I started experiencing sleep paralysis about four years ago. I also had the experience of waking, but being unable to move or speak, and had the feeling that this was connected with what seemed to be the presence of some entity which was in the room with me. It happened several times over the period of a week and freaked me out so much that I decided to sleep at a friend's house for a few days (I lived alone in an apartment that had a ghost and I thought that it might be related. I still don't know.) Since then, it's happened to me about ten times. I've given it a lot of thought and last night I started doing some research on the internet (since it happened to me again yesterday), so I'll share with you some of my thoughts and some what I found in my perusing of the internet (which was how I found your post.)

My research hasn't gotten too in-depth, since I've only been doing it for a couple of days, but the scientific articles I've read generally theorize that it's triggered by stress or sleep deprivation, and that it's simply a malfunction of the very complex, hormonally-controlled process of going in and out of the sleeping state. That seems perfectly logical and probable to me. They mention universal symptoms--inability to move or cry out, the feeling of a tremendous weight on your chest (which I personally have never experienced), and hallucinations. But all of these science-rooted articles said that the true cause was unknown. I also found an article that suggested that sleep paralysis was an attack by a "psychic vampire"--a person who is very sick or a spirit who wants to stay around on earth so they come to steal your life energy and accomplishes it by mingling its aura with yours. They may or may not know they are doing it. This is why you feel so tired and unable to remain awake after the incident. As sapped as the experience makes me feel (I've been sleeping more than I've been awake since yesterday afternoon), I could believe that too.

That's what I've found in my research. These are some of the observations I've made of my experience with this over the past couple of years:

The friend I went to stay with when I first started experiencing the sleep paralysis initially thought I was totally delusional, but she was a good friend, so she let me stay and didn't ridicule me. This was until she had a sleep paralysis experience of her own where she woke up, couldn't move and felt the presence of something else in the room that she felt threatened by. She and I have two things in common which have influence over each of our lives. We are both psychically gifted and we are both hypoglycemic. Every time I've had an episode of sleep paralysis, it has been when my blood sugar was low. It would be easy to write the whole thing off to just this physical problem, because during a hypoglycemic episode, you are a mental mess. But, the thing is, I have experienced sleep paralysis when I didn't feel a threatening presence in the room. This evening, I had an episode where I woke up and couldn't move, and I was aware of other entities around in my room, but they were just there. They had no interest in me. And I wasn't terrified. Just annoyed that I couldn't move. One of the people who responded to your post mentioned that we are more psychically attuned during this time. I agree with this.

The scientific articles listed hallucinations as one of the symptoms of sleep paralysis, suggesting that this whole threatening spirit thing is all in your head. Could be, but I look at it this way--I've had hallucinations. They were induced by extreme sleep deprivation and drugs. I knew at the time they were hallucinations. I've seen some wacky stuff, but it was easy to look at it and tell myself that it wasn't real--and it was easy to believe it. That's not the case with the things I see and feel during a sleep paralysis episode.

In Western cultures, we tend to think of the mind and body as separate things. (An aside--this may or may not be significant, but another friend of mine was told in a class that sleep paralysis only happens to those in Western cultures. I haven't been found anything that verifies or refutes this.) But I think the mind/spirit and body are very closely related, if not the same. During a hypoglycemic episode, my good intuition totally evaporates. Perhaps when we are physically at a low ebb, (due to stress, sleep deprivation, or any other condition that drains us physically) the life energy that is a part of our bodies and spirits also wanes, leaving us more vulnerable to an attack by something that would take advantage of us in this state for its own ends.

On the other hand, a couple of the articles I read suggested that these spirits hadn't come to harm us at all. We just interpreted it that way. Often these spirits were trying to reassure and calm the person experiencing the sleep parylisis. Think about it this way: When we're confronted with something so foreign to all of our past experiences, our "fight or flight" response kicks in. But when you can't move, you can't do either. So of course you would be terrified. Yesterday, the spirit that was associated with my sleep paralysis said "Do you trust me?" to me several times and when I decided to really look at him, I percieved only the beauty and good energy I've come to associate with positive psychic experiences. However, since I'm not experienced with this sort of thing, I'm not about to invite him in. Bad spirits are known to be tricky.

So my advice to you is to take care of yourself, eat right, get enough sleep, get fresh air and exercise, don't let things stress you out, don't drink coffee before bed, and, if it makes you feel better, learn to set your psychic shields.

Take care,
Dianne