Lucid Dream help

[ClydeMillen]

I've done a little research and have read that there are two types of lucid dreams, dream-initiated (starts as normal dream and person realizes they are dreaming) and wake-initiated (person has a lucid dream without change in consciousness). I have experienced both, but I need help with the latter.

A couple years ago I started having wake-initiated lucid dreams, but I didn't know what they were back then. My body would go into fits where I would suddenly become overwhelmed with a need to sleep, even if it was in the middle of the day. I had no control over this, even if I felt I had plenty of energy I would all of a sudden feel like I hadn't slept in a day and need to lie down. Then my body would start 'pulsing,' or 'vibrating.' I don't really know how to describe it, my mind literally felt like a phone put on vibrate, it would start pulsing and got stronger and more frequent as I came closer to being asleep. But I found that I never actually fell asleep. My eyes would be closed and I would be unable to move my body (actually it was more of like the idea of moving my body was erased from my mind), but I was still in complete control of my thoughts. Then I would open my eyes and find that 3 hours had passed but it felt like one minute.

That happened every day for about a week, and then it got a little worse. Instead of closing my eyes and having 3 hours pass by, I started having lucid nightmares. They were incredibly realistic, and they usually consisted of a friend or family member trying to kill me. I remember one where I was lying in my bed and a friend came up and started choking me. I swore I could feel his hands on my throat and when I came to I found myself flailing around in my bed gasping for air, but again it never felt like I ever went to sleep.

Anyway the reason I am posting this is because these dreams are happening again now about 2 years later. I am wondering what to do, why this is happening and what it means?

[ClydeMillen]

I was raised a Christian, but right now don't really have a definite religious belief. I am definitely leaning towards eastern religion (primarily buddhism) because I have read quite a bit about quantum mechanics and modern science in general, and it is interesting because instead of science going against religion a lot of quantum mechanics is coinciding with what buddhism has been saying for a long time. However, if I were to have a set 'belief system' it would be relativism, which is actually just another way of saying nothing at all. You see I am far from seeing anything in a monistic or universalistic sense. Therefore I will never fully believe or disbelieve any one religion.
I am no atheist though, far from that, it would be a contradiction for someone that studies quantum physics to say there isn't an unknown force that somehow binds us together. I do not believe, however, that that force is a sentient being in human terms, even though we are breaking down the line between what is living and what is not.
But I've gone pretty far off topic now. I hope that adequately answers your question.

[swift]

Vibrating, that is a good word for it. I have done a little homework on wake to lucid dreaming, having an issue with the 'lucid nightmares' myself. Actually what is happening is from the wake to lucid experience you are going straight into sleep paralysis, a condition brought on most commonly by sleep apneia.

This condition is also known as The Hag, as folklore has it she comes and administers nightmares...usually to the guilty. This phenomonon is as old as time.

Sleep paralysis without sleep apneia is linked to a high incidence of anxiety disorder in test subjects in dream studies.

It is supposed that since the body is not getting adaquate air the subconsious is alerting you in a drastic manner to wake and move around, no such easy an explaination exsists for those who don't have apneia.

[ClydeMillen]

Originally Posted by swift

Sleep paralysis without sleep apneia is linked to a high incidence of anxiety disorder in test subjects in dream studies.

Yeah, an acquaintance said he had the same vibrating feeling and that he was prescribed anxiety medication for it. But he said it wasn't caused by anxiety, in his opinion.