Sleep Paralysis - Another Attack

This is another account of an attack I experienced in my late teens. Each attack would compound the fear of the last until I got to the point of fearing sleep.

Another Attack

I found that through my teens I would be plagued by these night terrors. When I tried to explain them to my parents or my brothers they would just smile sympathetically and tell me that it would settle down and that they were 'just bad dreams'. Nobody understood the sheer anxiety I felt at the idea of going to bed at night and most certainly not my new irrational fear of the dark (which I still suffer from to a lesser extent).

After my first experience, I would insist on my mum leaving the bathroom light on when she herself was going to sleep so that should I wake there would be light to illuminate my room. Even though my mum sat awake most nights until the wee small hours, and sometimes approaching dawn, there were rare occasions that she would be tired and be asleep herself shortly after the last of my brothers had arrived home from working their shift in the local hotel.

This particular night, I would later realise, would be the first time that I would be able to identify strangeness BEFORE going to sleep. Something that I could take note of that I experienced on those nights I would suffer terrors that subsequently always lead to SP upon awakening.

An hour or so before going to bed my hearing would start to zone in and out. The sounds heard in my right ear would dull down for a while before heightening. I would hear subtle sounds so loud that the sound of them would drive me crazy. For example, I would be sitting in the living room, which was situated next to the kitchen, when the sound in my right ear would dull right down for a few moments before feeling like someone had cranked the volume right up to 100 in that ear. I could hear the hum of the fridge in the kitchen and it sounded unbearably loud. I would ask those in the room with me if they too could hear it and they would look at me in bewilderment saying they heard nothing. My mum suggested that I could be developing an ear infection and on those times she would do the motherly thing and put olive oil on a piece of cotton wool and plug my ear with it.

It wouldn't be until a year or so later that the significance of this would become apparent. The fact that there were others who experienced the same thing before instances of SP and had documented this in books, blogs, and forums was reassuring to me. I felt normal-ish, it felt good that I wasn't losing my mind.

The heightened sounds eventually dulled that night from a low hum, to almost a vibration sensation resonating in my ear. It hadn't gone away by the time I was going to bed, but it had dulled enough to let me sleep. I'd had a bath, got into my PJ's and curled up with my teddy bear (don't judge lol, it was a source of comfort and I did keep one up until I moved in with my husband). It's funny, since I was a kid, I rarely remembered my dreams. I would wake up as if I'd been switched off at bedtime and reactivated the next morning and no matter how much sleep I got I always woke tired. The only dreams I remembered and not just through a fuzzy haze, but with absolute clarity, were my nightmares and my SP experiences.

In my dream that night I was in a hut, something like the one in the image below. I was wearing blue jeans, generic trainers, and my long hair was tied up in a ponytail. I knew I had a white sleeveless top on with a pocket on the breast pocket even though I couldn't really see it as I was strangely wearing a white lab coat over it. The coat was a little too big for me and I'd had the sleeves rolled up to fit me better. The reason I am going into so much detail is to highlight just how aware I was and how it was so vivid that even now some twenty tears later I still remember it as clear as day.

(The cabin looked like this minus the bars on the windows. There had been only one window on the left of the door and it was a larger window with shatterproof, unbreakable perspex. The cabin was raised off the ground just enough that there were four steel steps up to the door.)

Inside the cabin was a wood and metal table with an old-style school chair pushed in. On the table was a bowl sat upon weighing scales and it held something that was glowing. I remember looking out the window to see that there was an identical cabin just facing the one I was in but it was roughly thirty feet or so away. The two cabins were surrounded by a metal eight-foot fence that had signs on them that I could not read. In the cabin facing me was my brother, he was wearing the same white lab coat and he was beckoning me to him.

I don't know why, but I felt to go to him I had to bring the glowing light with me, so I lifted it in my hand and placed it in my right pocket. I kept my hand in there holding it as I pulled the door open and exited the cabin. Stepping down to the ground I began to walk towards the cabin my brother was in, I'd gotten near halfway when I glanced up to smile at my brother only to see he was yelling. The cabins were soundproof so I could not hear him but I could see the panic on his face and he was banging on the window with his fists, his face red from his exertions. I remember frowning, confused as to why he would be acting like that as I knew the cabin I left was empty and that there were only my brother and myself there. I watched as he turned away from the window only to return seconds later bringing the chair violently against it in an attempt to break it.

It was at this point, and while walking in his direction still, I turned to see what he was so frantic about. This all seemed to happen in slow motion from this point on for me. I turned, the last thing I saw was the handle of the door belonging to the cabin my brother was in being tugged as if he was trying to open the door. He had just returned to the window once more as I glanced over my shoulder back towards the cabin I had come from. To my horror, there standing at the window in the cabin I came from was The Hooded Guy. He was just standing there and even though I couldn't see his face, I could tell he was watching my brother's frantic vain efforts to break the window. His head then slowly turned and he was looking at me. I could see the door was open and it had been wedged open with the chair.

I knew then that the reason my brother could not open the door to his cabin was that the cabins had a security system. For his door to open, mine had to be closed. I turned back to my brother's cabin and tried to run, but the harder I tried the slower I seemed to move, yet when I glanced behind me The Hooded Guy was slowly exiting the cabin I had been in and was moving unhindered and at a normal speed. The fear washed over me and I began to drown in panic. I knew it wasn't real, I knew I was dreaming, but I could not shake myself out of it.

I glanced up at my brother, he was crying, his fists slamming repeatedly of the window, blood smeared on it as he had hurt his hands in his attempts to break it. Then he stopped, just briefly before his eyes grew wider and he began once again, more frantic than before in his attempts to get to me. He appeared to be yelling, anger, fear, and panic on his face, a strange mix of emotions. I was so close now, so near his cabin that only a few more steps would have me there at the door. I glanced back just in time to see the arm raised, a large blade in a black-gloved hand raised above my head about to strike down. . .

And then I woke.

I was in my bed, lying on my back with my legs straight, toes pointed, arms by my side and hands fisted. My body poker straight, I could not move. The fear I felt in my nightmare was nothing compared to this. Why? Because the nightmare had ended, it had been a dream, this was reality and I could not move. Then I heard the whispers.

The only thing I could move was my eyes and I strained to look around the room, it was then I saw the figure of a person in the corner by the wardrobe. The room was dark, the only light was from the bathroom at the end of the hall. It did not light my room, rather it gently lit the part of the room my bed was in, where the thing was standing was in shadow but I knew it was there as the figure was blacker than the shadows themselves. Then, knowing I had seen it the red eyes appeared.

I tried so hard to scream that night, but there was no sound. I tried to move but the harder I tried the more restricted I felt. I remember closing my eyes tightly shut to see if I could make it go away, but when I opened my eyes not only was it still there but it was closer to the side of the bed. Tears now fell freely from my eyes and down the side of my face as fear robbed me of all I had.

I could hear my mum in her room talking to my dad. I could hear her telling him off for something he had done during the day that had annoyed her, and his laugh as he joked about it. Then, just like my first experience, I could hear this ungodly scream. It took seconds for me to realise it was me, I was making the sound. The hall was flooded with light as my parents came rushing out of their bedroom and into mine. My mum scooped me up in her arms and kept telling me it was ok. It was a bad dream. My dad stood just behind her looking worried and there, standing by his side was The Hooded Guy. My eyes grew wide and I began to sob. It turned and looked at my dad, then back to me before stepping back into the shadows, blending into the wall and disappearing. It was only then that I could move and I clung to my mum.

At the age of 15 for the first time since I was a child, I slept in my parents' room at the foot of their bed. My dad wanted to sleep in my room but I was so afraid that HE would get him that my dad stayed where he was, where I felt he was safer.

It was a horrific experience and it was then I realised that they could not see him, only I could and I thought I was losing my mind. It was just days after that I began my research into sleep disorders and discovered stories like mine. There where those who studied it called it a disorder and something that could be easily explained, while those who experienced it called it Sleep Paralysis and then knew it was not normal, not easily explained and most certainly something to be feared.

#SleepParaylsis #Nightmare #HoodedGuy #SP #Paranormal #SleepDisorder