This has happened a few times maybe once or twice a year, but it's definitely reoccurring. I don't know what it is, I looked up night terrors, lucid dreaming and none of those match what's been happening. Excuse me if it's too long, I try to detail it so nothing is left out.
Naturally I have sleeping issues, commonly insomnia. I took seroquil(excuse me if I spelled it wrong) for a good year because I would stay up all night and sleep all day. I'm off seroquil now but sometimes I go a day or two without sleep. So basically my sleeping schedule is a little out of place but I always make up for the hours of sleep I miss. Anyway a strange phenomenon has occurred in the past three years maybe four times. I'll be falling asleep, well rested and dozing off in bed (or sometimes when I sleep on a couch), and then I see something that SCARES me and makes me scream. Examples, disturbing machine type things, scary aliens, deformed men... Weird things. Now The obvious response is that I have a vivid imagination, but it's a big issue to me. Because I don't go back to bed, I am paranoid all night with a beating heart and it doesn't take me until many hours later to realize it wasn't real, and during that time of paranoia I can be pretty hysterical.
Any idea what is happening and what I can do to help????
WE have been learning so much new information about sleep issues, disorders, and disturbances that it is hard to keep it all straight. In fact I have been treated for some pretty serious sleep apneas for a few years now. Even with intense history, medication and sleeping religiously with a CPAP machine every night, my apneas have only gotten worse, to the point of serious health hazards....cardiac arrest while sleeping, arrhythmia's and other possibilities. The machine I sleep with every night, are completely computerized, and record a lot of information every night. I learned today that my risk level has continued to rise. That being said, lets talk about your situation and I will share what I know when it comes to sleep etiquette.
It is part of what I have been taught in my years of working with sleep doctors. it is an amazing field of medicine that is growing like a weed.
Sleep etiquette consists of several do's and don'ts abput what happens in the bedroom, as well as what to do before bedtime and what not to do.
Do not: drink liquids, especially caffeine or alcohol from after dinner and time for bed. they both interrupt your sleep and make you need to get up to go the bathroom during the night.
Do not: Watch TV, play videos, or do anything except for sleep and have sex in bed. This may be the hardest one.
Do not: skip sleep one day and try to catch up the next. Once the sleep is lost it cannot be made up for. Go to bed and get up at the same time each morning and night. Find the right number of hours you need to feel rested the next day and stick to that number. Both too little and too much sleep can get your system messed up.
Do: Make a habit of opening your drapes or blinds every morning and night. If you are gone all day , it matters less, but if you are home all day, it is important. Getting the proper exposure to light can be important in keeping your sleep in balance.
So the first step in getting better sleep without the illusions and disturbances is focusing on your sleep quality. If you have suffered with insomnia as well for years, these steps should ease you into a better balance of sleep and wake.
With the medications I use, I also get very wild and wonderful dreams. just crazy stuff that I love to have. Mind have their own story line with their own characters. They go way back, and can come and go, nightly following the same story. I happen to love mine, but they can be less that enjoyable at times.
I imagine the illusions come from a combination of the things you are doing in the day, and can be helped by trying these techniques. Once you have given them a good shot and you are still having sleep issues, I would see a sleep speculate to have it checked out.. I recommend you do these things first, because he will likely suggest them too, and if you are already done, you a ahead of the race.
When you start this a sleep log. A little book that you keep at your bedside where you can keep ny notes about your nights sleep. you daytime attitude, tiredness, etc. This will also help the doc to see if there are any clues or patterns to go on.
If you want to do some reading on the subject, I would search for sleep etiquette, as a topic. The older we get the more important I am to have good sleep on my side.
Sorry it got kind of long, but it is quite a topic of interest to me.
