Conference hydra::dejavu

    
    Cherie,
    
     Although my description might vary slightly from yours it sounds
    like a similar experiance I've had recently.
     It happened to me in the morning around 8:00 a.m. This is sleeping
    late for me because I have three (extremely) active boys all under
    the age of twelve. It was a saturday and I had been awake and out
    of bed earlier. Mostly to supervise the "sacking" of the cabinets
    and refrigerator by aforementioned boys. I went back to bed and
    slipped  into dreamsleep (REM). About an hour and a half later
    I started to wake up only I could feel this incredible physical
    fatigue. Not necessarily the pressure you mentioned but fighting
    it was difficult. I could open my eyes but the light hurt a lot.
    I also sat up but only with great effort. I also recall feeling
    the urge to slip back into dreamsleep. A very strong urge I might
    add. I would have attributed all the above to a strange dream except
    at one point I distinctly remember hearing my wife in the kitchen telling
    the kids they couldn't play Nintendo, (bless her). What I finally
    did was to drift back to sleep. A light and brief sleep then I woke
    up with a complete memory of the experiance. That alone is unusual
    for me as I have great difficulty remembering a dream in detail.
    
     I don't know what causes it but I suspect it is some sort of lighter
    stage of REM. It's intriguing in retrospect although I do remember
    feeling very frustrated at the time it was happening. My wife has
    stated that she's had similar experiances but mostly  the
    sensitivity to light, not fatigue. She has done pretty much the
    same as I did to get out of it. Just fell back to sleep. 
    
     There are two points that I find interesting. The first being the
    feeling of great fatigue. This was a saturday morning and as I
    mentioned sleeping past 7:30 on any morning is oversleeping for
    me. I wasn't especially tired from the night before and had more
    than enough sleep. The second point was the fact that I could slip
    back into dreamsleep so easily. That's assuming I was actually out
    of REM at the time.   
            
    
    Rob
    

    re: .0
    
    Would you please list the number of the "Hag..." note?  I remember
    reading it, but can't find it.
    
    You say that you wake up "...after a while."  About how long is
    that stretch of time?
    
    re: .0,.1
    
    I think that you're both waking up too soon.  During REM or rapid eye
    movement sleep the muscles are immobilized, because the nerves that
    control them are chemically blocked.  This paralysis happens to all
    of us at intervals whenever we sleep, but we're not usually aware of
    it.  Trying to force oneself to move apparently results in great
    fatigue.  Oliver Fox in his book "Astral Projection" has an excellent
    description of his experiences while in this state.  I'll try to put
    in that material tomorrow.
    
    Virginia
    
    
    

    Hi, Cherie Dery! Guess who?
    
    Seriously, I had the same type of thing happen to me only this last
    weekend, too. I was lying in bed (daytime also) and my husband and baby
    were downstairs. I fell asleep and woke up because I heard the baby in
    his crib next to my bed. Thinking my husband had come in while I was
    asleep and lain the baby down I attempted to open my eyes and see to
    the baby, and I couldn't open them or move! 
      I tried for about a minute and then just lay back in exhaustion, when
    my husband came in with the baby asleep, he was going to lay him down.
    
    I thought it was almost a precognitive thing, I "dreamed" his coming up
    with the baby, and the baby in his crib only minutes before it
    happened. Naturally, this is an ordinary occurrence, but usually if the 
    baby falls asleep downstairs, we let him sleep in his playpen, this was 
    out-of-the-ordinary for us.
    
    Weird, huh?
    
    See you tomorrow,
    
    Marilyn

    
    Re:  .2
    
    I did a dir/title and didn't find a "hag..." note, so I think
    I read about the hag as replies in a different topic, maybe about
    dreaming?  I'll check it out for you and let you know where the
    hag references are, if I remember correctly it was in one of the
    earliest notes in this file.
    
    Cherie
    

    
    re: 2 (again)
    
    I don't think the time between "waking up" and actually being 
    able to open my eyes is very long, maybe a minute or two.  I'll
    "wake up", realize I can't move or open my eyes, panic, then keep
    saying to myself "relax, try to open your eyes again" a few times
    then I'll open them.
    
    It's weird, but I'm glad someone else experiences this type of
    thing, too!
    
    The hag is referenced in note 107.  I know I've read more about it
    somewhere in here but I can't locate the note.
    
    Cherie

    re: .4,.5
    
    Thanks for the information - I enjoyed rereading note 107.  I was
    interested, too, in the duration of your entire nap.  If it was about
    seven minutes long, you were probably in stage 1 sleep, which is 
    characterized by slowly drifting eye movements (SEMs), variable muscle
    tone which can extend into complete paralysis and, possibly, hynogogic
    imagery.
    
    re: .2
    
    One of the reasons why you were able to slip back into "dreamsleep
    [REM]" so easily may have been because you slept so long.  The first
    period of REM sleep occurs about 90 minutes after you fall asleep,
    and it lasts for 5-10 minutes but, eventually, the REM periods last
    30 minutes or more.  As the REM periods increase, the time between 
    them decreases.  The original 90 minute interval drops to 20-30
    minutes.  If you get 7 hours of sleep, fifty percent of your dream-
    time will occur in the last two hours and, if you can sleep for an
    additional hour, that hour will be almost all dreaming time.  
    
    Another possibility is that when you returned to sleep about 8:00 
    a.m, you entered into stage 1 sleep, rather than reentering directly
    into a later stage of REM.  That could explain the ensuing 90 minute
    interval, but then you would have had to have mistaken hypnogogic 
    imagery for dream imagery - which is unlikely, because they're very
    different.
    
    And, as mentioned in note 107, dreams can occur outside of the usual
    REM periods.
    
    Virginia
    

    Here's the material by Oliver Fox (pen name of Hugh Calloway)
    mentioned in reply .2.  In 1902 Oliver Fox had discovered for him-
    self what we now call "lucid dreaming."  He says, "This new kind of
    dream I named a Dream of Knowledge; for one had in it the *knowledge*
    that one was really dreaming."  He found that if he deliberately pro-
    longed the dream state, he could experience what we now call "OBEs" 
    or out-of-the-body experiences.  But he was hampered by a pain that 
    occurred in his head when he attempted to stay "out" instead of waking
    up.  He also experienced dual consciousness at this time.  He was in 
    the dream and in his bedroom simultaneously.  One day he decided to 
    disregard the pain and had "a never-to-be-forgotten adventure."
         
          I dreamed that I was walking by the water on the Western Shore.
    It was morning; the sky a light blue; the foam-flecked waves were
    greenish in the sunshine.  I forget just how it happened, but some-
    thing told me that I was dreaming.  I decided to prolong the dream and
    continued my walk, the scenery now appearing extraordinarily vivid and
    clear.  Very soon my body began to draw me back.  I experienced dual
    consciousness:  I could feel myself lying in bed and walking by the sea
    at the same time.  Moreover, I could dimly see the objects in my bed-
    room, as well as the dream-scenery.  I willed to continue dreaming.  A
    battle ensued; now my bedroom became visible and the shore-scene dim.
    My will triumphed.  I lost the sense of dual consciousness.  My bedroom
    faded altogether from my vision, and I was out on the shore, feeling
    indescribably free and elated.  Soon my body began to call again, and
    at the same time I became aware of [the] pain...[which] gradually in-
    creased, reached a climax, and then, to my delight, suddenly ceased.
    As the pain vanished, something seemed to "click" in my brain.  I had
    won the battle.  My body pulled no longer, and I was free.
    
           I continued my walk, revelling in the beauty of the morning and
    my sense of freedom.  ....but presently it occurred to me that I ought
    to be getting back to my body.  I had to be at the College by nine
    o'clock, and I had no idea what the actual earth-time was, except that
    it was probably morning.  I therefore willed to end the dream and to 
    awake.  To my great surprise nothing happened.  It was as though a man
    actually wide awake willed to awake.  It seemed to me that I could not
    be more awake than I was.  My reason told me that the apparently solid
    shore and sunlit waves were not the physical land and sea; that my body
    was lying in bed, half a mile away at Forest View; but I could not feel
    the *truth* of this.  I seemed to be completely severed from that phys-
    ical body....
    
           I began to feel terribly lonely.  This experience was quite new
    to me: always before I had been able to wake when I cared to will it -
    indeed, the trouble had been that I woke too easily.... Desperately I
    willed to wake - again and again, until a climax was reached. Some-
    thing seemed to snap.  Again I had that queer sensation of a "click"
    within my brain.  I was awake now - yes, but completely paralyzed!  I
    could not open my eyes.  I could not speak.  I could not move a muscle.
    I had a slight sense of daylight shining through my eyelids, and I
    could distinctly hear the clock ticking and my grandfather moving about
    in the adjoining room.  
    
           ...It seemed to me imperative that I should remain as calm as
    possible.  To this end I mentally repeated the Binomial Theorem and
    several other mathematical formulae.  I then concentrated on willing
    my body as a whole to move.  The result was an absolute failure.  I
    was feeling more frightened now, but I managed to keep fairly calm.
    Then I had an inspiration.  I would devote all my mental energy to
    raising just my little finger.  I succeeded.  The third and middle
    fingers followed.  I was then able to move my whole hand - the right
    one.  Then I managed to raise my arm above my head and to grip the
    bed-rail.  I was still blind, and the rest of my body seemed made of 
    iron.  Willing steadily to rise, I tugged and tugged at the bed-rail.
    At first without success, and then quite suddenly the trance was bro-
    ken.  In an instant my eyes were open to the light, and my body was
    sitting up.  Joyfully I sprang out of bed, then staggered and had to
    lean against the post.  For a few moments I was prey to deathly sick-
    ness and feared that I would faint, but I speedily recovered.  It was
    eight o'clock, so I had to hurry to get to College in time.  I felt 
    rather unwell and very depressed for the rest of the day, though not
    seriously inconvenienced.  About three days passed before I regained
    my normal health and spirits.  
    
          ...I now know that there was no need for me to have that painful
    struggle to break the condition.  If I had just composed my mind and
    dozed off again, my body would have been normal on waking.
    
    

    
    
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                Psychic Phenomena
Created: 22-JAN-1986 14:01         1234 topics        Updated:  4-APR-1990 18:45
          -< DEC Employee Use Only - Please read 1.* before writing >-
 Topic  Author               Date         Repl  Title
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
        BPOV06::GROSSE        1-JUN-1988  103.51  the hag
        PBSVAX::COOPER        7-JUL-1986  107.18  Murder by the Hag?
  1232   SWAM2::DERY_CH       2-APR-1990     7  Hag in the day????
    
    
    Mildly edited version of the output from:
    
    	Dir *.*/title=hag
    
    A plain
    
    	Dir/tit=hag
    
    only checks base notes (.0 notes).
    
    I know there are more "hag" references than these... but there should
    be some in the vicinity of those above...
    
    thanks
    dwp

    
    
    Re:  .7
    
    Thanks for entering that, I find it really interesting.
    
    I remember reading somewhere about this type of occurance
    happening, but instead of concentrating their energies on
    opening the eyes and waking, they let themselves, "slip back"
    into their previous state.  From what I remember (I even think
    it was a reply to a note in this file but I can't find it) the
    person started having an out of body experience, but got scared
    and willed it to stop.
    
    Any ideas about this theory?  Or is it all purely a physical
    thing and nothing more?  I was so scared the last time it happened
    to me that I now make it a point to lay on my side when I nap so
    it doesn't happen again, but I'd be interested in anyone's ideas
    about the above.
    
    Cherie

    re: .9
    
    If you went back to sleep you might have an OBE.  But, as Stephen
    LaBerge says in his book "Lucid Dreaming," an OBS or out-of-body
    sensation would be a better description of this phenomenon.  There
    is no evidence that a person who has this experience is *actually*
    out of his or her body.  LaBerge proposes that OBEs are variant 
    interpretations of lucid dreams - and that dream telepathy will pro-
    vide the basis for an explanation of the occasional accuracy of para-
    normal OBE vision.  Chapter 9, entitled "Dreaming, Illusion, and Real-
    ity" covers this topic in detail. "Lucid Dreaming" - now out in paper-
    back - is an excellent book; it presents the work being done at Stan-
    ford University Sleep Research Center, and gives enough historical 
    background to clarify the relationship between terms like "astral pro-
    jection" and OBE.
    
    In note .0 you say you feel that a tremendous weight is holding you
    down.  Do you feel the weight before or after you try to move?  If
    you try to move and *then* feel it, I wonder if this wouldn't be 
    comparable to trying to lift a dead weight, the kind of weight you
    get when someone goes limp in your arms.  Like those demonstrators
    the police are always hauling away.  During this sleep paraylsis
    the muscles that provide locomotion have no tone, so I think they'd
    be limp, but other muscles - such as those that control breathing -
    are active.  You might be straining to lift your body weight with 
    the non-paralyzed muscles.
    
    Virginia
    
    
    
    
    
     
    
      

    
    Virginia,
    
    When I "wake up" I can feel the weight holding me down, and
    I try to move but can't move or open my eyes.  It's a really
    strange sensation, I almost feel like something's on me and if
    I could open my eyes I'd see something or someone.  I'm sort of
    afraid to open my eyes but try without success.  My husband thinks
    I have an overactive imagination.....I guess you have to experience
    it to really understand the sensation.
    
    Cherie

    
    
    A friend of mine suffered from this regularly. She would be awake but could
    not open her eyes or move. She was diagnosed as having sleeping
    sickness (I think that's what it's called). She now takes medication
    and no longer suffers the syptoms. In her case it was nothing
    sinister, I believe it is something to do with some kind of
    delay in brain impulses reaching the body.
    
    

RE: .12

>    not open her eyes or move. She was diagnosed as having sleeping
>    sickness (I think that's what it's called). She now takes medication

    I suppose that is possible -- "sleeping sickness" is the common name
    applied to a number of forms of encephalitus (inflamation of the brain)
    because their obvious symptoms are drowsiness, leading to
    round-the-clock sleeping, frequently (if untreated) leading to coma and
    death.  More likely the diagnosis was "narcolepsy" which is a catchall
    for a number of forms of neurologically based "sleep" disorders --
    either abnormal sleep, or suddenly falling asleep or into a paralyzed
    state during normal waking activities.  Very roughly translated,
    "narcolepsy" means "sleep seizure".

					Topher

    Those who have had the waking-paralysis experience can probably
    empathize with this fate better than most...
    
    The recent movie, "Awakenings" is about one doctor's experience
    with a different but reminiscent phenomena.  Those cases were not the 'hag'
    experience, but were post-encephalitic conditions; the people had 
    encephalitis at an earlier age, and were believed to have recovered.
    
    The syndrome for some worsened over time (the periods of apparent
    non-responsive trance lengthened and their frequency increased).   
    Eventually, for some, it became a permanent state.   Not really
    catatonic, but almost or completely immobilized and unable to
    communicate in any way.   
    
    The doctor discovered that they were not actually completely
    unresponsive, and found a chemical means (L-Dopa) 
    of restoring their neural control.  Some of the victims appeared to
    have lost their sense of consciousness while in the paralyzed state,
    closer to true catatonia, while others did not, but appeared to have 
    created alternate realities for themselves mentally while imprisoned in 
    their immobilized bodies.  
    
    Perhaps their reality became the equivalent of a lucid dream, and then a 
    permanent dream, as all connection with the outside began to fade.