Good evening, everybody.

I'm glad to have found this site. I am a fairly well-educated American male of nearly seventeen years, and, although I am not familiar with any of your terminology, I am certain that I have been experiencing much of what is being described here during my dreams. During my early adolescence, I was on a number of psychiatric medications; Zoloft, Ativan, Seroquel, etc.. During that entire period, I did not dream at night (or at least, I didn't remember any dreams.) Ever since I have come off of my medications, my dreaming patterns have been going through a progression of sorts.

At first, the only thing that struck me about my dreams is how olfactorily stimulating there were. As I mentioned, any and all dreams I had had before then were, at the best, a blur of jumbled thoughts. For months, I would be woken up by excessively sensory dreams that would often shock me back into the waking world. This, as one could expect, began to throw my sleeping schedule off-kilter, but I refused to take anything more than over-the-counter sleep aids when consulted by my doctor; I had had bad enough experiences with aforementioned psychiatric drugs and had decided to refrain from further medication.

After about five or six months of this, my sleep schedule had become sporadic enough to affect my entire lifestyle (grades, social life, family, and the like) to a noticeable degree. A rough estimate of my daily sleeping pattern would be two to three periods of one or two hours of sleep throughout the day, the rest of which would be spent in a semi-conscious, caffeine-induced awareness. It was around this time that I began to experience a new phenomenon almost every evening; A state which I approximated to being between somnolent and waking states. I would be laying in my bed, deep in thought, when without warning my vision would become blurry and shaky, and I would be able not move my body. Sometimes I would hear sounds, see a light out of the corner of my eye, or experience a suspended sensation of falling in no direction in particular. I would try to force myself out of this frightening state, and, with some persistence, usually could awaken myself, although I often could not sleep for the remainder of the evening after such an event. I believe that you call this a "sleep paralysis," although I have only just begun to scratch the surface of your reading material (I have been busy with the holidays.)

These sleep paralyses (once again, forgive me if I am using the wrong term,) progressed as time passed; the sounds, sights, and sensations I would feel began to grow more elaborate and distinct. I began to hear distinct phrases or otherwise determinable sounds. I began to see patchworks of other rooms, stars, or strange amorphous lights. I began to be aware of two consciousnesses - I would scratch my face, trying to wake myself up, or fall off of the bed, but at the same time be completely aware of the fact that my body was not moving. I do not know if you have a name for such things, but I had nicknamed the two consciousnesses as the "Asleep" and the "Awake" selves, respectively (original, I know.)

For a few months now, almost every day I am able to sleep, I have become fully immersed in distinct worlds with their own terrain, physics, and people. Usually, this starts out with a paralyzed sensation (as described above) and, if I am unable to awaken myself, I would wake up instead to a bizarre world (not of my choosing.) I would be able to interact with this world as I would in real life, although I would still constantly be aware of both my "Asleep" and "Awake" selves as separate entities. These worlds are usually nonsensical patchworks of real-world places, but extremely sensory; the smells and tastes are even distinct. When I wake up from these dreamscapes, I would either be unable to sleep for the rest of the evening or wake up to a paralysis state in a world that approximated my bedroom (or a bedroom from my past,) at which point the entire process would start over again.

Upon reading your website, it seems I have only scratched the surface of this phenomenon. I read of people who are able to control their dreams, however I am still bound by the physics and dynamics of whatever world I find myself in. I have no control over the nature or length of these experiences, although they are frequent enough for me to detect some inconclusive patterns in these realms. I hope, with your guidance, to be able to achieve such control over my dream worlds, or dismiss this surreal happening from my life permanently (at this point, either would be fine by me.) If you know anything about the experiences I have described above, please, explain to me in detail what is going on - I'm a fast learner.

Finally, I would like to tell you a bit more about myself. I keep a regular journal, which doubles as my dream journal at times, which has allowed me to assign approximate time periods for each stage in my "dream progression" as described above. I attend high school, where I achieve excellent test scores, as well as dreadful class participation and homework scores (the tests seem to be an innate talent of mine, and my dismal sleep schedule interferes with the latter two.) I enjoy reading, writing, mathematics, and music, and I try to keep to myself as much as possible. Although I have been experiencing some degree of lucidity in my dreams for almost two years now, I am still new to the LD community and have very limited experience with your terminology at present, so please correct me where I go wrong in this respect. I hope I am well-received here and this community provides me with insight and control over my somnolent life.

Regards,
Deep Thought.