Waking up in the middle of the night and unable to move a muscle or even to make a noise for help, chances are your experiencing sleep paralysis.
Sleep paralysis has been closely associated to extraterrestrial, or even demonic interventions – which is largely due to the influence of movies and books we see and read in our life.
Contrary to Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, sleep paralysis isn’t an old hag doing her voodoo on you; neither is it an evil presence in your room that prevents you from moving.
To define the term, sleep paralysis is a situation when a person is conscious but is unable to move for a few seconds, minutes, to hours, which will already cause extreme panic.
Sleep paralysis can occurs when falling asleep, which is called hypnagogic or predormital sleep paralysis; and when waking up, which is called hypnopompic or postorbital sleep paralysis.
When asleep, our body goes into “offline mode” called muscle atonia where are muscles are locked down to prevent us from acting on our dreams that happens in REM sleep. We are unconscious and fully relaxed so we are not aware of the change happening in our body. However, when a person remains conscious during falling asleep, predormital sleep paralysis occurs, because you will become aware of yourselves inability to move.
On the other hand, postdormital sleep paralysis occurs when you wake up without completing the process of REM sleep. When sleeping, we alternate between NREM (noon rapid eye movement) and REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. During the NREM part, our bodies restore and relax itself and then transitions to REM part of the sleep. REM sleep induces atonia to lock down our muscles, and waking up before REM will render us unable to move.
So, where do the terrifying stories of sleep paralysis came from? Our brains are hijacked into assuming the worst of things and our inability to move or speak in the middle of the night is a surefire for paranoia. The sensations of hearing noises, choking, and feeling some weight on our bodies to name a few is actually our own doing. It can be our heart thumping and own breathing that we hear which are amplified by panic and transformed into something more by terror.
Fortunately, sleep paralysis are is not a symptom of acute psychiatric conditions; however, it is a reflection of our irregular sleeping habits, which will be the chief cause of a disorder if not treated early.
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