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Sleep Paralysis vs Old Hag

Posted on December 16, 2010

Two nights ago I had the “Old Hag” experience. I have had this experience half a dozen or more times in my life. I understand the sleep paralysis theory, but why does it always involve some sinister presence and a feeling of impending doom? Why not a giggling Baywatch babe laying on me?

If it is a hallucination while coming out of REM sleep it seems like 50% of the time the hallucination should be positive, however that has not been my experience and that’s not what I’m reading here. If the people explaining it from a scientific standpoint haven’t actually experienced it, I don’t think they have a realistic perspective on the actual experience.

Regardless of whether it was a hallucination or real, here’s what I experienced -

I was sleeping face down and woke up to the sensation of being forced down in my bed, actually sinking deeper into the mattress. I’m 6’6″ tall and 240 lbs and despite using 100% of my strength I couldn’t budge an inch, however I could feel the resistance as if I was pushing against something physical rather than simply unable to move or speak. Besides the actual feeling of being pushed deeper into my mattress I also felt the sensation of something moving directly in front of my face right before it ended. The entire experience probably lasted less than 60 seconds however it seemed much longer.

If I try to explain this scientifically I have to question why no one ever has a positive sleep paralysis hallucination. I’ve had girlfriends sit on my chest and try to pin my hands down in fun, so why do I never have this hallucination or something similar? Where are all the positive sleep paralysis stories?

Based on the various folklore theories I’ve read on this topic I think the Eskimo theory explains it best – At certain points during sleep when you’re transitioning between sleep states, your spirit’s defenses are at a low point. It is at these points that another spirit may try to take possession of your body. What you are actually experiencing is another spirit trying to press your own spirit out of your body. You wake up in the middle of this process and fight to regain possession of your body. This would explain why many people report the feeling that they’re being pressed deeper into their bed and some even report they feel they’re beneath or outside of their body.

I’d like to believe the scientific explanation, however the folklore version describes it exactly as it feels to me. If it is the “Old Hag”, I wish she’d send her sexy grand-daughter instead.

Sent in by WTFwasthat, Copyright 2010 TrueGhostTales.com

Also see – Sleep Paralysis ~ Scientific Explanations And The Old Hag Legends




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Comments

23 Responses to “Sleep Paralysis vs Old Hag”
  1. sharayah says:

    go with your feelings on this one, i feel the same way. i have had sleep paralysis many times and never felt like something was on me or around me.so i feel if a preson feels like there being hurt in some way then you should go with what you feel.you are funny you do like the pretty girls lol :)

    • Anonymous says:

      i also suffer with paraylisis and i cannot express how terrified iam some nites to go to bed.ive evan just lost my presant partner who i loved very much.but how can any body understand any part of this evil thing i go.i av no understanding of it,and choose to keep most of my experiences to my self as the look on most peoples faces say it all……if i myself struggled to understand haw the hell can any body else understand or beleive what happens to me…..i feel like iam totally crazy mad as mad can be….but i know iam not….then i question the spirital side of things …and i really have no idea but wht i do know is ,,if it dont stop soon ,,as the papworth sleep clinicare my last hope i guess i could considerer ending my life as only yous who known wht iam talking about will understand the fear and extreme courage neened just to go to bed some nites and close your and pray for a normal nites sleeps……….but then after 2 or 3 mins of lying there it hits that awfull electical sound with a wave that vibrates through your hole body…..omg is all u think ..here they come….who ever they are.and u fight so hard just to move your little finger or to squeeze out a scream …..but nothing happens…you are totally in the hands of them…..and no matter how many times u go throught it it gets no easier infact it feels worse and more powerful then th time before……i would rather be raped and tortured my a group of pychpaths than experience one more nite of this pure evil whatever it is………………………the other strange thing is i know that if it happens once for some strange reason iav to go throught it 3 times in that same nite for it to stop.but after that first time .and i finally wake my self up iam not getting back into that bed for nothing for the rest of the nite id rather stick pins in my eyes.the most ive ever managed be for staying awake for 5 days in a trot throught the totall fear of another nite that can only be related to evil…..

      • sharayah says:

        oh my don’t ever take your life these demon would just love that. you must pray to God for help and get out side help from people of God. you will really start to buggout if you stay up like that with no sleep.on top of what’s going on u will see things and would fall out on the spot where ever your at.can some friend watch you when you sleeping.just so you can get some rest.these demons want you so tired all the better to mess with you.may the lord be with and take this out your life.

      • Simon Matthews says:

        I may be able to help you. I have discovered a way to help stop this from happening so that you can get a good night’s sleep, and it works. It’s not a cure, but it helps. Don’t worry, this is not a sales pitch for some miracle cure – the simple method is written below.

        May I start by saying that I know how you feel, I myself am too terrified to go back to sleep when this happens. Here’s the simple method I use to help stop it from happening:

        When the experience begins and you manage to fully wake yourself up, change your sleeping position completely. One thing I have definitely noticed is that the experience will continue to happen as long as I fall back to sleep in the same position.
        You may have to change positions a couple of times before it works, but it does work in the end. Try it yourself to see if it works. If it does work then please spread the word and post your results on here so that I can find out if it works for other people too.

        Good luck!
        Simon.

  2. Bry says:

    Interesting story. I happen to fancy many things about sleeping especially dreams and paranormal stuff, but what fancies me more is the combination of two. I have read many folklores about this topic, in the country where I come from, instead of ‘old hags’ we call it ‘Batibat’, its a fat spirit that would crush a person by sitting on the person’s chest giving the sensation of being pressed. But on a scientific point of view, sleep paralysis is a fairly normal occurance. It’s a state when the brain releases some sort of a chemical that disables motor functions ie, arm movements, legs, body etc.. But this process happens in deep sleep, this is a safety mechanism of the brain so that the body won’t reenact a dream. Failure of this safety mechanism results to s sleeping disorder commonly known as ‘Sleep Walking’. Now here is the weird part, not all instances are perfect and most of the paralysys only happens during deep sleep and the cycles between REM light to deep sleep occurs, lapses can also happen. If a person happens to wake up during the paralysis state, the brain goes on overdrive, it panics because the first thing you would want to do is move, but for some reason your movement is restricted. During deep sleep breathing is rather shallow because the body does not consume much oxygen as it does when active. But once the body goes in such a ruch, the minimal amount of oxygen in your lungs is not enough to compensate for the sudden adrenalin rush, therefore causing the sensation of feeling suffocated or being out of breath.

    In a Paranormal point of view, the only way to defeat the spirit that is trying to take over your body is by sheer ‘will power’. In the Batibat folk lore, the only way to make it leave is by trying to move your toe or bite your finger. But if you are paralyzed, you will need a great amount of determination to make your body move.

    • Lee Igleheart says:

      I unfortunatly know what you mean by the pushing you down and the what I call a out of body esperiance. I would feel a downward force of about threehundred and fifty pounds. I tried to move but couldn’t. I even struggled real hard one night and only hurt myself. My problem was a demonic presents. Mine went on for about twenty months any were from three to twelve hours a night. Guessing I spent about three thousand hours out of twentyone months time like that. Helpless and terrified is how I felt.
      The out of body thing was kind of scarey, but it felt peaceful. I think my soul left my body. I hear that energy can only be trasfered and doesn’t disapate. Our minds have electrical impulses right. Kind of makes sense it could leave it’s container, like a car battery if it sets on the ground to long. Maybe there is sommething to that?

  3. Anonymous says:

    I think it could be that sleep paralysys in itself is not a positive thing. Your body is trying to tell you somethings wrong. When you cut your finger or something you’re not going to feel a positive sensation. My theory anyway.

    • Bry says:

      I beg to differ, having no sleep paralysis is a negative thing because, there is a term called “Lucid Dreaming”. A lucid dream is the kind of dream that feels so real that people can feel sensations like taste, smell, touch. Some times this type of dream looks so real that some people mistake it for a real memory. If the body is not paralyzed at this state it will move and act whatever the person is doing within the dream and that can be harmful.

      • Caretaker says:

        A lucid dream simply means that the dreamer is fully aware that they are dreaming while it is going on.

        Lucid Dream “Triggers” – How to recognize that you are dreaming:

        http://paranormalculture.com/group/luciddreamimg/forum/topics/lucid-dream-triggers-how-to

        • Bry says:

          That is what I just mentioned. You are fully aware of it, but your body isn’t. Now mind you, in a lucid dream you can travel and do many sorts of things if your body motor system is not paralyzed in this state it will mirror what you are doing in your dream. It’s like sleeping while driving a car. Have you read medical journals about sleep walking? Many people report that they were having some sort of dream when they were sleep walking, many doesn’t even recall whatever they did while sleep walking!

          Sleep walking can be seen as a topic for comedy in TV shows or in movies, but real sleep walkers are rather violent and very unstable. Dreaming, sleep walking and lack of sleep paralysis are interconnected.

          • lynsey says:

            sleep paralysis and lucid dreaming are two different things, ive had both happen and have looked into it pretty deeply. Sleep paralyisis, you are awake, your body is ‘alseep’ because of the reasons mentioned about acting out dreams etc. Lucid dreaming on the other hand is when you know you are dreaming and can control your dream, or they seem very real but your still dreaming and realise that even if its only after waking up.

            • Eric says:

              FYI not everybody are oneironauts!
              Yes you are pretty much aware when you are in a Lucid dream, but how many people do you think can completely control the dream? Are you able to completely control your lucid dream? No, I don’t think so… If you have experienced lucid dreaming more than often, haven’t you noticed that your body feels heavy in a weird way? Inside a Lucid dream you can see yourself flying, floating and swimming effortlessly, but for some reason your torso feels like it’s been strapped with lead weights. If you have noticed that, then my friend that means your body is in sleep paralysis! and if you will ever feel a bit more conscious than that, then the heavy breathing and the feeling of being pressed will kick in.

              Ever since I was young I am able to fully remember most of my dreams, that’s why I got into knowing a bit more about sleeping and dreams. I log and write journals about my lucid dreams and all the things I did within my dream, it took me quite a long time before I was fully able to do all the things like flying and stuff within a lucid dream. And one thing you will find that is so bloody hard to do in a lucid dream is FLYING! That’s very different from waking up in the middle of the dream finding yourself already flying, but the real challenge is taking off from the ground and then fly. Any novice will tell you that they can’t do it!

              • Caretaker says:

                I have had many experiences with lucid dreams and you are correct that not 100% of everything that happens can be controlled. I can say however that my body never felt heavy or anything like that. Also flying is very easy to me in lucid dreams. I am sure that what we experience with lucid dreams is not the same from one person to the next.

  4. Carri says:

    after I read this story I dreamed of an old hag climbing up a Victorian castle. she was old like in her 80s she had climbed up these long stairs with old bare feet. she was the caretaker of the mansion. She was old and creepy looking. i wonder if there is any significance.

  5. spikedglove says:

    i slept with the lights on while the old hag came. guess what i saw? NOTHING. i was just paralised feeling the presence but seeing nothing. but there is possibility somebody wants to take over your spirit cause they died and want to live again. but it’s really annoying when you got an itch you cant scratch D: thats the worst part XD jk. dont sleep on your back or stomach, or it’ll happen again, and dont suffer large amounts of stress in the middle of the day, that could make it happen again 61% of the time. when something stressful happens, calm down. it should help stop it. or maybe try sleeping in a different room if you think a ghost trieing to take over your spirit lives there.

  6. Anonymous says:

    I read your story and I have been having similar things happen to me for the last nine months. The episodes are getting more frequent so I just started doing some research on the internet to find answers or similar experiences. I could go into great detail but would take a lot of space to write. I will let you know our previous house was definitely haunted and we’ve lived in our current house for eight yrs.with no episodes. I would always comment to people ” I don’t dream anymore” up until nine months ago. The day we put our current house on the market. I had the strangest dream and awoke to this so called sleep paralysis I’ve been researching. It happended about once or twice a month, now it can be several times a night but I do notice, it’s freqently around the 3 a.m. hour. I do want you to know that my episodes are not all negative. In fact, I’ve had some quite pleasant and calming ones. One example: my former co-worker had a very ill child. The news was passed aound my work on a Fri. We were told the child probably wouldn’t make it over the weekend. We all said we would be in touch if we heard any news. I never heard any news but had a strange dream (not related to the child) and awoke to the most calming floating feeling and the image of white hands holding very bright pink and purple stones. At work that Mon. we had learned that the child had passed and details of a funeral in which everyone attending the funeral was to wear no black but only pink and purple to honor the childs favorite colors. I don’t believe at all that these are scientific episodes of REM sleep. It’s definitely a paranormal experience.

  7. Keith Ritchie says:

    I actually had the old hag syndrome this morning. I always think its kind of cool when it happens but i could have swore i heard footsteps at the same time. it happens to me from time to time usually about once every two years. it used to happen a lot more when i was smaller for some reason. like when i was 4 it happened every week or so.

  8. Jenna says:

    Hi i have had sleep paralysis many times, although not for a while now.
    When i think about the episodes its normally when i am alone, and
    in a different place i.e on the sofa, staying at a friends, new house. I Have always said
    to my partner, if you think i look like im struggling in my sleep please
    shake me out of it. Because i feel like i am trying to struggle even
    though i am completely paralised. And i try to scream but nothing comes out.
    most of the time i just wake up, paralised, and struggling to breAthe. No feeling of Any presence. And the only way to get out of it is to fall back to sleep.
    There has been once where i had a weird experience though.
    My sister had moved into the pub where her boyfreind lived on his own. I had been told
    it was haunted by an old regular. I stayed over nite on the sofa in the same room they wbere sleeping in although i couldnt see them from where i was laying. I was laying with the door on the wall behind me so i couldnt see it. I woke in the night, paralised, although i can still move my eyes! I heard the door knob turn and open, footsteps walk towards
    me. I looked right in the corner of my eyes and saw a tall bearded man with grey hair, with a pint in this hand, blurred face though. He laughed as he went to pour his beer over me. I didnt feel anything and thats all i remember. Sure enough the man i saw had the same description as the regular. Scary! Ive got the shivers writing this.

  9. T-BO says:

    Sleep paralysis roughly is caused by an incomplete transition from REM (dreaming) sleep to a conscious, waking state. When you fall asleep your brain releases a chemical to keep your extremities from moving about, in order to prevent you from actually acting out your dreams. The mind and the body do not communicate as well as some would like to think – sometimes when you begin to wake up, your body is still rendered immobile by these chemicals, and not to mention a small amount of DMT (the “natural hallucinogen” that creates dreams in the brain) that creates the visuals is being released. The undesirable effects such as seeing a scary figure or creature are caused by this DMT. Although it is not known why all hallucinations from sleep paralysis tend to be negative, it is likely that this immobile state puts your conscious mind into a state of fear and frenzy, producing quite scary images. Perhaps if you woke up and for some reason the sleep paralysis made you feel like you were having sex or something like that, your images would be a little bit more positive.

    • Bry says:

      Thanks for that update, I was trying to point out that fact with my previous posts, but unfortunately not many people knew or even believe this scientific info about sleep paralysis.

  10. Kim says:

    I had a bad experience last night. I have had many episodes of sleep paralysis in the past and they were all the same-feeling of being pushed down by some evil presence on top of me. And a big sense of something in the room. Terrifying.
    Last night I couldn’t sleep. I had a slight sense of something in the room but didn’t feel afraid. Finally, as I was trying to go to sleep, I could hear music around me and what sounded like voices. Even though it sounded like it was right in my ear, I couldn’t place where it was coming from. It sounded far away, like traveled sound. At this point, I asked for protection. And visualized a pink bubble surrounding me to protect myself.
    I fell asleep. Then, I woke up being thrown around my bed. It was a sense of terror, and I felt like I was levitating about 6 inches above the bed. My head and arms were thrashing around and I was being shaken out of control. I tried to scream and willed myself with all of my might to jump out of it and gain control. It took about 15 seconds and I was able to jump (from what seemed like mid-air) out of bed and was instantly standing at my bedroom door. I was trembling and more scared than I have ever been in my life. I ran to my son’s room and yelled that something was happening. Then I just sat in the living room shaking for about 20 minutes, and finally got in bed with my daughter.
    This was just terrifying. And come to think of it, my son had the same experience in that very room several years earlier. I just didn’t understand what he was trying to describe.
    What in the world-or not- is this???? Feels evil.

  11. Megan says:

    I’ve had sleep paralysis countless times even though I’m only twenty and most of the time there aren’t any hallucinations. I kind of think that it’s because I’m pretty much a positive dreamer anyway and even my bad dreams aren’t very scary and most the time are humorous to recall- burrowing skeleton that tries to grab my feet, vampires that shoot barbs out of their fangs. I’m also a very “happy-ending” person and it’s extremely rare for anyone to die or get hurt in my dreams, probably because I influence it to be that way.

    When I do hallucinate, I seem to have experiences that few other people seem to have the same way except for perhaps one. That one, I was sleeping with the covers over my head, and when I “woke” I was surrounded by a completely black, empty void pressing on me almost tangibly on all sides. No sound, no sight, no solid bed beneathe me. I was like complete nothingness, and yet, as we often do as children, a growing fear crept over me as I comtemplated what could be hiding in the blackness. At any moment, I expected unseen claws or fangs to sink into me, and though I still felt the familiar feeling of paralysis, I felt my arms reach out in front of me- somehow even scared out of my mind, I guess I reasoned the truth- and tried to touch the blankets but felt nothing. Going into a panic, I clawed the empty space in front of me- I believed that my arms were the only part of me that could move- and eventually, I did feel the blankets and threw it off me and I could see my room around me. It was a long time before I went back to sleep, and I never sleep with the covers over my head again.

    Two other experiences, I could’ve sworn that I got up and walked around, though with a lot of effort. The first, I simply got up, barely able to open my eyes to slits, and took a few steps toward the end of my bed. Realizing that something was wrong, I sat on my bed and thought for a few seconds. I could feel the carpet on my bare feet, so I was very confused and disoriented. For whatever reason- my thinking was muddled and cloudy- I decided to lay back down and I though I don’t remember it, I must’ve gone back to sleep.

    The other seemed to last hours, though I’m sure it probably lasted a few minutes. I fell asleep on the couch, something that seems to often cause an episode, and for no reason I woke up and had the familiar paralysis again. I can’t exactly recall everything that happened or in what order, but there was a very dreamlike feeling to it, however, I’m very certain that it wasn’t fully a dream because my dreams are always very unrealistic and never take place in my house. Like before, I got up and started walking around, not really with a clear purpose, though it was more difficult this time. Again, I knew something was wrong with me, though it was very hard to think clearly. Only emotions seem untouched by this particular type of episode. At certain times, I laid on the floor, unable to move or sat in one of the chairs for no particular reason other than perhaps I was tired from trying to fight the paralysis. Though vision- cloudy like my thinking- and, I think, hearing are greatly affected, my sense of touch is normal, even though I never feel anything in my dreams. I even glanced at the clock a couple of times, trying to get a sense of time, but my mind was too clouded to make a clear enough sense of it. Near the end, though I don’t even remember opening the door or walking in the direction, I found myself in in the backyard and I laid down again, unable to move. Suddenly, with a jerk that almost felt like falling down on my back, I was back where I’d started and perfectly fine but more disoriented than I’d ever felt in my life.

    The last, which was only a few days ago, was my first floating episode, though it was more like a drifting, but the feeling was like in the other two.

    These scare and disturb me more than the others, which only irritate me now, because the feeling of helplessness is amplified. It’s not enough that I can’t move, but they also have to take away most of my sight, some of my hearing, and cloud my mind so that I can’t reason through it.

    Another irritating type of sleep paralysis that I’ve had before is when I’m in the middle of a dream and for some reason, when I’m trying to control myself in my dream, I try to sit up in bed. That immediately ends my dream and sleep, and all I can do is lay there until it wears off.

  12. spikedglove says:

    i slept on my side today and this happened in my dreams: i was sitting up in bed. then all of a sudden without being touched i was forced to lie down. and then it happened to me. it was in a dream, it didn’t feeel real since it happened in my dream, but i think since im sleeping on my side the old hag is deciding to attack me in my dreams. can that happen?

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