Dear Joe:

What you are describing may be a natural phenomenon called cataleptic somnambulism, also known as sleep paralysis. Sleep paralysis is a feeling of being conscious but unable to move. It happens when we are in a twilight stage between wakefulness and sleep. The paralysis happens when one "wakes" up before the body is ready to wake up during REM sleep. Our bodies are in a partial paralysis during REM sleep. That is why if we wake up while in REM sleep we cannot move.

This is rather frightening if you do not know what is happening. Actually, it is rather frightening even if you do know what is happening. “People freak out because they can’t move, and it’s this extreme anxiety which causes people to be very fearful of their surroundings,” says Michael Breus, Ph.D., clinical psychologist and fellow of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

Breus also says that “Most patients say the same thing to describe sleep paralysis: that it feels like you woke up dead. You know that your mind is awake and your body is not — so you’re trapped, essentially.” 

This paralysis is the body protecting itself. During REM sleep we are essentially paralyzed. This is called atonia. Atonia protects the body from injury by preventing us from physically acting out our dreams.

In addition, this cataleptic somnambulism may be accompanied by what is called hypnopompic hallucinations. These hallucinations are often terrifying and demonic looking.

The Wikipedia article gives a good description:

These hallucinations often involve a person or supernatural creature suffocating or terrifying the individual, accompanied by a feeling of pressure on one's chest and difficulty breathing. Another common hallucination type involves intruders (human or supernatural) entering one's room or lurking outside one's window, accompanied by a feeling of dread...

Visions and hearing a demonic voice when resistance is attempted are symptoms commonly experienced during episodes of sleep paralysis. Some scientists have proposed this condition as an explanation for reports of ghost parasites and alien visits. There are three main types of these visions that can be linked to pathologic neurophysiology: the belief that there is an intruder in the room, the incubus, and vestibular motor sensations.

Many people who experience sleep paralysis have a sense of terror when they sense a menacing presence in the room while paralyzed—hereafter referred to as the intruder. A neurological interpretation of this phenomenon is that it results from a hyper-vigilant state created in the midbrain. More specifically, the emergency response is activated in the brain when individuals wake up paralyzed and feel vulnerable to attack.This helplessness can intensify the effects of the threat response well above the level typical of normal dreams, which could explain why such visions during sleep paralysis are so vivid.

James Alan Cheyne, in his book, Sleep Paralysis and the Structure of Waking-Nightmare Hallucinations, [Dreaming, Vol 13(3), Sep 2003, 163-179] states that the intruder and incubus experiences highly correlate with one another, and moderately correlate with the third characteristic experience, vestibular-motor disorientation, also known as out-of-body experiences.

Michael Breus, Ph.D., days that the hallucinations that may accompany sleep paralysis are not like the images of nightmares or lucid dreams, which happen with our eyes closed. The hallucinations with sleep paralysis happen between the sleeping and waking states. The mind is alert and the eyes are open. While visual and auditory hallucinations during sleep paralysis are relatively rare, according to Breus, many patients report feeling an undeniably strange or scary presence in the room.

Shelley Adler, in her Sleep Paralysis: Night-Mares, Nocebos, and the Mind-Body Connection, lists several symptoms of sleep paralysis. For an episode to be considered sleep paralysis only symptoms 1-3 may be present. Symptoms 4-9 may or may not be present, in varying degrees of severity.

1. Being ‘Awake’

Those affected report feeling consciously awake during sleep paralysis experiences. It is experienced as part of waking consciousness, not as a dream.

2. Realistic Perception of Environment

The immediate environment surrounding the bed is clearly perceived. Distinctive elements in the room are observed (e.g. a sleeping partner or a clock).

3. Inability to move

The sense of paralysis is one of the first elements of the experience noticed by the individual. Sometimes this paralysis is attributed to an outside force.

4. Overwhelming fear and dread

A sense of overwhelming fear can accompany the experience. This can be felt so strongly that those who experience it may later struggle to articulate its intensity. Sometimes feelings progress from a sense of foreboding to complete terror and may include feelings linked to death or dying.

5. Sensed presence

Individuals may sense an ‘evil’ or malevolent ‘presence’ in the room with them. This presence may be seen or merely ‘felt’.

6. Chest pressure

The sense of a physical weight being pressed down onto the chest. This can be purely sensual or can seem to be the result of an external presence or force literally pushing down on the chest.

7. Difficulty breathing

This can occur alongside pressure to the chest.

8. Supine position

Most sleep paralysis attacks occur whilst the individual is lying on their back, although studies have shown that generally people tend not to fall asleep in this position.

9. Additional Unusual Sensations

As well as visual hallucinations, sleep paralysis episodes may be accompanied by hallucinations of an auditory, olfactory and/or physical nature. Commonly reported hallucinations include doors opening, animals growling, approaching footsteps, scratching, internal buzzing/beeping, malevolent whispering as well as smells of rotting flesh, ‘death’, decay, damp, mold, and feelings of being moved, drifting, rolling, floating, cold or heat. Out-of-body experiences are also sometimes reported.

Frequency of Experience. There are two types of Sleep Paralysis

• Isolated sleep paralysis (ISP): ISP episodes are infrequent, and may occur only once in an individual's lifetime. ISP episodes are generally short (usually no longer than one minute) and are typically associated with the intruder and incubus visitations. Out-of-body experiences can sometime occur.
   
• Recurrent isolated sleep paralysis (RISP): RISP is rare compared to ISP. RISP can recur throughout a person's lifetime, with episodes lasting up to an hour or longer. This type has a much higher occurrence of perceived out-of-body experiences. With RISP the individual can also suffer back-to-back episodes of sleep paralysis in the same night, which is unlikely in individuals who suffer from ISP.

 Causes of sleep Paralysis can include:

• Lack of sleep
• Sleep schedule that changes
• Mental conditions such as stress or bipolar disorder
• Sleeping on the back
• Other sleep problems such as narcolepsy or nighttime leg cramps
• Use of certain medications, such as those for ADHD, Substance abuse

Prevention (how to stop the experience):

• Get plenty of sleep
• Try to sleep at the same times each night
• Reduce stress
• Do not sleep on the back
• Check with your doctor about medications that may cause this
• During the experience wiggling the toes, fingers, or facial muscles, may help to wake up the rest of the body “Everybody tries something different, but you can’t fool mother nature — there’s no way to pull yourself out of it. You just have to wait it out,” says Michael Breus, Ph.D.

Having said all of that, is it possible that this is a demonic attack? Yes, it is possible. Demons can cause these types of experiences which can easily be indistinguishable from the natural phenomena of cataleptic somnambulism and hypnopompic hallucinations.

The twilight stage between sleep and consciousness is a vulnerable time that the devil can exploit.

In dealing with this we do not necessarily need to know which is occurring — the natural or the demonic. Demons mostly hitchhike on problems or conditions that already exist, thus this experience may be both natural and demonic.

While it is wise to check out any medical causes, we can approach this with prayer any case. The Prayer will hopefully get rid of any demonic presence if there is one, and if not, the prayer still confers a grace and asks God for protection and a peaceful sleep.

There is a Bedtime Protection Prayer in the SW Prayer Catalog, linked below, that may be useful; and when the experience happens calling upon the Name of Jesus, even if only in the mind because you can't talk out loud, asking Him to rid you of this presence will hopefully take care of any demonic attack.

Since this happened only once, with no other phenomena happening, I would not worry about it.  Perhaps the devil is just wanting to remind you that he is around, but most likely it was an isolated case of sleep paralysis.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary