who I thought was a family member until I realized fuck I’m not fully awake. This time I could feel it lie on top of me almost for comfort, with its head on my chest nuzzling into my neck, one hand cradling the back of my head and the other groping between my legs. Normally it’s trying to hurt me by squeezing my testicles. This time it felt like it was groping me to keep me calm so I wouldn’t react with the usual terror. Usually it feels like it’s trying to harm me, this time it seemed like it was tired and like it was trying to rest on me. I could tell it was a girl and could even feel its curly hair in my face.

Knowing I was in one of my sleep paralyses, I had my usual reaction except for a split second this time I considered trying something different and I did for a moment, I kinda hugged and cradled her back (I was lying on my back), but I became too scared of what would happen next so I stopped. I knew exactly where I was in real life but couldn’t wake up fully and I kept trying to yell for someone to wake me up but my vocal chords weren’t awake yet so I can only do this horrific moan that feels like a yell but only comes out as a really scary and desperate moan. My wife knows it well and would wake me up from it but no one hears me up in this room.

When I usually realize no one can wake me up I go thru the process of telling myself, you gotta wait it out, your body will wake up and this entity will just be here until then. Then I do a thing where I wake myself up body part by body part that helps. I hate it but it helps. But this time was different. I woke one arm up to use it to grab my sleeping arm bc that can usually wake my whole body up, and I thought it was my arm but I think it was the arm of the entity. I thought I woke up but I actually didn’t. Tried yelling again, of course didn’t work, then finally the rest of me woke up. Meaning my body joined my brain.

But this was as far as I’ve ever gotten in trying to sit with it and not escape from paralysis world immediately. Oh and at the end the split second before I woke up I took this breath through my nose that felt like it went into my nose really quickly, that’s never happened. But it couldn’t just been me taking a nasal gasp after fighting to wake up, it was an EXTREMELY strange feeling. This is a different world, it’s happened for decades by now. I’ve only heard my mom explain anything like it.

Does anyone have experience with SP running in their family? I am curious about the genetic factor with it and have been doing some reading, but want to hear what other people’s experiences are.
My mom experiences SP (has for over 40 years, she is now 73), I have experienced it since having children 18 years ago, and my eldest son has had 4-5 episodes.

I’ve been getting SP since I was a teenager, and since my twenties the paralysis has gotten more handsy. I’ve learned to scream in my head for it to get the f off of me and it would immediately release me. But this morning that didn’t work, it continued caressing me. I don’t see or hear it thankfully, but I feel him. I have no one to talk to about this in my life who wont look at me like I’m crazy and it’s frustrating.

I haven't had SP in years, but this morning I was on my stomach and it was a dog scratching my back and growling in my ears. My past experience was the usual unseen figure in the room and some auditory hallucinations of speech that I can't make out while on my back. This type was a first for me.

Hey guys, long time SP-sufferer here.

I was wondering how being touched or moved affects your guys’ episodes?

I sleep next to my partner and I have caught on to the fact that after an episode, depending on whether they try to touch or move me, I request they do the opposite next time. LOL. Basically, if they try to help me out of SP by, say, turning my on my side, it startles me really badly and the next morning I’ll ask that the next time they don’t do that. Then, next SP, they won’t touch me, and I’ll feel pretty awful, and ask they try to turn me next time.

Basically, both options suck because SP sucks. And I’ve realized I have absolutely no idea what my partner should do — they don’t know how to help either and they say it’s really tragic watching me have SP because I sound/look so scared 😭

Anyway, I guess I’m just wondering how my fellow SP comrades go about sleeping in bed with somebody. Any tricks of the trade? Anecdotes? All ears.

Hello I'm a teenager I'm here to share one of my most disturbing experiences on sleep paralysis I'm sorry if my English is quite bad. Yesterday night around 2:12am, I was watching tiktok to help me fall asleep after that when i was feeling very tired so i had to turn off my phone and sleep and i eventually fell asleep, fast forward around 3:56am i think, and suddenly my body feels tense and my chest feels heavy and i felt something near in my presence around in my bedroom, i can control my eyes to open or closed and then suddenly i heard a loud cry of a child near my bedroom I can't see them but i can hear them it was very loud it sounds like a child getting skinned alive or burned i was scared i was trying scream for help but i cant speak i felt muted, so i closed my eyes just the right amount of pressure, and i suddenly waked up i was sweating, i check the time on my phone it was around 4:15am it was the longest and scariest sleep paralysis ive experienced ever, so i stand up and ran to my parents bedroom, which is next my own bedroom, i woke them up and i cried besides them they comforted me i was to scared to sleep again, but i eventually fell sleep next to them, till this day im still traumatized.

Every time SP happened before, my mild tinnitus grew into an ear-piercing torturous whine over a short period and stayes like this for about a minute. Imagine the loudest sound you can, and then imagine something even louder. Naturally, I want to avoid SP as much as I can if instead of fabled succubuses I get execution by audio.

And this night it was about to happen again, my usual ear ringing began gradually rising in volume. Having noticed it in time, I tried to move as vigorously as I could. What came out were "jagged" movements, a hand would jerk, pause, jerk again, pause, etc... Thankfully, this must've been "enough": the ringing fluctuated at louder than usual but didn't rise further, movements never truly froze, and after about half a minute it began to subside.

So, YAY, audio torture avoided! [Maybe I misremember something as this happened deep in the night before falling asleep again]

Has anyone ever used the method of not breathing to come out of paralysis?

I have had severe sleep paralysis at times in my life, all the good hallucinations, all the hits.

Eventually I become self aware during the episode, and in my mind I always say, "if I cant move, maybe I cant breathe either" and a sensation of panicked breathing begins.

I have found that by simply saying that I will just not breathe, and essentially slip into a type of drowning, and accepting whatever happens, I wake up.

Its equally horrifying and effective, has anyone else tried or experienced this? 🤣

Ive been really scared to share my experience and hear what your responses might be. I have really bad anxiety which includes health anxiety. I just want to know what happened to me and if anyone has a similar experience.

About a month ago I was laying in bed, trying to sleep. I was very sleep deprived for a couple of days at this point ( autistic child, sleeping issues.) I was laying for hours without being able to sleep. I was staring at my fan and suddenly it was like my body shut down. My hearing dimmed, vision dimmed, I completely lost all my strength, I could barely see my fan, and I could barely think. I remember thinking I need an ambulance but had absolutely not an ounce of strength. All sensations faded except my heartbeat which became so amplified. It wasnt faster or pounding intensely or anything. The sensation of it was just amplified like 20x. This only lasted seconds until I wiggled my finger and got up like nothing.

Ive been absolutely traumatized to fall sleep since.

I did go to the doctor and tested and scanned, did imaging, ct scans etc,. Nothing abnormal has been found. Only sleep paralysis has been given as a possible explanation. Ive had episodes of SP for over 10 years but this did not feel like the others at all.

when it happens, if I can't move and im really tired, I will just go back to sleep or find it interesting and trying to break out of it.

ive had sleep paralysis all my life and ive never had those terrifying experiences everyone has had.

ive also been in war so maybe the high pressure makes sleep paralysis easy.

I don’t really have any scary figures but rather caterpillar like figure which is translucent or a translucent floater like thing.
I feel like its watching me and runs out of the window or below the bed when I wakeup.
It runs away as soon as I wake up.
Anyone else experiences this and what helped you.

i went to sleep 4 times last night. when i woke up the third time, my eyes were slightly open and it felt like a wave of heat was keeping my body from moving. what i saw was a billboard-esque sign approaching me, almost like i was driving. around 30 seconds in i could move my left index and middle finger. then almost immediately i woke up. it was surprisingly underwhelming and calming almost. though i find it weird that when i woke up my mind immediately thought i was experiencing hypnagogic hallucinations.

So i experienced it twice , in the first one i found myself lying flat on the ground surrounded by buildings and no one was there i couldn't do anything instead of moving my eye does it is considered a sleep paralysis then why was i not in my room but i was somewhere else in the second one is the most terrifying one i had i was lying with my father and sudden sleep paralysis occured i cant do anything instead of moving my eyes but there were some black figures in the bedroom i am saying it demons because as i saw the figures i don't know why i suddenly shouted "in the name of Jesus Christ leave my house" and then there would be so much vibration , trembling everything vibrated i thought the figures were terrified and frightened in the name of Jesus but again after that i said "in the name of Allah leave my house" again and then there was so much vibration , i didn't even thought why i said these sentences and i was saying these like shouting screaming to my father to wake him up and tell him that there was something in our bedroom but then my voice went i couldn't even say a single word and i felt it was a dream when i said these thing without thinking , but also i thought it is also considerable that i couldn't move instead of moving my eyes

is this 2 sleep paralysis or what ???

I’m wondering if what I experience is actually sleep paralysis or just a vivid dream.

I’ve noticed that I can sometimes predict when it’s about to happen. The moment I close my eyes, wait a few seconds, and open them again, I suddenly can’t move anymore. Before this happens, I feel a tingling, almost numb sensation in my ear and head when I’m still fully awake (it gives me the signal that I’m about to have sleep paralysis). My entire body feels extremely heavy, like I’m physically unable to move even when I try. I can sometimes move very minimally, but it takes so much effort. Other times, I can’t move at all.

I also try speaking during these episodes, but nothing comes out, no matter how hard I try. Once I become unable to move, the tingling continues throughout the experience.
I don’t see any monsters or scary figures, but sometimes I hear sounds that feel very real. When I finally wake up, I sometimes find myself sleeping in a completely different position from the one I thought I was in, which makes me wonder if I was actually dreaming rather than experiencing sleep paralysis.
Has anyone experienced something similar?

In my teens and young’s twenties, I would get sleep paralysis at least three times a week. I would be aware of my surroundings, able to see my husband and dogs, but unable to move or make any sound. I would hallucinate a shadow person in the corner of the rooms and after so many, I became aware of what they were and squeeze my eyes shut to avoid seeing anything scary.

I started smoking weed and have for the past 5 years and they stopped, I figured it was me growing out of them. Well it became illegal again in Texas so I am now off of it and have had sleep paralysis dreams for the past 4 nights in a row and one of them really shook me.

I was laying on my stomach when I realized I had that familiar heaviness to my body and I was unable to move or speak. It was strange because it didn’t feel like I fell asleep, I could still feel, hear, and see my husband breathing next to me and I tried hard to move my hand closer to him or speak to get his attention with no luck.

I then saw the familiar shadow person start to form and crawl down from my ceiling and quickly shut my eyes to block it out. Them something new happened, I had a falling sensation and felt like I was on hard ground all of the sudden, the texture under my hands sandy and I opened my eyes to find myself still stomach down in my backyard.

I could feel the breeze, hear the crickets and the cars pass on the nearby highway, but I still couldn’t move or speak. I desperately tried to move towards my bedroom window or make a noise to maybe trigger my dogs in the bedroom to bark but couldn’t. I then heard the door to our wood shop behind me open and I closed my eyes again and tried hard to scream.

When I opened them, I was truly awake and back in my bedroom. It was so real feeling and terrifying that I stayed awake since 3:30am. It is now 12:34am the following day and I still can’t convince myself to go to sleep in fear of it.

Has anybody else struggled with recurring sleep paralysis?

Growing up i would have sleep paralysis about three times a week. I was a kid/teen so i was used to it and never scared me anymore. I accepted it and went back to sleep. Just my body unable to move and a high pitched tinnitus for maybe 5 seconds, nothing more. No insane weird stuff or ghost thankfully. Come to find out after starting anxiety meds in my 20s, they stopped completely. Never knew my anxiety was the cause.

Well due to new diagnoses and me stopping anxiety meds, they came back. I had maybe the worst sleep paralysis ever three times in a row. I felt SO heavy and I THINK i was able to move my head. So i started hallucinating a weird knocking noise everytime my head would attempt to move. Then i would wake up.

Anyways the point of this post, is maybe to check your anxiety out and see if that’s the cause. Cause i can’t wait to get back on the meds lmao.

I've been having sleep paralysis for the last year, and lately it has been intensifying. Right now I'm up at 4 AM after a recurring cycle of sleep paralysis lasting between 1-2 hours. This happens while I'm trying to go to sleep, not waking up from a dream. What happened now is that my body fell asleep but my brain knows I'm not. When I wake up again after circa 30 seconds I'm way to tired to move or keep my eyes open, so I just fall back into paralysis over and over again.

While I'm in the state of paralysis I can hear music and full blown conversations. I could also for example see and hear my friends sitting next to me and acting completely normal while talking to me, only to wake up and realise nothing was real. Sometimes i still see shit while forcing my eyes shut. To counteract this I can sometimes "move". I feel and even see myself moving my body, standing up and rolling away, but when I eventually wake up again I haven't moved an inch. Once I even fell from my bed, heard my friends laugh at me only to find out I'm still in bed when I "hit the floor" and woke up.

This is seriously starting to creep me out and haltering my quality of sleep, so I just want to know if this happens to anyone else.

I am 19 and as of 2 days ago have been having nightly sleep paralysis. I have never in my life had it before until now and have no idea what is causing it. The first night, i was having trouble going to sleep and was paranoid as well as i was staying in an unfamiliar location with my girlfriend that was pretty creepy to say the least. i close my eyes, and open them again to discover that my body will not move. my first thought was not sleep paralysis, it was actually me thinking i was having a medical emergency. i had an intense vibrating/tingling and heavy sensation all throughout my body and could open my eyes and blink and look around but not move. i started freaking out and trying to call for my girlfriend because she was right next to me but only a whimper would come out (i was trying to scream at the top of my lungs). the entire ordeal lasted about 30 seconds and i was freaked out to say the least and ended up figuring out it was sleep paralysis. The whole next day i was still confused as to what happened but not too worried about it until i was going to bed last night. i had my buddy sleeping on a couch in my room at my house and was attempting to go to bed and this episode was MUCH weirder. i fell asleep after a minute, and began dreaming. i dreamt i was at a pool/resort type place and literally not a second after the dream started i felt this insane sensation of being ripped upwards and i started flying into the sky. i’ve never felt a dream this real in my life, i could feel and hear the wind pushing all around me and felt the G force of being catapulted upwards. after about 10 seconds of me flying upwards it goes black, and then in creeps that same vibrating/tingling sensation in my body. i immediately begin panicking again and trying to call for my buddy to come wake me up. he hears me, runs over and starts shaking me ( i told him to if he heard me having an episode) and i came to shortly after and was able to move again. could this be stress related? i just recently began living alone in my own house and have a few other factors that cold be causing stress.

I was thinking about something the other day. And now i've found myself curious enough about those thoughts that i decided come on here to see what the outcome would be. It will be interesting to say the least, if enough people will engage.

How many of you that suffer from sleep paralysis have migraines as well? If so, do you ever have sleep paralysis during a migraine episode, or are they typically seperated from one another?

I am asking for answers from anyone that gets sleep paralysis, if you dont suffer from migraines, than just answer stating so as well.

Do you tend to see auras with your migraines, are they severe that you absolutely have to lay down in the dark until they're gone, are you on any treatment from a Dr?

If it comes to be that there is a connection, would then those 2 connections also be connected to use of perscribed migraine medicine. Or will i find that paralysis still happens to most people who get migraines reguardless of whether they take medication or not.

I thank anyone that takes time to answer. This is what happens when i start thinking about things. They snowball into many other questions.