a terrible, terrible LD?

So basically ive been having this terrible "dream" for as long as i an remember. Im always laying in my bed as if i had just woken up but i cant move, or at least its almost impossible and i cant swollow, nor can i breath. it almost feels like i have a bunch of mucus in my throat. I have had this happen to me more times than i can count. The reason i ask about this is because it just seems very unnatural to me. i remeber one experence were i was comming home from deer hunting with my dad. I was riding in the front seat when i "awoke" not able to breath nor really move but able to see as always, i rember all the cars passing by us and seeing my dad and not being able to alert him to my situation. I always snap out of it the instant befor im just about to choke to death. This happend to me agian today durrring a nap after school but today was diffrent, when it happend i thought about the possibitly that it could be a dream(i had never done that befor) and i dont remeber what happend next, and i dint even remeber the expernce untill just a few hours ago. i was just wondering if u guys think this is just a strange dream or if i should get it checked out, it feels very real and im not a big fan of it. It kinda feels that my windpipe is cocked in a strange direction that i cant move to fix. just dont want to die in my sleep, you know.

Thanks for reading

Hey man,

From what you described it seems like the symptoms of Sleep Paralysis... check it out in Google. I saw a BBC documentary about this once; maybe you could download it somewhere. - Its NOT dangerous so don’t worry!

The basic idea is that when we go to sleep we have 2 major mechanisms snap into action. One is responsible for disengaging our motoric activities, which is important so you wont react to what you dream (i.e. you wont start punching your g/f when you think you are in a boxing arena) the other mechanism is responsible for letting our nerves go to sleep (i.e. disable our sensoric input).
Sleep Paralysis means that the two mechanisms are not in perfect sync, thus causing the nerve mechanism to awake but keeping the motoric mechanism still asleep, which then causes the feeling that we are wide awake but can't get up!
this quasi wake period could be very frightening and sure enough a lot of people reported strange hallucinations like dwarves sitting on your chest (due to the lack of ability to breath deeper than the mind wants to).. or burglars running through the house (due to manifestation of sounds and sights that are interpreted wrongly).. . Remember this state is a temporary state just before you fully wake up! it is not dangerous! The only thing to remember is not to panic and wait it out...

Hope this helps a bit...

the above poster about summed it up.

unless yours is a very rare,different case, it sounds like prototypical sleep paralysis.

i have experienced the seeming inability to breath many times, and can assure you i have never been truly unable to breath. i am pretty sure that you/i are still breathing, but we just can't feel it normally, so it feels like we aren't.


sleep paralysis can be disconcerting and a little scary (especialy when it feels like one is choking or asphyxiating), but it is nothing to fear, and natural.

actually, once you conquer your fear of it, you may learn to love and be grateful for your propensity for sleep paralysis. if you are interested in lucid dreaming it is one of the best gateways there is, as you are basically on the threshold of dreaming.


i used to dread episodes like the one you describe...however, after a few times of staying calm during this sensation, i real-ized that i would not die from lack of oxygen, and that if i concentrated, i could actually enter a lucid dream!! :D

i hope your mind can rest easier now :)

Hey tusmechmes, where do you find that documentary? Think you can make a link for me?
Thx

Beautiful! thanks you guys, i apprecate it very much. and it defintily puts my mind at ease a little bit. Thanks again

That's odd. I occasinally have SP and I've never had trouble breathing during any of my episodes. There has been one where I felt like I was being choked and suffocated, but the whole time I wsa breathing really fast (and aware of that).