Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Am I Dreaming?

Have you ever heard of sleep paralysis? Maybe you or someone you know has experienced this condition once in their lifetime. The feeling is not something exciting or even relaxing, rather, something pretty scary. Imagine finally drifting into sleep after a long day of work when, suddenly, you wake up unable to move or even speak. No, this is not a nightmare, it actually happens in real life.  Over centuries, symptoms of sleep paralysis are described as heavy sensations on the chest, floating outside of ones body and even accompanied by hallucinations or a being attacked by a “demon like-figure”.  Luckily, this only lasts for about a few seconds to a minute; however, I definitely would not want to be woken up by this!

Sleep paralysis occurs mainly due to sleep deprivation, being jet lagged or even simply napping during the day. So, what actually is going on in our bodies that are causing this? Well, to be brief, sleep paralysis happens when you are awake during the stage of sleeping, called rapid eye movement (REM). During REM, the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (a part of the front brain), which correlates to the ability of planning, memory, and thinking, is turned off. This, then, causes your muscles to relax and vivid dreaming starts to follow. During sleep paralysis, the body remains paralyzed in REM while the brain awakes and the eyes start to open. At this point, you are in a conscious state but are unable to move voluntary muscles or speak. Thus, sleep paralysis occurs when the body has trouble making the transition between REM sleep and wakefulness.


The most interesting thing is that people tend to, but not always, experience hallucinations which could be extremely terrifying to say the least. When fear is escalated during sleep paralysis, you are more likely to try to move causing even more tense hallucinations, and could even convince yourself that there is a supernatural entity in the room with you. If you want to check out a more in depth explanation on why people see these demon-like figures, UC San Diego neuroscientist did a study to try to answer some unknown questions about it. Now, before you freak out about going to bed tonight, there is really no clear cause to sleep paralysis, therefore, you really cant prepare yourself for it until it actually happens!  Goodnight! Sleep tight!

15 comments:

  1. Super interested in this because I've actually experienced sleep paralysis before. I had it a year or two ago for about a whole week straight that I was actually terrified to go to bed at a point. That's probably because I do believe in demons and whatnot, all that paranormal activity which definitely makes it ten times scarier for me because of the paranoia. But it's pretty interesting that it's actually just our bodies working that way, and our mind just creating those illusions (I've never personally seen anything though, but definitely felt things!). Have you ever experienced sleep paralysis yourself, and if so could you describe it?

    Posted by Natalie Nou

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I haven't experienced this that is why I was so interested in learning about it! I actually believe in the supernatural as well and it's so mind-blowing that it can correlate to sleep paralysis. I secretly want to experience it for myself but I am terrified to see what could actually happen. At least Ill have a sense of whats going on in my body if I ever do experience it rather than freaking out! haha!

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete
  2. I loved reading this because I've experienced sleep paralysis a number of times in the last 3 or 4 years, but I've never had any hallucinations come with it. What happens is I would wake up in the middle of the night with this "pulsating" feeling throughout my body, then I would try to move, but I would not be able to. The way I would break out of it is I would try to move my head around, since I read somewhere that that actually helps, and it seemed to do the trick for me. The only problem is it would happen around 5 or 6 times a night, usually in nights when I was very tired and when I'd taken a long nap during the day (which probably has something to do with a messed up sleep cycle). Since I haven't had any hallucinations come with it, it's more annoying than it is scary for me, but it's still something I'd rather not experience again..

    Posted by Peter Makhoul

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Wow!! Thanks for sharing your experience! I find it so interesting how people have different experiences. I could only imagine how terrifying it could be and possibly very annoying as well because it wakes you up during the night. haha :)

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete
  3. This is pretty cool since it explains why this happened to me when I was younger. It was scary since it was following a nightmare and I could not move. I thought it was connected to my dream and since it was such a scary dream I thought it might have shocked me into being unable to move as I was trying to wake up. It’s definitely not fun at all but I’m glad it only happened once. However, is this in any way connected to lucid dreaming?
    Posted by Ana Carolina Nepomuceno

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes I believe they talk about lucid dreaming in the article (I provided it at the end of the blog if you want to check it out!!). It states, "both sleep paralysis and lucid dreaming are consciousness states that lie between REM and wakefulness ; the former is dreaming while awake, and the latter, being awake while dreaming."

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete
  4. I have actually experienced sleep paralysis myself a couple of times when I was younger in middle school. I have never been more scared in my life. I woke up unable to move any of my body, my whole body felt so heavy. I tried to call out to my mom to come help me, if someone or something just touched my arm then I might be able to move it. This is the sole reason why I am so claustrophobic until this day, not having control of my body and be able to move when i want scares me so badly. Sleep paralysis is like when you dream of something chasing you and you try so hard to run or scream but you cant move or yell. Even when you try with all your strength nothing happens. I would love to know more like what to do if this happens again ever, if there is a way to snap out of it faster than just waiting for your brain to catch up to your body? Are certain people more susceptible to experiencing sleep paralysis?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thats a crazy experience! There is no REAL clear cause to what goes on so it's hard to pin point a way to get out of it! luckily the experience should only take a few seconds to a minute, however, it sounds very scary! Studies have found that if you are lacking sleep, or jet lagged or sleep deprived you are more likely to have sleep paralysis!

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete
  5. This was such an interesting article to read because as the people above have commented, I too have experienced sleep paralysis. It has happened a couple times and it is such an eerie feeling that takes over your body; I have never been more thankful to move in my life! One trick that I have come up with is to just go back to bed because I found that panicking only makes it worse as you mentioned in your article. I think that studying sleep paralysis would be an awesome research project to work on because there is still so much we don’t know about the brain. In my psych 100 class freshman year we learned about the different theories about dreaming and how there is no definite theory that explains why we dream or why we dream about the things that we dream about. After reading your article I’m really going to keep an eye out for any new discoveries with regard to any sleep study!

    Posted by Kate Masterson

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Im so glad to hear that you enjoyed this article! I am very interested in the science behind dreaming and sleep paralysis caught my attention because of how crazy it is!!! Ive never experienced it for myself however doing a study on it would be so exciting !! I find it so fascinating what the brain is able to do and I definitely would want to study more about it!

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete
  6. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I'm not sure if I have truly experienced sleep paralysis or, instead, some paranoid, psycho-somatic induction of immobility. I know the latter sounds a lot like the former, but I'm skeptical of how genuine my experiences have been, as sleep paralysis, on paper, sounds a lot more frightening than my encounters with it. I'm sure it manifests itself differently from person to person, but in my case, it usually starts with "am I experiencing sleep paralysis?" then I think about not being able to move, and that creates some positive feedback loop where the more I think about being unable to move, the more I believe that I cannot move, thus leading to immobility. I know, it sounds like a load of hypochondriacal crap to me too. So, I'm curious how a predisposition to anxiety and/or hypochondriasis would play into a phenomenon as potentially subjective as sleep paralysis. If it's [my opinion] worth anything (answer: it's not), I would definitely expect some correlation.

    Posted by Owen Mulledy

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree with your assumption Owen! I definitely think that paranoia or anxiety could play a role in sleep paralysis or even your experience!

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete
  8. It's crazy to think about how complicated the brain is with all of it's different processes and states of consciousness and unconsciousness. The thought of dreaming in general has always baffled my mind, but the fact that the brain can still be in REM while conscious is even crazier. I've never experienced sleep paralysis myself, but I know people who have. I also know people who have night terrors, which is sort of the opposite. In their case, they're mind is still in the middle of a nightmare but their body is moving as if they were awake. I wonder if there is a connection between sleep paralysis and sleep walking/sleep terrors. I'm not sure if we'll ever know everything there is to know about the brain and a person's conscious mind, but it's a fascinating subject, to say the least.

    Posted by Jordan Milone

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I too can't begin to imagine what goes on in the brain during sleep, let alone dreaming or sleep paralysis! The article i provided digs a little deeper into what goes on when you sleep walk so I would assume there should be a connection between them! The brain is a very interesting, complex organ !!!

      Posted by Angela Driscoll (group 1)

      Delete