Sleep Apnea Causes

This is a reenactment I made in GMod of what my first ever experience with this interesting little psychological phenomena called sleep paralysis. It happened a couple of years ago when I feel asleep with the TV on in the other room. I have been having them ever since. Usually a few times a month or so, depending on my sleep pattern.

Its a common condition where your brain is literally half asleep and half conscious. Sometimes but not always accompanied by hallucinations, some more terrifying then others.

I have it happen to me regularly and I feel obligated to have such an experience. I know there are many others out there that experience it and are terrified of it, it haunts them and makes it difficult to sleep.

I just want to say stop fearing it, and learn about it. We don’t know a whole lot about our brain and I think this is a huge insight of its power and what it can do. It certainly opens up to lucid dreaming and if you learn to control your fear of it you can have yourself floating around the room or run down your street and take off flying.

Anyways, post comments or video responses of your experiences. I love to hear about them. =]

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This is a short i made after i found out about the condition sleep paralysis, as i was learning about it i thought it would make a great idea for a short film. This is the first film i have ‘completed’ using my complete hv30 rig. It was entirley shot on a canon HV30 w/ a letus flip 35mm adaptor in 24p with +6 db of gain, edited in premier pro CS3, colour corrected using magic bullet. I am open to all opinions and critisisms on the short (although some of you i’m sure will state that the picture is too dark as i have heard that from some, well this was the look i was going for and i’m very happy with it – infact i made it darker in post). Audio was recorded using Rode video mic on boom. I’m not sure what else i can say but if you have any questions please ask and i will be happy to anser. The footage has been scaled down to 720p to meet this sites 1280x720p max resolution from its original 1440×1080 24p but still looks quite good ( for internet standards ). Hope to hear some feedback regards Marty.

Heres the info on sleep paralysis :

Sleep paralysis is a condition defined by paralysis of skeletal muscles and or absence of reflexes that occurs upon awakening from sleep or during falling asleep. Sleep paralysis occurs when the brain awakes from a sleeping state, but the body paralysis persists. This leaves the person fully conscious, but unable to move. In addition, the state may be accompanied by terrifying hallucinations and an acute sense of danger .Sleep paralysis is particularly frightening to the individual due to the vividness of such hallucinations. The paralysis can last from several seconds to several minutes after which the individual may experience panic symptoms and the realization that the distorted perceptions were false.

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Has there ever been any medical studies on whether or not liposuction of the face and neck areas can improve sleep apnea symptoms? I keep hearing that airway obstruction can often be caused by excessive tissue around the airways, and is common in overweight people.

So – what if someone had most of the excess fat removed from their neck and face through liposuction? Would that take some of the pressure off the airway and allow it to open up a little bit? Or is this just a pipe dream? (pardon the pun)

Just stay awake, it’s easier, and sleep is way over-rated anyways. You can sleep when yer dead. I’ve heard of a converted "Red-neck", but never a converted "Fat-neck".

In my experiences of sleep paralysis, I always feel like something evil is trying to hurt me or strangle me. Sometimes I have OBE’s and I’ll either hover over my body or sit up out of it. I would like to make these experiences more pleasant and possibly induce having an OBE.

I started having these episodes during college and periods of high stress. Mainly they were very disturbing and left me very exhausted and stressed out and worried for the next few hours after an episode. I got to the point where I was afraid to go to sleep because I didn’t want to have an episode. Basically, you have to remind yourself as you’re going to sleep that you are supposed to pay attention and if and episode/dream happens, then you should remind yourself that you’re asleep and try to guide the experience to a more peaceful place mentally. I think it comes down to simply being aware of what you want to accomplish in your sleep…rest and peace. Then, when your conscious mind wakes up but your body is paralyzed, you "pick" your dreams and sortof "write" the dream like you’d write a play. then, that gets boring and you fall back into a more peaceful and restful state!

I finally decided that I would be the one to be in charge (control freak in me!) of my sleep and dream life. I found a book called "Lucid Dreaming" and it was very helpful. This was 15 or 20 years ago.

I mainly don’t have these episodes anymore. But, if I get sleep-deprived or am up and down all night with sick kids, I will usually have an episode. Now, they don’t disturb me nearly as much as they used to.

Good luck – everyone deserves a peaceful’s night sleep.

This is a short, poorly edited video response for anyone “suffering” from sleep paralysis. I feel I know quite a bit about SP (its history, common “symptoms,” techniques for avoiding it, techniques for making it more common, its ociation with lucid dreaming and out of body experiences, as well as techniques for moving from sleep paralysis to out of body experiences and lucid dreams). I started to make a video thoroughly explaining all of this, but realized it was going to be extremely long and possibly for nothing. Didn’t want to spend my time if it wasn’t worth it. Anyway, if you are interested in knowing more, you are welcome to ask. I don’t know everything, but I know how the experiences work with myself and many others. Background music by Woven from the album “Designer Codes” for sale on itunes. Worth every cent and then some!

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Falling asleep when I don’t want to, same time every day, I’m told its narcolepsy. Now I feel like I can’t move, like I’m paralyzed, in my sleep, but not a dream. Ifyou have one or both, can you give me tips on what I can take to make it better.

First of all who told you that you had narcolepsy or even catoplexy. You need to see a pulmonologist who is also a board certified sleep specialist. Only then after a battery of test will you have a definite diagnosis. There are medications that can be taken, these are by prescription only. They are not to be treated lightly. I understand your concerns and frustration. My husband has sleep apnea with pickwickian syndrome. Pickwickian is very similar to narcolepsy. He is much better now that he is under the care of a MD and is following his advice. Contact your MD and ask for a referral as they usually take about a month to get into see one. Best of luck.

I just experienced sleep paralysis yesterday for the first time, i dreamed about someone waking me up which is impossible cause i always lock my door. and when i opened my eyes i saw this black figure standing beside my bed. I freaked out and cant scream and move, the next day i got fever, runny nose and cough, am i being possesed?

I’d describe SP as the threshold between dreams and reality. Normally before you go to sleep your whole body paralyzes so that you don’t act out your dreams. Most of the time we are already at an unconscious state at this moment, but if you are conscious you experience the SP.

Your mind is still "awake", but your body begins to feel strange and the mind associats this to danger most of the time, so you get a very spooky feeling most of the time. And yes you can open your eyes in this moment and you hear weird repeating noises sometimes.

Still it has its advantages because you can sort of "leave" your body and enter the dream state right away into a lucid dream, which is a transition that is simply undescribable in words.

And no you are not being possesed, although it is a scary feeling the first time, if you relax thorugh the process you can actually benefit from it.