Imagine you are just about to fall asleep and you start to count sheep in
your head when all of a sudden you feel a pressure on your chest and you sense a
presence in the room you cannot move a muscle we can see your
surroundings and are awake and alert this is sleep paralysis sleep paralysis
is a momentary alertness but loss a voluntary muscle movement that occurs
when you are just about to fall asleep or when you're just waking up from sleep
it can last anywhere from 20 seconds to a few minutes and it affects about 8% of
the general population some of the common sensations and emotions
associated with sleep paralysis are an awareness of your surroundings but
inability to move a sense of physical weight and pressure on the chest
difficulty breathing or a choking feeling, hallucinations are a sensed
presence in an overwhelming sense of fear or dread. Some people even describe
hearing footsteps getting closer, see intruders, demons or spirits and
feeling as if they are about to die. Although there is no physical danger to
the person experiencing sleep paralysis they cannot pull themselves out of it
and must wait for it to pass. Sleep paralysis is different from nightmares
or night terrors and that the brain is awake but the body is in its sleep state
and thus cannot move. What is most interesting about sleep paralysis is
that it dates back to the 10th century and is prevalent in all ethnicities. In
fact people from many cultures have used sleep paralysis as a way to explain
supernatural events and beings, such as witchcraft ghosts and alien abduction.
Now let's go into detail of what sleep paralysis really is. There are two types
of sleep paralysis: hypnagogic and hypnopompic. These two
terms refer to a difference in time at which sleep paralysis occurs.
Hypnagogic also known as predormital is when sleep paralysis occurs at sleep
onset or just before falling asleep. On the other hand hypnopompic also known as
post dormital refers to sleep paralysis that occurs
just after waking up, at the transition from sleep to awakening in order to
understand how sleep paralysis occurs we have to understand what REM sleep is.
During sleep your brain cycles through five different phases: stage 1, stage 2,
stage 3, stage 4 and stage 5, which is called rapid eye movement stage or REM
for short. A REM sleep cycle consists of 25% of your sleep which may occur
several times throughout the night since your sleep cycle is repeated. REM is
important because this is when dreaming occurs and when your body becomes
energized. During REM the signals are sent to your spinal cord and motor
neurons to shut off movement creating a temporary inability to move the muscles
of your arms and legs. This serves as a protective measure to prevent you from
injuring yourself or others while you dream. Now that we have an understanding
of what REM sleep is let's talk about its importance to sleep paralysis. Sleep
paralysis is thought to occur due to an error in the flip-flop switch
controlling REM sleep. REM sleep is thought to work as a switch between two
stages "REM-on" when REM occurs and "REM-off" when it does not. This mechanism
allows for smooth transitions into and out of REM sleep. This REM switch works
in opposition to the wake-sleep switch. Normally "REM-on" occurs at the same time
you are asleep. However, when sleep paralysis occurs the neurons controlling
the wake side of the wake-sleep switch and the neurons controlling the "REM-off"
side of the REM switch are weakened. This allows the REM on neurons to prevent
muscle movement while the body is somewhat awake which should not be
happening. This can cause sleep paralysis. Experiencing negative emotions is
another common occurrence during REM sleep. This is because the area of the
brain known as the amygdala which is important in fear processing is active
throughout REM sleep. Since it is active during REM and is
closely associated with fear it is thought to facilitate the
generation of anxiety and fear during sleep paralysis. So how do you avoid
sleep paralysis? There are a number of factors that contribute to your
likelihood of experiencing it. A twin study conducted on 862 participants
showed that genetics are at least partially to blame for sleep paralysis
with researchers finding that genes accounted for 53% of the occurrence of
sleep paralysis. If you have a sleep disorder you're also most likely to
experience sleep paralysis sleep paralysis is a common symptom of the
sleeping disorder called narcolepsy which is characterized by excessive and
uncontrollable daytime sleepiness sleep paralysis is also most likely took her
if you sleep on your back and if you regularly don't get enough sleep in
general poor mental health is associated with sleep paralysis higher scores on
self-reported measures of depressed mood and anxiety have been associated with
sleep paralysis research focusing on sleep paralysis and patients with PTSD
she would higher prevalence as well and another study has linked bipolar
disorder to sleep paralysis as we have seen there are a number of factors
associated with sleep paralysis like genetics or sleep sleeping disorders and
poor mental wellness aside from avoiding or treating these specific risk factors
are there other treatments that could work for avoiding sleep paralysis well
there is no Universal treatment that works for treating sleep paralysis there
are preventative and management strategies however these strategies lack
empirical consensus among researchers some researchers have suggested that
treating underlying sleep related disorders are mental illness disorders
may help with preventing occurrence of sleep paralysis and some pharmaceutical
drugs such as antidepressants may help in managing sleep paralysis due to their
REM suppressing properties additional preventive strategies for sleep
paralysis include having optimal sleep hygiene avoiding alcohol and caffeine
before bed and incorporating relaxation practices into your nightly
routine although experiencing sleep paralysis
can be extremely frightful there are no immediate dangers or health risks
associated with it we hope that you were able to learn something from this video
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