First Sleep Paralysis Episode... Felt Like I Was Dying Slowly!

by Phil
(Rochester, NY)

It's interesting that I ended up in this website, and decided to share my story, because it just happened to me for the first time, no more than 20 minutes ago. It all was really weird but in a way, even going through such a hard time, I was being able to have some interesting thoughts. Everything is so vivid in my mind right now that I need to share it before it starts vanishing.

So before my story I'll give you some background that I think might have caused my sleep paralysis. I'm staying at a friend's house for the weekend and her brother is letting me sleep in his bed. However, my friend told me she hated this room because there was a ghost in it and she and her brother had seen and experienced some strange things in the past. I got really exited about it because I've always been attracted by those kind of stories.

Having said that, tonight I went to bed after having a few drinks, and for some reason before falling asleep I started thinking about said ghost, and one of my thoughts right after was "dammit, I'm calling it, I better stop thinking about it". The interesting part of this is that I was facing down (that's how I usually sleep more comfortable) and I woke up facing up. So the "dream" starts with me feeling like I can't breath, so I open my eyes and I see I'm facing down but with my head out of the bed (kind of like the "The Nightmare" painting) and when I tried to move back into the bed I realize I couldn't, I wasn't able to move a muscle. Then I started struggling way more, I couldn't breathe and I was choking, my vision was going blurry and sometimes I was only able to see the window next to the bed. I started thinking that it might be the ghost, but since I was facing down I couldn't see anything, so I was trying to scream "let me fucking see you" but of course words wouldn't come out of my mouth.

That's when I started panicking and tried to scream. I failed, so I started fighting it. I was trying so, so hard to move and slowly I started to be able to move one arm, then one leg and ended up facing up, all of this battle without being able to breathe. When I was finally facing up, hardly moving, not able to scream and choking, I started to make some noises with my mouth, those same noises you make when you're trying to take one last breathe before finally dying. So with my blurry vision I saw the light from the hall went on and my friend was screaming my name, then she entered the room and touched me. At that moment I was able to move rapidly and grab her arm, but the rest of my body was still paralyzed and I couldn't breathe yet, so I moved again and then my friend was gone, looking for help or something because I could hear her downstairs talking to someone. However I was still choking but suddenly I was able to move one of my legs and I finally woke up.

What I find terrifying is that when I woke up my body was completely calm, my heartbeat was totally normal and I was not even sweating (I've had terrible nightmares before and I would wake up soaked and with my heart about to explode) so I started thinking about what had just happened. Of course I was thinking about the ghost and because of that I wasn't able to go back to sleep. So I remembered I had read about SP before and decided to look for some info, which lead me to this site. After reading a few articles and stories I decided to share mine, because I can't fall back asleep anyway.

I have never felt so close to death. It was the worst thing ever.