[scrollaway]

I used to lucid dream pretty naturally, then stopped because I started getting very regular sleep paralysis.

Nowadays when I do end up lucid dreaming (most often by accident) I notice a fairly significant drop in sleep quality.

Even worse, I sometimes lucid dream, then "awaken" into another dream where I'm not lucid and those experiences really fuck with me.

On a different note I'd love to get a high quality sleep-tracking night mask. Most of the "smart" ones I know of have awful battery life. I don't want another device to charge every few days.

[bencollier49]

Learning to lucid dream is basically giving yourself a sleep disorder on purpose. Having done this deliberately in the past and had some fairly wacky side-effects, I think it's worth people considering the negatives if they style trying to induce lucidity.

[bloomthrowaway]

I could believe it ruins sleep quality definitely. Even with experience it's hard to keep your mind from fully waking during periods of lucidity. I've managed to go an hour or two many times but it invariably ends with me waking at a random time in the middle of the night

[daenz]

Anecdotally I tried for a few weeks to lucid dream and had success a few times, but both mornings after the lucid dreams I felt absolutely exhausted.

[clankfan]

What side-effects did you experience?

[apo]

Having done this deliberately in the past and had some fairly wacky side-effects

Such as?

[vokep]

False memories are one which many have experienced, as well as mentioned above, increased chance of sleep paralysis. Increased SP doesn't seem so bad, just maybe inconvenient. Building up more and more false memories doesn't seem like a great idea.

[ptrincr]

Thanks for sharing your experience. Can I ask how you found your sleep paralysis encounters? (for want of a better word).

Personally I've found them deeply disturbing. Throughout my life I have experienced moments of sleep paralysis at most on 10 occasions. They've left a big impact though, and I sympathize with anyone who has the misfortune of feeling as though you are trapped and unable to move.

After watching the film "Waking life" I spent a long time thinking about lucid dreaming and perhaps maybe had 1 or 2 myself. I had never connected the two however, definitely food for thought.

[grawprog]

I used to get sleep paralysis a lot when I was younger. It could be fairly terrifying sometimes. I remember the scariest i was probably as a teenager lying on my stomach while it felt like someone eas holding me down with the blankets. The first one i remember i was pretty young. My brother and me still shared a room and had bunk beds. I remember waking up one morning and watched a giant spider crossing the ladder towards my face and freaking out but not being able to move or yell or anything. Then suddenly I could and the spider was gone.

When I actually learned what it was I tried lucid dreaming and stuff with it. But, I always find the feeling uncomfortable. I don't like not being able to move or do anything while your dreams mix with your bedroom.

It doesn't happen so much now. Every once in a while if I wake up in the morning and go back to sleep, the second time I wake up it'll happen. I don't tend to sleep in any more and once i'm awake I get up.

I don't know if it's related but i've always had problems sleeping. When I was young I was scared to sleep, even as a baby i didn't sleep well. I can usually fall asleep alright now but the slightest noise in the night wakes me up and I still feel wary about losing conciousness.

[barbs]

I'm not the parent but I experience sleep paralysis fairly regularly - maybe once or twice a month. It's happened enough times that I can usually recognise it and can either try to wake myself up or wait until I go back to sleep, so it's not particularly scary. It depends though - if I get sleep paralysis coming out of a nightmare it can be fairly uncomfortable, but not much more than if I were to have just the nightmare on its own. Probably the worst part is the embarrassment of someone witnessing me thrashing around trying to wake up or hearing me moan in my sleep.

[jjeaff]

Have you ever been checked for sleep apnea? Sleep paralysis is a common symptom.

[jjeaff]

I've always had trouble with false memories. Not of anything important, but I sometimes dream of very mundane things, like moving my wallet or keys. Or telling someone something.

Makes it very difficult to keep track of things.

[tacon]

I used to have regular hypnogogia, and I often imagined that monsters were coming to steal my wallet and keys from my bedside. Those items started "moving" during the night, to under the mattress, or into blankets in the closet, so "they" wouldn't find them. It is genetic for me, as my mother had some similar experiences. I only happened to learn it was a "thing with a name" because I was dancing Argentine tango with a postdoc sleep researcher, and we got to talking. Oddly enough, her suggested solution worked perfectly - a night light. It is a very long story.

[garfieldnate]

Would love to hear this very long story!

[UlisesAC4]

That is why you keep a dream journal. To understand what is real and what is not in the long run.

[travbrack]

I used to read lucid dreaming forums. A lot of people complain that their sleep becomes less restful, the more they lucid dream. Also that it becomes impossible to have a night without lucid dreams once you get enough experience, so you can't catch a break.

[eof]

I experienced this for years, but it never seemed to actually affect "rest". I'd have multiple intense dreams per night, waking up often between them. But not feeling sleep deprived at all, if anything the opposite. However i was also in my early 20s so maybe it would be harder now.

[flatline]

I used to lucid dream all the time as a kid, it just happened naturally, and never left me tired. It mostly stopped and in my 20s I tried some exercises to induce lucid dreams. My experience was like a restless night of sleep after studying late for a big test the next morning. Because, there was something I was supposed to be remembering, instead of just sleeping soundly.

So I think lucid dreaming is not necessarily a problem in itself but forcefully training yourself to do it can be rough going.

[ModernMech]

> I started getting very regular sleep paralysis.

I do not blame you. I've experienced sleep paralysis more than once, and it is not pleasant at all. I remember trying to scream at the top of my lungs in my head for... I don't know how long but my perception of it was that it was for hours on end. Then all of a sudden something broke through, and I woke my wife up with the loudest scream she's ever heard out of anyone.

Took a while for me to sleep again after that.

[knicholes]

Coming from a religious background, I believed that I was being possessed to explain the lack of control over my body. I even hallucinated an "evil" "form" coming towards me before my body locked up and I felt tingles. So ~weird~ terrifying being able to scream without your body doing anything.

[scrollaway]

Sleep paralysis is mortifying if you don't know what you're dealing with. I can completely understand how that's been the source of many people believing in possessions over the centuries.

Most of my paralysis episodes didn't involve the "evil presence" people often talk about. That is, until a recent one less than a year ago, where I woke up with a giant "invisible" spider on my chest

It's terrifying to be in this state of mind where you know what's happening, but you also really, really feel that presence. I wonder if this is similar to what schizophrenic patients feel.

[ryall]

Yeah I just had one of these a couple of weeks ago. Lying on my side and could feel an evil presence behind me, but couldn't move my body at all, even though I was (or at least believed I was) fully awake. Not fun.

[noir_lord]

When I had massive dental problems a few years ago I was taking codeine 60mg and an over the counter sleep aid (which it turns out is a potentiator for codeine).

I had the worst sleep paralysis I've ever had, I was laid facing the wall with the light and I would have sworn there was absolute evil behind me, it was frankly terrifying.

It broke suddenly and I kept out of bed and shot out the room, took me about 15 minutes for heart rate to come down.

I don't scare easily and I'm a life long atheist but I can see how if you where raised religious you'd assume it was whatever evil presence your religion has.

[zormino]

Seeing figures and humanoid shapes when experiencing sleep paralysis isn't uncommon. I've never seen them myself, I just get a progressively louder ringing noise in my head until it feels like my head is going to blow up. I was always able to break out eventually, but it's terrifying. You can't move and are in pain. The only way I could get out was to find one finger or toe I could wiggle a tiny bit, then keep doing that until my body started to slowly come back to life. It takes some time but eventually you hit a threshold and you come back online pretty fast. It doesn't happen often, but when it does it takes me 2-3 tried to fall alseep as it happens consecutively.

[AznHisoka]

" find one finger or toe I could wiggle a tiny bit"

Do you know for sure that it actually wiggles? Because that's what I tried doing once, and my wife told me that my entire body was still and I just woke up all of a sudden.

[ptrincr]

I've had sleep paralysis but never had the feeling of the presence. I just know I'm stuck. As if some kind of force has frozen my whole body. The first few occasions it is extremely scary, I think after that you know what is happening but it is still very disconcerting.

[crehn]

It's not a fun experience.

A year or so ago, I woke up during the night and felt tingling in my feet. The tingling kept increasing in intensity and seemed to slowly rise along my limbs. A few seconds later, I suddenly heard someone shout with an aggressive but soft voice next to my ear, and felt eerily realistic hands grab my arms and vigorously scratch my right palm. In absolute terror, I remember trying to scream and shake it off, but I couldn't move. And it felt so real. A few seconds later I managed to snap off the paralysis, and rocketed out of my bed. I didn't sleep that night.

[danharaj]

I've woken up others the same way. At some point I learned to recognize sleep paralysis and just wait it out. It's still unpleasant though, I get sensations like needles pricking my skin all over.

[jrockway]

This happens to me every so often. The worst is the feeling of not being able to breathe, but it's happened to me enough that I figure my body will take care of oxygenating itself if necessary.

Once you come to terms with the fact that sleep paralysis is a thing, I think it's just another interesting mental experience. The lack of control is also kind of fun. Who knows what's going to happen next? But you probably won't die. Not the worst thing in the world.