Early to bed, Early to rise .... & then some ...

Things have been going fairly well as of late with the slight exception of last night.  I wasn't feeling too well & I knew it was a result of not enough sleep over the past few days.  I decided to go to bed early to catch up on my sleep.  I'd made that decision earlier in the day & come the time I'd mentally set to accomplish this, I was oddly pretty close to wide awake at that point .. or should I say - my mind was  - my body - not so much.  You know the feeling, your body is tired but your mind is going a mile a minute ...

Regardless, I proceeded to kiss my boyfriend goodnight, grab my cat & trudge on towards our bed with a steadfast determination to hit the hay at an early hour.  Of course, I knew my mind was racing at that point (which often leads to ISP) so I left our hallway light on in the master suite for "comfort".  I know, I'm a 34 year old woman but the light makes me feel better damnit - shoosh!

Nonetheless, I must have had about 6 or 7 rolling cycles of SP (or RISP as read in an article today - also referenced on my blog - I'm too lazy to look up the reference but if you scroll down & read the article by Sirley you'll find it).

All of the cycles were memorable but the one that sticks in my head (& the one I shared with my other half) was the last one.



You see, because my mind was going a mile a minute (which is never good when you're trying to sleep) & I knew my boyfriend would soon (not sure when, but soon) be coming into the bedroom to go to sleep as well ... I was anticipating the possibility of being woken up.  Doesn't sound like a big deal right?  Well, when you have RISP it is a big deal because it can add to the anxiety involved in the simple procedure of falling asleep.

Ok, I got a bit off track.  Nonetheless, so ... the one that sticks in my head went like this:  I "woke up" & sensed that my boyfriend wasn't in the bed with me because I saw the light was still on, so my natural instinct was to see what time it was.  Now, I have my Blackberry set to turn off at 2am & restart at 7am so I anticipated having to turn it back on to check the time (I was assuming it was after 2-obviously).  So, I "reached" for my blackberry with this in mind only to find that although I was sending the signals to brain to perform this easy/normal-every day task - it wasn't happening.  I looked down at my arm only to see it not moving.  I thought to myself, "self, it's ok, you're just stuck, stare at the light & you'll wake up".  I did this to no avail.  I then thought, "ok, move your big toe" - I know - sounds like the "Kill Bill" movies but, darn it - it worked & poof, my toe moved, cracked & I woke up.

It was quite refreshing yet disturbing.  I was upset that I'd been going through RISP episodes for over 2 hours - around 2-1/2 to be exact but at the same time I was happy that I'd come out of a pretty harmless episode of your standard SP with complete ease.  How did I manage that?  I'm not entirely sure but I'll tell you this.  I refused to even get scared, I simply accepted what was happening & found a solution/a way to make it stop.  That's it.  Whether or not that will happen from now on remains to be seen & quite frankly I'm a bit doubtful.  There are so many instances where it seems I am in no control whatsoever & at the mercy of "someone" else.  I'd like to be hopeful, but it's difficult when I compare this instance and the few other good instances to the amount of bad instances I've had.  Unfortunately, the few are few & far between ...

I'd also like to point out that my other RISP's included a number of the different symptoms associated with SP however never all of them at the same time.  To be more specific, & to give another example, I completely "hallucinated" that my boyfriend had opened the door, walked into the bedroom & then into the bathroom at one point.  I then woke up & it had not happened.  I was a little baffled because it seemed so real but at the same time, part of me knew it wasn't real.  I also heard loud explosions, doors opening, voices etc .. all while I was going "in & out of sleep". 

Anyway, so much for me catching up on my sleep last night but ... I will say, as bad as it was - I did at least get to lay down for a few extra hours last night & I woke up refreshed so - I'll take it any way I can get it :-)

Sleep well!

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Little Bitch

What I've Been Up To:

I've been surfing around for other blogs to read & I've found quite a few out there that are interesting & fun to read (some even help to put your brain to use!).  I've put links on my page should anyone else want to venture their way as well.  I highly suggest visiting them, I'm confident you'll be glad you did.  In my "surfing", I've really been pleasantly surprised at the writing ability that's out there among bloggers.  It was quite refreshing if I do say so myself!

Ramblings (a.k.a. bitching & moaning):

I'm finding as of late that I'm incredibly annoyed by people that talk out loud, or to me, interrupting me,when I'm trying to complete something that takes my concentration (such as blogging).  I can't help but reflect back to when I was a teenager who lived (yes "lived" not just "loved") to read ... but got nasty as could be when interrupted.  My poor sister, I would yell at her for interrupting me & she'd tromp off in a huff, slamming my bedroom door & then her own.  Part of me still thinks she was overreacting, but looking at it from her point of view, I can see how I wasn't taking her feelings into consideration yet completely expected her to consider my feelings.  Ironic or human nature?

To this day I'm annoyed by people that interrupt me or make strange noises (usually of the subconscious nature).  I find it comparable to nails on a chalk board.  Maybe I'm just an irritable little bitch ... or maybe I should just rip off whatever part of that other person's body is that's making the sounds ... Ok, maybe I am just an irritable little bitch :-)

SideNote:

Did have an SP episode the other night, but other than the dark figure & the paralysis it was uneventful.  The figure just stood there as if his presence was necessary to maintain my paralysis, but eventually it ended.  Oddly, it was in the middle of the night & I just fell right back into sleep afterwards.  It's strange however that I still remembered it.

Comment (Hello?):

Remember, you're all more than welcome to leave me a comment anytime you'd like.  I'll even comment back.  I know you're reading because I see the stats, but ... no comment love for me yet?  Hehe, make a girl smile - leave a comment ... even if you just want to tell me to shut up & stop asking you to leave them ... it's ok, I can take it!

Take care & sleep well.

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St. John's Wort, Narcolepsy & me

Well, I up & decided to try some St. John's Wort to help me sleep & it turns out that it did help me sleep but ... it also made me incredibly groggy the next day. I did research it first & found that the grogginess doesn't typically go away so I'm thinking it will need to be something saved for use only on weekends. I will say though, I did sleep really well & even fell asleep fairly quickly without as much anxiety as usual so that's good. The other thing I noticed is that I spent a lot of time in REM (more than usual & I usually spend a LOT of time in REM) which is not good ..

I've also been researching narcolepsy as of late & I'm finding HUGE similarities between my symptoms & narcolepsy. I also found out that although we all associate people falling asleep in the middle of conversations with narcolepsy, that assumption is incorrect. A symptom of narcolepsy - cataplexy is what causes sudden REM (falling asleep) & not everyone has that symptom!

Other symptoms of narcolepsy include:

• excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS)
• sleep paralysis (SP)
• hallucinations (hypnagogic & hypnopompic) (HH)
• cataplexy (C)

You'll notice that SP & HH are listed separately.  In researching, that is how I found the symptoms presented.  At first I thought that seemed odd, but as we all know - people can have SP & not have HH. 

Now, remember, you can have narcolepsy & not have all the symptoms listed above.  I even found a forum for narcoleptics & there were several posters that label themselves PWN w/o C (Person with narcolepsy without cataplexy).  The majority of the narcoleptics on the site had been tested at sleep centers & diagnosed by doctors (some even neurologists since it is considered a neurological disease).

Another interesting fact I came across is the reference to "hypocretin".  Hypocretin is the chemical in the brain that is thought to control sleep & awake signals.  Per the Harvard Medical School Guide to a Good Night's Sleep by Lawrence J. Epstein MD w/Steven Mardon, hypocretin is thought to regulate when wakefulness & sleep occur.  They refer to Dr. Clifford Saper of Harvard Medical School, a researcher that studied narcolepsy, describing this process as a "flip-switch".  The go on to state that hypocretin appears to be involved in when the flip between states occurs, as well as keeping you in that state. The belief is that when there is little or no hypocretin, people will (of course) flip between sleep & wakefulness frequently thus, causing muscle paralysis & dreaming to occur during wakefulness.  I found that a great deal of the book is available for reading via Google books (great site!) so I encourage everyone to check it out!

I also found a lot of material that refers to SP as being a result of REM occurring first rather than gradually going through the normal sleep stages (beginning with light sleep).  This makes complete sense to me because it happens every time I go to sleep.  The unfortunate instance is when that occurs before I actually fall asleep (SP), which it sooo often does (arg!).  That's when my (ever so wonderful) cycle of jerking myself up once I start to dream while not completely in a sleep state begins (along with my anxiety).  I found a lot of posters on the narcolepsy board stating this happens to them as well & it's actually part of the testing required to diagnose narcolepsy.  Narcoleptics hit REM much more quickly than "normal" people & spend more time in the REM state than other "normal" people as well.  Often, switching sporadically between REM & other stages throughout their sleep time.  (I wish I was one of those "normal" people ... lol).

Anyway, I hope everyone finds this information as helpful as I did.  Unfortunately, the only way to know for sure whether I just have ISP (or RSP) or something more (like narcolepsy) would be to get sleep testing done at a sleep center ... which I can't afford ... but, judging by my symptoms & the amount of time I spend in REM I would say it may just be a obvious that I do in fact have narcolepsy.  If only I were a doctor ...

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New website that is of great interest to me!

I just came across this webiste that's of great interest to me:  The Conscious Dreamer By Sirley Marques Bonham .  I haven't explored it in it's entirety & in fact literally - I just stumbled upon it searching "isolated sleep paralysis" via google.  The reason I find this to be of extreme interest is because I am ever-so-often pulled into what she calls "recurrent isolated sleep paralysis", which I call rolling cyclyes or the like.  Regardless, one-in-the-same.

Check it out & check her site out (as I will continue to do) & I'm sure we'll all find it of interest :-)

Sleep well!
~ Jayequeue

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Sleeping Well (not to be confused with a wishing well .. hehe)

Sorry to have been lacking in my posts as of late, however I haven't had all that much to blog about.  I've had the luxury of several good nights of sleep!  Yay for me!  I have an inkling it has to do with the fact that I'm doing my best not to allow myself to get anxious about the possibility of an SP episode prior to falling asleep.

The closest I came to an episode was this morning.  I noticed that I almost had trouble going from REM to wakefulness.  The easiest way for me to explain it would be as if I stuttered in waking.

It's truly amazing what a good night of sleep can do for a person.  I'm actually enjoying my sleep again & feeling quite rested when I wake up.  I notice also that I tend to wake up earlier, but of course don't want to get out of bed because I'm enjoying being able to sleep so much!

That's about it for now.  I will continue researching & posting as much information as I can.  I will be watching the SoulSmack video soon & will share my thoughts on it. 

Oh & here's the link for one of the best books I've found out there thus far:

This book is also highly recommended on the web from other SP sufferers - enjoy!

Sleep well everyone :-)

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I've opened up a can of worms ...

Ok, apparently beginning this research and putting the subject of SP out there has (as I suspected it would ...) brought on a slew of SP "attacks". 4 rolling cycles to be exact.

Having stayed up until around midnight (give or take) last night I went to bed tired and wired at the same time. Prior to finally dragging myself to bed I had been dreading the very thought - KNOWING it would happen - KNOWING I would be faced with the fear of going to sleep. As it is most every night (and if I cave and take a nap), I lay down with great anxiety, fearing the Dark One will visit. I close my eyes and whip them open to look around the room ... I move my hand, my arm, cough or clear my throat to be sure I am truly awake. If strange dream-like visions come into my head, I repeat this test of wakefulness yet again. Sometimes I will hear my name spoken when I KNOW it clearly was not spoken.

Eventually, after at least a good hour of half falling asleep only to jerk myself awake I did succumb and fall asleep. Soon I was there and there he was; only he was different this time. I must have somehow injected a sense of humor and personality into this creature because what took place was far beyond my normal "attacks".

 

Once I realized where I was and what was happening I saw him on top of me - he was dressed kind of like a "superhero" ... I know - totally weird. Anyway, we spoke back and forth. He stating "Well, here I am Mr. (I forget exactly how he referred to himself). You knew I was coming" and I replied back "I did, I did. How are you? Good to see you." All this while he pressed down so hard on my ribs it was causing excruciating pain. We maintained a slight conversation back and forth with discussions as to who would visit me next ... he proceeded to press down on my ribs and as is the Dark One's usual repertoire, once I took a breath in he would press down as hard as humanly (or non-humanly) possible so I wasn't able to get the satisfaction of releasing a full breath. This of course was accompanied by the same excruciating pain. At this point the pain is so unbearable that I actually fear my ribs will break and grow concerned that I may have a heart attack and die in my sleep. I can actually feel the bones move and almost crack.

He proceeds to stick his hands in my mouth and in a sickly manner press his fingers all around my gums with my jaw gaping wide-open almost beyond what one would consider possible. (this part probably sounds a bit funny but, I swear it was awful! Not to mention the fact that he was doing that at the same time as pressing on my ribs - how is that possible?!!).

After this went on for a few minutes he changed into a new Dark One ... and then another as if they were working shifts! It was very odd ... My subconscious caught onto this and putting it together with the notion that they were all "workers" I requested Mr. Superniceguy (remember - they all had strange darksuperhero type names) and "poof" I was in this building where a whole bunch of them were walking around, clocking in, eating lunch etc. I was being led to Mr. Superniceguy who then proceeded to walk me out the door (apparently you go through a door to get back to bed?) and then I woke up. It was by far the strangest SP episode I've had yet. I even remember walking by the other Dark Ones who I had previously been taunted by.

I would like to expand on the idea that the Dark One's were "workers" and my feeling as if I would die of a heart attack from the pain. At the time, the fear I might die was more from the pain then from any malice on his part. Oddly, I actually felt as though he was simply "doing his job" - earning his keep...

By the time I truly woke up the familiar feeling of utter exhaustion had taken me. I so desperately wanted to go back to sleep but knew if I did I would fall back into another rolling cycle so I managed to get myself up out of bed for a few minutes. Eventually, I went back to sleep and didn't have another instance.

As is "the curse" with SP - if you're thinking about it when you go to sleep - it will happen. I was hoping that by getting it out on the table and researching it that might not occur. I was wrong. I will however continue to research it and note my episodes here every time I can.

I will also state that I was NOT lying on my back last night and most often times I am NOT lying on my back when it occurs, so the theory that you can prevent it from occurring by simply not laying in the supine position is complete bunk.

Additionally, although it didn't occur this time, there have been instances when after a night of battling with the Dark One I have had residual pain in my ribs the next day. There was one time in particular that they were actually painful to the touch as if I had bruised ribs! How that's possible is beyond me. If we are hallucinating - are our minds truly that capable?

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What is Sleep Paralysis?

An Explanation

You’ve just woken up, only to realize you can’t move a muscle. You can’t talk even though you want to shout for help and you sense someone in the room with you and you know they want to cause you harm. You try to move your arm, but you can’t, you try to scream ... You fear for your life but you can’t move because you’re paralyzed!

Sleep Paralysis (SP) (also called Hallucinatory Sleep Paralysis or HSP or Isolated Sleep Paralysis or ISP) is a condition in which, upon waking, a person is completely aware of their surroundings, able to breathe and sometimes move the eyes but is unable to move the rest of the body due to the onset of muscular atonia (a normal part of the REM sleep phase). This condition (often referred to as an “attack”) is a common symptom among narcoleptics but can happen to others without narcolepsy and often does, although the exact percentages vary widely.

What are the symptoms of SP?

There are many articles and books available but unfortunately they do not cover a vast scope of the actual symptoms that can occur during SP. As individuals our experiences differ. As we progress through our lives, our symptoms can change and evolve as well. Below is a comprehensive listing of the most common symptoms associated with an “attack” of SP.

The core symptom associated with every instance of SP is a feeling of wakefulness and awareness of surroundings accompanied by the inability to move, often (but not always) including sensations of:

• Hallucinations
• Hypnagogic or Hypnopompic
• A sense of evil nearby
• Sensation of a presence in the room sometimes accompanied by:
• pressure on the chest or body
• choking , felt to prevent adequate breathing in an effort to end one’s life
• poking
• stabbing (as if with a needle or digit)
• extreme, terrifying fear for one’s life
• very heavy limbs and extreme fatigue
• sensations of trying “fight off” the presence sensed
• sensations of sexual nature
• Vibrations (or pins and needles feeling)
• Noises
• door slamming
• object(s) falling
• buzzing
• household sounds (as if lying in bed awake and hearing a family member talking)
• Voices
• one’s name being called
• words or sentences whispered or growled in ones ear
• Smells
• Levitation (floating or gliding)
• Lights
• Flashing
• Atmospheric (surrounded one while lying in bed)

How long does SP last?

Sleep paralysis can last for as little as a few seconds to as long as a half hour and although uncommon, one may have several recurring episodes in which they think they are coming out of it only to find themselves still paralyzed and stuck in what appears to be a vicious and terrifying cycle.

The Good News

Remember, although terrifying, SP is a normal part of our sleep cycle and it will end.

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Change to Blog Content

Hello folks! It's been a while since I have updated my blog and I have decided to make a temporary content change.

My intention is to research a much needed subject matter and to do so I need your help.

The topic of choice is Sleep Paralysis (SP) (also called Hallucinatory Sleep Paralysis or HSP or Isolated Sleep Paralysis or ISP).

If you have woken up to realize you can't move a muscle, can't talk and a terrifying cloud of fear envelopes you then I would like to hear about your experience.

SP can be an extremely frightening occurrence and unfortunately many people that experience it don't know what it is and worse - feel completely alone because they are afraid to share what has happened to them, for fear people will view them as "crazy". What we don't realize is that we are not alone and we can share our experiences and learn from each other. Not to mention the fact that SP is actually a completely normal part of our REM sleep cycle!

If you have experienced SP, please drop me line via my blog so we can get the word out about this frightening experience. With your help I will be able to provide accurate information and make it available to those who need it.

Should you need a clearer description or definition of SP, it is defined at MedicineNet.com as "A frightening form of paralysis that occurs when a person suddenly finds himself or herself unable to move for a few minutes, most often upon falling asleep or waking up. Sleep paralysis is due to an ill-timed disconnection between the brain and the body."

Additional Symptoms (to name a few):

• Hallucinations (Hypnagogic or Hypnopompic)
• Sensation of an evil presense in the room sometimes leading to a choking sensation
• Vibrations
• Noises/Voices
• Flashing lights
• Smells
• Feeling of intense fear or terror

SP is also often referred to as "The Old Hag" an "Incubus" or "Succubus".

I will post a reflection of one of my past experiences to get this started. Please feel free to add your 2 cents regarding it. I will also be adding further content to further expand the definition of SP.

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