The dream inside of a dream inside of a dream?

[TCru]

Ok, so I stayed home from school today, it was snowing outside and I thought there wasn’t going to be school anyways, but I guess it wasn’t snowing hard enough. Anyways I left a note on the table for my mom saying that I was staying home and not to wake me up, because usually if I don’t tell her or anything she storms down to my room or yells from the top of the stairs waking me up from a dead sleep and then we get into a fight about me missing too much school ( well that was all last year).

Anyway so it was cool and I was listening to For the Horde Radio a World of Warcraft podcast that absolutely despises the alliance side. I fell asleep after the podcast and I am going to try and explain what the dream is about, because it’s not a normal dream at all.

Well, I don’t actually remember what happened in it because usually people don’t remember most of their dream like seconds after they wake up, which sucks because it could have helped a lot more. So I was in my dream sequence apparently some story line going on, I woke up out of my dream ( In real life), then went back to sleep. Then something else happened I woke up again, but then this time it ( I don’t know how to label “it”, maybe the unknown) phased me in, like there was some “white snow”; you know like if you hit the wrong channel on the TV or something and it becomes all black and white haze and really loud if you have the volume high enough. Well my dream didn’t have any noise but it did have the snowy effect.

Anyway, it kept doing that a few times, but in reality I had to force myself to wake up and it kept getting harder every time. I really did not like what was going on in my dream. Every time I would phase in or phase out it would give me that snow effect. When I go in it would just sap me in I would have to make an effort. I did have my arms and legs crossed and sort of crunched up and laying sideways. In my dream though my bed was facing left of where it is now. In the end of all of this, I am not sure if I was in my dream or not, but I could not move at all, although it was pretty damn real, I could actually move my eyes by myself, like it wasn’t a dream, but I couldn’t move the rest of my body. I tried yelling to my mom upstairs by yelling “MOM!”, and tell her to come here and I thought I was actually paralyzed in real life, but she couldn’t hear me because I was mute, so apparently I was in my dream sequence but I still almost had a heart attack. Finally I tried with all my might to get myself out of the dream, and it worked. I went upstairs and told my mother what happened; it was really hard to explain.

Now come to remember I think I was around the school area and I got on the bus, and I guess the road was really flooding bad, but the school us was trucking through it, the bus came down the hill, and we were pretty much hydroplaning at the time. That’s as much as I can remember. So If anyone could help me out with this, I would greatly appreciate it. I hope it isn’t a problem that I may have, because I really don’t want to experience this again, it was quite terrifying not knowing which was reality and which was a dream. Sorry I couldn’t provide for information, I really couldn’t remember anything else.

[sailrmc]

What you have experienced is called sleep paralysis. It is a pretty common occurrence especially as we are going through awake/asleep patterns. This is exactly the state that you describe. (you did an excellent job).

Now I will try to discuss this in a manner that is understandable.
The mind shuts down certain circuitry in the brain as the mind begins it's sleep sequence. The motor control section of the brain shut down for safety (to keep us from acting out our dreams...sleep walking into traffic, falling down stairs etc).
As well the speech is all but shut down to keep us relatively quiet as we sleep, our respiration slows to economize our energy level and to give the organs rest...all this and more takes place in preparation for a safe and restful experience. Then your dreams start typically as REM sleep is achieved.

If sleep is bothered for any reason and the body interprets danger the adrenal glands pump our system full of chemicals so as to bring the body into a readiness stage (fight or flight). The problem that you are having occurs as the mind is still in the sleep mode (circuitry off), and the body is pumped full of chemicals to allow for immediate action (as a response to get to safety).
When this happens it is like flooring a Farrari with the brakes on. At that instant the mind becomes aware and yet it has not flipped the breakers to open the circuits so that muscles can be commanded. The system is pumped full of energy but the mind is still waking up. Until that circuitry is makes continuity the body can just lie there motionless, speechless etc.
The feeling is beyond compare... often we try to scream or cry out but the mouth cannot form words. We want to take get up and take off running but we cannot.

As for your dream meaning. It looks to me that it was purely anxiety associated to school and being out of control regarding school.
sailrmc

[TCru]

Wow I never would've thought that at all, thanks for the explaination. Is it a serious thing, or is it something normal and I don't need to check out? I indeed feel so paralyzed, it was a weird experience. I actually haven't been feeling any anxiety at school, I do have A's and B's, not worried at all.

This might be a little off topic, but could you also explain this: Sometimes when I'm dreaming ( I do have the TV on), I sort of like fall out of my dream, and I feel an impact like I actually did drop onto my bed. Then my heart races. I really don't know what that is, but it's creepy. I'm not necessarily falling of lets say a cliff in the dream, sometimes my dream is interrupted and that happens.

[sailrmc]

I believe this is called a "night terror" (or maybe night tremor?), an involuntary single action jolt...Wham.... Others might be more helpful in establishing an identity for this event. If I am off on my nomenclature it is because it has been years since I have had the course, in college, that covered this.

When this happens to me, I am thinking, what was that about? But most of the time I am too incognizant to consciously think anything.

It also has to do with the shifting of gears (so to speak) between light states of consciousness and going in and out of deep sleep states.
Wow can this startle a guy! Have you ever been driving your car at seventy mph and down shifted by accident in to second gear? The bugs normally would splat on your front windshield but when you down shift, as discussed, they splat on the back windshield!! It is like changing degrees of consciousness so fast it causes whiplash!!
sailrmc