Was it sleep paralysis?

Hi Yvonne,

Absolutely nothing to worry about. Everyone is paralysed during certain phases of sleep and it occasionally gets out of sync and happens when we're awake.

I'll post a fuller explanation later today but right now I'm rushing to get to work.

For many years I wake up after I,ve not Long gone to sleep and feel as if I,m going to die, I also see people standing by my bed, they disappear within 3 seconds, I say a prayer and go back to sleep.  It is very frightening but I,ve got to 70 and am still alive.  I do suffer from anxiety and emotional issues. I envy people who go to sleep without any problems and can sleep 9 hours, I,ve never been able to do that since I was 20 years old.

Hi Yvonne,

Here goes with a full reply to your question. As already mentioned, sleep paralysis (SP) is absolutely nothing to worry about, though I know only too well how scary it is the first time it happens.

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 may 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, in which we dream, and one of dreamless 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. Many people get what are sometimes referred to as "sixth sense hallucinations" - i.e. the sense of an invisible, and usually evil, presence. I suspect that's what you were experiencing when you felt as if "something" was trying to kill you.

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 asking 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! The most common age of onset is mid-teens to mid-20s, but it can start later. I was 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, try not to worry about it. As I already mentioned, most people will get one or two one-off episodes in their life, so this was probably the only time you'll ever have it.

I strongly suspect the migraine might have had something to do with the episode. Either that, or the medication you took, or both. I'm one of the aforementioned 5% and have had regular episodes of SP for the past 50 years. I also suffered common migraines throughout my working life. That's the kind where you get pain, nausea and vomiting, but without the aura. I would sometimes be unable to go to work and would have to take a dose of ibuprofen (Nurofen) and just go to bed. (I live in a country where the diagnosis of common migraine isn't accepted, so couldn't get the stronger prescription meds I really needed.) During these spells I'd regularly get bad attacks of SP, and I always noticed that the more Nurofen I took, the worse they were. The migraines mysteriously stopped when I retired from paid employment seven years ago by the way. As someone else on these boards recently said: "Work will do your head in!"

To summarise, you'll probably never have another attack, but there's nothing to be afraid of if you do. 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. Like Ann, I've had this thing for 50 years now and am still perfectly OK and unharmed by it.

If it comes back, there are all kinds of things you can do to reduce the frequency and severity of attacks, but I won't go into all that now as I'm sure your attack is a one-off. There's a very small possibility you could have another one in the next couple of days, but that's just due to very natural anxiety. Most people stop having them once they've been reassured and understand what's going on.

If you need any more help, don't hesitate to post here again or send me a private message via this site. (Click on the envelope icon next to my name.) PMs via this site don't expose the email address of either party or carry viruses.