Sleep Paralysis, When Nightmares Are Conscious

Can you imagine waking up at night and feeling that you are paralyzed? Your body is completely still, you feel pressure on your chest, and worse, you swear that someone or something wicked and evil is with you. It looks like a horror movie… but the truth is that it happens to those who suffer from sleep paralysis.

What is sleep paralysis?

It is a disorder that causes a person to experience normal sleep phases out of the natural order. Basically, and in simpler terms, your mind wakes up before your body.

Generally, when you go to sleep, you first fall asleep or lose consciousness, so to speak. Then the chemicals in your brain cause your body to “paralyze”. You start dreaming, and while you’re running, playing, or dancing in your dreams, these chemicals make you stay put in bed. When dawn begins, you stop dreaming and start regaining mobility in your body. Finally, you wake up.

Now imagine this process happening out of order. What happens if your brain continues to produce glycine and GABA (two chemicals that make your body paralyzed) even after you wake up? You would wake up before regaining mobility in your body.  What if some traces of your dream get mixed up with your conscious state? This combination is capable of producing a truly frightening experience.

Beliefs and Symptoms

Being paralyzed makes a person feel helpless. She cannot scream for help, nor satisfy her normal instinct to protect herself. When someone is in such a vulnerable state, it’s possible that their greatest fears take hold of him (or her).

Therefore, it is understandable for a person to think: “If I am not controlling my body, who is controlling it?”. Many people who have had episodes of sleep paralysis come to the conclusion that a malicious force is harassing them. These ideas are influenced by religious and cultural beliefs. Depending on the context, the person comes to think that he is being harassed by spirits, aliens, demons or other mystical creatures.

But no matter how each person explains the experience, the truth is that some common symptoms are shortness of breath, pressure on the chest, lack of bodily mobility, and the ability to perceive clear details of what is around you. , such as the bed, bedside table, alarm clock, etc. In almost all cases, the episodes usually occur when the person is lying on their back, stomach up.

before bedtime

Regular exercise every day will contribute to a more restful sleep at night. It also helps to take a break from your work at least once or twice a day by closing your eyes, relaxing, and breathing deeply.

Another advice is to avoid excess caffeine and try to take a walk outdoors for at least 30 minutes in the afternoon. And another very important thing: make an effort to maintain a regular time to get enough sleep each night.

what to do during an episode

Some people have had good results by concentrating on moving a small muscle, such as a finger or neck, and so, in essence, they are able to “wake up” their bodies. Others focus on breathing calmly until the body regains activity. In any case, it’s about staying calm and seeing what’s happening to you through the eyes of logic.

Carla MacKinnon*, who has suffered from this disorder since childhood and who has researched the topic in depth, said: “I’ve noticed that by focusing on the details of the experience and comparing them to my studies, I can distract my mind from the feeling of fear and threat. Thus, I eliminate the overwhelming dark force that these experiences had before”.

Has anything like this happened to you before? Cheer up, you are not alone and you can even fight this frightening disorder.

* Carla MacKinnon coordinates  The Sleep Paralysis Project  and developed a short film about sleep paralysis, called “Devil in the Room”, which was completed in May 2013. This film combines techniques such as stop motion animation, live action film and projection mapping to evoke and explore the worlds lived between waking and sleep. The film is a graduate thesis by Carla MacKinnon for the Masters Course in Animation at the Royal College of Art, created in collaboration with the art and technology resources of Seeper Studios.

Text by: Claudio Navarro