Feeling somebody sit down on my bed at night..

[Tigress941]

It has happened three or four times now over the past couple of months. I'll be laying in bed trying to drift off (which takes a while sometimes, so I'm still awake when it happens) and I can feel, as clear as day, somebody sitting down on the bed either next to me or at the bottom.

Suffice to say it does nothing for helping me drift off! Obviously when I look, there's nobody there.

Has anybody else experienced this? Is it some sort of sleep paralysis? I'm generally not a believer of anything 'woo' but I'd be lying if i said it hadn't crossed my mind.

NC incase I sound like a nutcase 🙃

I used to get it a lot, it's sleep paralysis. Got to the point were I was no longer scared and kind of resigned to it. Usually happened when I was stressed or sleep deprived.
Since I retired it's almost disappeared, less stressful life and if I have a late night I don't have to get out of bed at 6am anymore.

I used to get this while I was in my late teens. We'd not long moved to a house where an old lady had died and I was absolutely convinced my bedroom (her old bedroom) was haunted by her. I could feel her presence, she would sit on my bed and pull the duvet down. I would try to scream to scare her away but I was completely unable to move or make a sound. It was horrible. Then one day it just stopped. It was decades later that I heard about sleep paralysis - I wish I had known about it at the time!

Don't read this thread before bed. It gave me nightmares last night!

I feel someone brush past my feet as I'm waking up. However only in my old bed. I sleep half the week in another house but it never happened there. I swear I'm awake too. All very weird. I did a few times in the past feel someone pushing a finger into my back when fully awake, standing up and talking to people. That was weird. I had to rub the spot after too a few times. It never feels threatening

Am probably on the wrong wavelength but I have been in our kitchen and have seen a shadow walk from sitting room and disappears upstairs.At least 3 times. Also a mirror in our lounge rolled off mantle piece avoiding pics and crashed to the floor taking out woodwork!
Yesterday a pic in my bedroom went crashing to the floor. I was in Kitchen and thought the wardrobe had collapsed…it was so loud and my neighbour called round thinking I had fallen down the stairs..it was crazy!! Am absolutely not a woo woo person but it has unsettled me TBH !

When you are in that state between sleep and waking people are prone to hallucinate - or dream really - it's a milder form of dreaming. If you are falling asleep it's called hypnagogic hallucinations. If you google it there is lot written about it like this -

https://www.sleepfoundation.org/how-sleep-works/hypnopompic-hallucinations

It's the same thing that makes people believe they heard someone say something in that state when there is no one there.

Don’t read my post 😂

When something has given me the willies I welcome it in the house (sounds batshit I know), the action of doing that seems to lessen the anxiety sufficiently to make it stop.

When I was a child I used to wake up and see a human sized statue of Mary praying over me. Scared the shite out of me at the time as I couldn't move, but it passed. I learned to tell myself it wasn't real (in my paralysed state) after a while and it worked.

No, that's not it.
If you've ever had it happen, you'd know.

@Itsokish I think I could cope with that better than being crushed in my sleep 😅

Hypnogogic and hypnopompic hallucinations.

When you're brain is going to sleep but not quite there. Body starts become paralysed ( which it usual is in sleep) and the altered state of consciousness plays tricks on you..

It what happens when you wake up from a dream feeling you are falling but can't move too, that frozen moment of terror.

I used to get sleep paralysis quite a lot. Normally in the form of something (an old woman) pressing down on my chest. And I’d try and try and wake up but couldn’t. Often I’d think I’d woken and start to go about my day and realise I was still asleep and try again to wake. I’d try to scream but I couldn’t .

It is awful. When I was younger I had no idea what it was. I was relieved to find out about the old hag (though glad I didn’t live in older day times - I’d be burnt at the stake!).

I used to get it when I’d be having a lie in (that doesn’t happen anymore!!)

I think stress doesn’t help either so maybe something relaxing before med would help? And try not to worry - there is a scientific explanation!.