Talk:Sleep paralysis

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[edit] cleaning up talk page

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Sleep paralysis article. This is not a forum for general discussion about the article's subject.

Can we just remove those comments? maybe move them? The S/N is getting pretty high here. Kl4m 04:52, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I think the recommended Wiki course of action is simply to archive the heck out of this discussion page and 'start over'. But personally, I hope Wiki in general would give a little slack to this discussion page since it -is- such an intense topic. I've had it before and it isn't fun at all. Lots42 13:21, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
There, how's that? We can't keep all the issues here forever. Archiving makes them still available, but this (now shorter) page more accessible to the greatest number of users. — Frecklefσσt | Talk 11:20, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What about OBE's? What about felt presences?

Why is there no mention of the effects of SP that the sufferer experiences? The majority of experiences report at least one of the following: out of body experience, loud buzzing in the ears, pressure on the body as if being pushed into the bed, malevolent presence, extreme feeling of dread...

How can you have an article on SP without its non-physical effects? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.131.71.70 (talk) 16:20, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Globalize tag

I've marked a section globalize/USA because of this fragment: "... in African-Americans panic disorder often co-occurs with sleep paralysis." The article African-American itself discusses at length the intended referents of the term, but the conclusion seems to be that it refers to people living in the USA who have some black African ancestry. There are several possibilities about the sleep paralysis statement:

  1. it co-occurs with panic disorder in Africans and people of African descent
  2. it for some reason only occurs in such people when they live in the USA
  3. it's only been studied in the USA

Probably it should be stated which holds. Thayvian 04:20, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

I think it's pretty clear that the article is referring to people of african extraction in the USA. It's in the first couple of paragraphs

62.31.228.92 (talk) 20:26, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] reference not found - see LOC and WorldCat

Provide ISBN to the "Notes"

  • Parker Johnston, states after his encounter with sleep paralysis, "I can tell you right now, if I hadn't read about this type of thing earlier, mainly the part about the hallucinations, and known exactly what was going on, what was causing it and what to expect, this would've easily been one of the most nightmarish experiences of my life" and goes on to say that "knowing is half the battle".[1]

Jclerman 11:22, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Nothing more than a dream

In my experience I find it difficult not to panic even though i know that it's just a dream. Recently, I find myself avoiding the actual seperation (i.e. mind and body) by turning over. I don't how to describe it, yet i feel my body sink gradually and immediately turn over as this feeling semi-wakes me. it generaaly occurs when i'm stressed and sleeping on my back.Fabulus (talk) 22:01, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I dispute the claim made in the article that "More often than not, sleep paralysis is believed by the person affected by it to be no more than a dream". There's no citation and "it's only a dream" has not been my experience or the experience of anyone I've ever read about. My experience is that SP is so potent because it doesn't feel like a dream and it takes a great deal of mental self-convincing to decide that it really was just a dream and not, for example, a reason to sleep with the lights on and a knife under the pillow and perhaps a nice exorcism of the surrounding area (just in case). --TheCynic (talk) 19:08, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

No, it definitely doesn't feel "like a dream" to the person experiencing it. It feels like being physically attacked or suffocated. — Frecklefσσt | Talk 20:07, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Of course this is all anecdotal - But I concur - I have never mistaken the phenomena for a "dream" - I am fully aware and panic internally. Wisdom89 (talk) 20:10, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree, I know it isn't a dream because I can defeat the paralysis when it happens to me. I take the slowest deepest breath and then I force it out as hard as I can while physically trying to move as hard as I can. Usually, I flail my arm and my body "snaps to." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.168.15.166 (talk) 02:35, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

I experience this quite frequently. Often I'll be awake, but unable to move. It sometimes feels like I can't breathe either. It is the scariest thing, especially as you almost have to force your body out of it, I sometimes find this painful almost. I perspirate with the effort of moving out of it, and worst of all, if my mouth and nose are partially covered by my pillow, I feel like I'm about to suffocate. Hypnogogia is one of the scariest things I've ever encountered, simply because you are literally unable to do anything about it. Wissam24 (talk) 12:30, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

I only get this when I am sleeping under the Supine position. Theseven7 (talk) 23:48, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Observations: sleep paralysis while asleep

[edit] Tripping in a dream

I just encountered an xkcd comic[1] that duplicates my own personal experience, and which I assume can't be too uncommon - while in normal people sleep paralysis prevents all normal walking motions, when reacting to a stumble the mechanism seems to be bypassed. I've been woken a dozen times myself this way, from the sensation produced after actually moving in response to a dreamed stumble (though I suppose I can't rule out that some spasm only occurring while asleep simply resembles a stumble and is interpreted as such in the dream just prior to causing wakefulness, though it seems less likely)

[edit] Is paralysis a misnomer?

To me the word "paralysis" seems altogether inappropriate for this situation. Far from going limp, the muscles work, sometimes overwork, to maintain a fixed position. Perhaps this phenomenon once served to hold our ancestors safely in trees? I remember one occasion during which I took a moment to rest my eyes while reading a textbook, and held it open, balanced on the flat of my hand. Two hours later I was awakened when it fell on me. It is possible for this to cause muscle soreness, should I happen to fall asleep while in the process of trying to get up out of bed or holding up bedding in my arms, for example, and I assume that the phenomenon of a "stiff neck" happens the same way for people who experience it often. I assume also it is the means by which storied sleeping Western gunslingers kept weapons or treasure firmly in hand, if such stories are based in reality.

[edit] Anaesthetic properties

The ability of this phenomenon to cause soreness depends on the lack of sensation. Actually, it has been my perception that a broad variety of aches and pains one might have before falling asleep are relieved while this is active.

[edit] Not all or nothing

I've noticed that upon awakening, it seems I can retain the "paralysis" in some limbs and not others, simply by not choosing to put forward the mental effort to initialize their movement at first. I haven't put this to any rigorous experiment, but it would seem to be a useful way of narrowing down the biological mechanisms.

Of course, I can't dump comic strips and unsourced musings into the article, but perhaps better info will turn up. Wnt (talk) 00:14, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Did you have anything to contribute to the article? Personal experiences are original research and can't be used in articles. — Frecklefσσt | Talk 13:28, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
As I said... but perhaps observations of this type are tucked away in some of the published literature, so I mentioned these things in the hope I'd jog someone's memory. They're not the sort of thing you can search for quickly at NCBI. Sorry... Wnt (talk) 04:15, 20 March 2008 (UTC)