3 upvotes, 3 direct replies (showing 3)
I believe you are referring to night terrors. "Vanilla" sleep paralysis doesn't necessarily have the evil presence factor, but night terrors are defined by it.
I get sleep paralysis sometimes (used to happen a lot more in teens and 20s, it's calmed down a bunch), and I'm typically aware of my surrounding but moving or vocalizing feels impossible. There is some terror in a sense, but it's just from feeling trapped and unable to move, not from any evil presence
Comment by Certain_Concept at 05/02/2025 at 03:28 UTC
1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I've had these for one summer a few years back when we lived with some roommates.
We adopted kittens and were keeping them in our bedroom, but since they were kittens they would wake us up with play on the regular (or atleast that's what I think triggered it).
I started having the same feeling of waking up totally frozen, can't speak, can't move, can't even whisper but I can open my eyes. I would see a shadowy figure at the end of the bed just chilling and menacingly staring at me. Id eventually be free and then be uncertain whether I had been truly awake. It felt like I was.. but was my nightmare just that elaborate?
That was also a period of time where my dreams just got weird in general. I started to be able to lucid dream. Id realize I was dreaming, and either try to wake up, or change the course of the dream. That went away after I started getting more regular sleep.
Comment by flamingmonkey93 at 05/02/2025 at 08:15 UTC
1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Wait. Are night terrors different to nightmares? The way you're describing it sounds that way, I always assumed night terrors were just the American term for nightmares.
Sleep paralysis to me doesn't have a "demon" so to be speak. Its more that im semi awake, in darkness and aware that I can't open my eyes, or move or talk and then panic sets in until hyperventilating kicks in and fully wakes me.
Comment by goodytwotoes at 05/02/2025 at 09:10 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Oh, lol. I guess they’re terrors.