The "Tug"

[Becks]

Hi, I'm wondering if anyone else has experienced what I call "The Tug" or something similar. I have been a lucid dreamer for years and on a couple occassions experienced sleep paralysis full-out in which my eyes were wide open and I was scared to death of a black furry creature running around my bed. In the last few years I have learned to make myself aware that I am experiencing SP and it is not at all scary anymore. Now it seems that I have melded SP into dream control. I laugh at the creature and it seems to annoy him so he comes and scratches my neck; I then wake up. Now something else is happening that is not really scary but is disturbing my sleep at least once a week and causes me to wake up cranky and groggy and I spend the day in a haze. I think it has something to do with a false awakening or SP but I'm not sure. I will be having a lucid dream and then I dream I'm in bed and some force grabs my foot and yanks me out of bed. I get that roller coaster feeling in my stomach and feel weightless. This force gives me a sense of creepiness and it can happen over and over again. After I will wake up or go back into dreaming. If I wake up I'm toast for the night and I can't get back to sleep and my day is a write-off. I have tried everything to make this stop but it doesn't work. Does anyone have advice? Has this happened to you?

[uberyoshi]

I believe it's called a hypnic jerk. You're sleeping and you suddenly feel as if you've missed a step going down the stairs. If this is what you're experiencing, it's perfectly normal. Hypnic jerk - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[AURON]

I believe it's called a hypnic jerk. You're sleeping and you suddenly feel as if you've missed a step going down the stairs. If this is what you're experiencing, it's perfectly normal. Hypnic jerk - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia I don't think thats it. Hypnagogic jerk's only occur while going to sleep...becks claims it's going on in the middle of the dream. I've had something similar to this happen to me in non-lucids, and I just chalked it up to having Isolated Sleep Paralysis, but now that I think about it, I really don't know what it is.

[Becks]

Hi guys, Thanks for your replies. I too thought it might be Hypnic Jerk Uberyoshi as I do get that once in a while just as I'm falling asleep but my boyfriend at the time was awake one time reading beside me when it happened about two hours after I went to sleep. I woke up and told him it just happened about 4-5 times in a row before I woke up and he said I didn't budge an inch for over half an hour. He was used to me opening my eyes and not responding to him, sleep walking and talking and all that crazy stuff. I'm stumped. I'm starting to wonder that because I've trained myself to ignore my already existing episodes of sleep paralysis that my mind is creating a new "terror" that I can't control. Like I said, it's not so scary but I do get a creepy feeling that something is present and yanking me out of bed. I have kept a log of when it happens and under what circumstances and there's no connection or consistencies between bedtimes, moods, foods I ate, time of week, etc. I'll just keep thinking of ways to change things to make it stop.

[SilverDreams]

"The Tug" sounds scary. Hope it doesnt happen to me. Maybe its severe type of SP hallucination. Look at the thread about hallucinations upon waking up.