Sleep Paralysis

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 So there is a phenomenon that sounds like some weird Grimm tale and utterly ridiculous unless you happen to experience it, in which case you may try your hardest to forget. 

I am not working on my fiction writing- I am just talking about sleep paralysis. I have heard some friends jokingly call it their sleep paralysis demon, because it's like your dreams project themselves into your awake life for a couple of minutes until the brain wakes all the way up and the brain system that keeps you paralyzed, so you don't act out your dreams, turns off. The demon idea comes in because during those truly terrible 60-120 seconds your sleep brain has free reign and for some of us tends to project the feeling and visuals of a malevolent presence beside you. Just think of it like if Pokemon Go hated you and was made of your nightmares (no big right?). A lazy internet search suggests that around 20% of the population has this, and I have been told it can be made worse by stress and bad sleep habits.... doesn't sound like anyone I know of... (just me)

As a kid this really scared me the first few times it happened, back then the presence was much more cartoonified, often a cross between Pirates of the Caribbean skeletons and dementors (so a classic Scrooge ghost robe situation), and it would stand in the corner or in my doorway until I either found the ability to move (my brain woke up) or I fell back asleep accidentally while playing possum. Many nights I just gave up on sleep and read instead until the sun came up.

These days it is less often, but my personal "sleep paralysis demon" has changed as of a couple of years ago. I miss Scrooge ghost a little in a weird way, I mean jarring and terrifying yes but I was making in-roads. Well- at least I was starting to recognize it so it was becoming less scary. These days it is much more realistic, and can take the form of my very estranged paternal unit glaring down at me like he used to do when I was trying to sleep as a kid. So...that's the worst in a very special way. Nothing like starting a workday with a personal nightmare projecting itself into your room. It always takes me a while to realize it's a product of my head too; I adrenaline springboard into How did he find me? How did he break in without me hearing? If I scream will anyone be able to hear me before he hurts me? 

Then I realize that it is my head, and if I look at the face directly it doesn't quite seem convincing (because at that point my brain is probably closer to awake than asleep), or that the sound effects of him stomping up the hallway and opening my door are incorrect, those sounds are pulled from a memory of a different house, a different door, with a different noisy item strategically hung on the back of the knob (by me, ancient habits can be hard to shake). Then it vanishes and I get the great door-prize of dealing with the panic attack, and getting ready for work pretending like everything is normal... because to someone who isn't me it is normal. Nothing real has happened, everything is technically fine.


Anyway, sunrises can be really pretty, sometimes it feels like I am collecting them. Also midday naps are way underrated.


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