Sudden paralysis, intermitent loud noises in my head, pressure on my whole body before sleeping?

Hi,

Nothing to worry about at all. This is sleep paralysis (SP). I know all about this one from both ends as I'm a former neuro nur se and a fellow sufferer of 50 years' standing! I don't want to bore you, as I suspect you've already googled it, but I'll just go through the mechanism for the benefit of anyone else reading this.

During the night we go through regular sleep cycles, each lasting about one-and-a-half hours, and each including a period of REM (rapid eye movement) sleep and one of non-REM sleep. The REM phases get longer as the night wears on. Daytime naps and morning lie-ins consist mainly of REM sleep. Everybody dreams, btw, but a lot of people don't remember their dreams, so they think they don't.

During REM sleep the brain secretes a chemical that paralyses all the body's voluntary muscles, to stop us jumping up and acting out our dreams. The muscles of the autonomic nervous system aren't affected by it. That's the heart, the diaphragm (for breathing), the muscles of the throat that control automatic swallowing of saliva, the intestines, the muscles in our artery walls that keep our blood pressure steady, and so on and so forth. So you're not in any danger whatever during these periods of paralysis.

Sometimes the brain goes on secreting the paralysing chemical for a short time after we wake or, less commonly, it kicks in just before we fall asleep. Everyone will experience one or two episodes of SP in their lifetime, but in about 5% of the population it happens regularly. About half of regular sufferers - including me - also experience hallucinations during periods of SP. These hallucinations can affect any of the senses. My own hallucinations are mainly tactile like yours (i.e. sensations of pressure, being touched etc.) and just occasionally auditory, with the sound of banging doors, running footsteps, things like that. My father used to get multi-sense hallucinations, including the olfactory (smell) kind. He used to see, and smell, unpleasant things.

As you'll have guessed from the last paragraph, SP is strongly hereditary, though it has to start somewhere, of course. My father, a couple of his siblings, and his mother all had it. It might be worth enquiring around in your family. However, many people don't like to talk about it as they think it's a sign of mental illness - which it quite definitely isn't!

I forgot to mention that the most common age of onset is mid-teens to mid-20s, so you're about average. I was a little older than you, at 23, when I had my first attack. Anecdotally, the incidence may be slightly higher in males than females, but I think it's pretty evenly distributed.

So... what can you do about it? Well, for a start, face up to the fact that you might be stuck with this for life. That's not nearly as bad as it sounds, as it can be managed, and the frequency of episodes reduced. And once you understand what's going on, the episodes that you do get will be much less scary.

The main thing is to identify your triggers and avoid them. This is a very individual thing, but I can spot one of yours already! You say:

"...my sleeping pattern is go to sleep around 12-1am and wake up at 7, then nap from 8 to 9-9:30 (around this period of time is when I get the sleep parylisis)".

Quite... If you managed to read my explanation above, you'll understand that SP always arises from REM sleep, and daytime sleeping consists almost entirely of the REM phase.

I'm afraid you're going to have to try and reorganise your sleep if you want to reduce these episodes. It may well be that at age 19 you've already switched to your adult sleep pattern and don't need more than the 6-7 hours you're getting in your main sleep period. Since you say you haven't exercised much recently, it might be a good idea to start taking regular exercise during the day - but not late in the evening - so you sleep a bit longer. If something is waking you at 7 every morning, maybe you could try and get to sleep earlier, so you don't need your morning nap? I'm afraid this morning nap is the problem, and it'll have to go, one way or another, if you want to stop the SP. I have the same problem. As I'm an old lady I sometimes give in to temptation and take an afternoon nap - and sure enough, I always get an SP attack! The other alternative is to carry on with the morning naps and just accept the SP episodes. After all, they won't harm you.

To summarise, there's nothing to be afraid of during these episodes. You're not going crazy and nothing outside of your own mind is "attacking" you - in spite of some weird stuff you'll find on-line. I've had this thing for 50 years now and am still perfectly OK and unharmed by it.

If you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to post again here or send me a personal message via this site. Click on the envelope icon next to my name. PMs don't expose the email address of either party or carry viruses.