My trip to the hospital

[Willkillforfood]

Apparently sleeping on your side can temporarily paralyze you if you do it the right way. I wasn't able to move my arms below the shoulders for 3-4 hours yesterday. I got worried as fuck, went to the doc, and they told me it could be a progressive disease where you eventually become close to a vegetable. Then after hours, vials of blood, and cat scans, she was like, "do you sleep on your side?"

Lesson learned!

[D3V]

I've done that before, but within a few minutes my arms wake back up.

[-Spector-]

LOL wow. I'll remember that... congrats on not having the vegetable disease.

[HandOfHeaven]

But vegetables have excuses to be lazy...

[Willkillforfood]

Mine normally wake up in a few minutes. However, this time it was on steroids and took hours. I must have clamped off the bloodflow nicely, since I've had some muscular damage. It feels like I worked out TONS.

[D3V]

That's crazy. I can only remember one time where it didn't want up almost instantly. I was like running late for work and my arms weren't working. I kinda freaked out for a second, but ended up just running around the house to get my blood pumping, and sure enough the life kicked back into them.

[Chruser]

Last year, I managed to sleep on my left leg in some awkward way. When I woke up, I swiftly leaped out of bed and landed in an orthostatic state (standing position) on both of my legs. I quickly realized that my left leg was temporarily paralyzed before I lost my balance and inevitably tumbled to the floor. I'm still not sure how I managed to perform the leap, but it was an interesting experience.

[Thanatos]

The only way I can sleep is on my side...

Am I going to die?

[Willkillforfood]

No, but if you sleep in the wrong exact spot, you can have permanent nerve damage and your hand will be worthless. But the odds of that happening is slim.

[-Spector-]

The only way I can sleep is on my side...

Am I going to die?


Yes .

[Wallow]

On the topic of sleeping, does anybody not sleep in some variation of the fetal position?

[Lenny]

Nope. Stomach.

---

Must have been a terribly scary few hours, WKFF - glad you're OK.

You'd have thunk that if it were the progressive disease, though, it wouldn't jump on you without warning like that. I'd imagine there'd be some sort of gradual deterioration.

[-Spector-]

That'd suck, every day you wake up and a little bit more of you is paralyzed until you can't move at all.

Fuck that.

[PureRebel]

this happens to me sometimes since i can only get to sleep on my side, i got told its due to the body part being under enough pressure to stop the proper circulation of blood to the muscles in that body part.

a small example would also be resting your head on your hand and losing all feeling in that hand for a short period of time if you do it the right way.

[Willkillforfood]

Yes, definitely. That's what I thought too though. But apparently it happens that way sometimes too.

[Jessifer]

I sleep on my stomach, as well. Example pix below! C&P ftw.


Anyway, I suffer from the occasional Sleep Paralysis. It can be rather panic-inducing if you have no idea what's going on. You're completely aware of your surroundings, yet you can't speak, make any sounds, or even move a finger or toe.

[Willkillforfood]

I had the same thing happen this morning. They have no clue what it is, could be a mixture of unrelated things. I think I've got a messed up disk. Muscle relaxers make a nigga goto sleep.

[Grav]

Hmmm, that sucks. It seems to me that if it were something like a disease it would have kicked in before now.

[Willkillforfood]

Yea, I think I have a disk fucked up or something. I have to talk to a neurologist and have some nerve tests done. They looked at me in MRIs and CT-scans, and I have no indicators of any diseases or conditions. Could be my own unique case, or it could be that I have a disk fucked up and they didn't MRI my lower area of my back like I asked them to. I'm going with the latter, and thinking I may need some back surgery.

[Tuttifrutti]

Poor Wkff. :(

[Wallow]

Yea, I think I have a disk fucked up or something. I have to talk to a neurologist and have some nerve tests done. They looked at me in MRIs and CT-scans, and I have no indicators of any diseases or conditions. Could be my own unique case, or it could be that I have a disk fucked up and they didn't MRI my lower area of my back like I asked them to. I'm going with the latter, and thinking I may need some back surgery.

That sucks, although whatever you have might be genetic. Do you know anyone in your family with sleep induced paralysis or back problems?

[Draco2003]

Actually I read about sleep paralysis about 1 year and a half ago. Although many people believe it to be something totally different.

Anyways, when you sleep, your brain disables many motor functions and only keeps the most necessary on, so that you aren't "acting out" any dream you might be having. The paralysis usually occurs when an individual is abrupty awakened, or simply wakes up before his brain has a chance to "turn on" the rest of the body. As a result, the brain ends up running a systems check and a reboot to get you up to speed.

[Willkillforfood]

Yea. Well, I woke up today without any paralysis. My back still hurts though. They supposedly MRI'd the spot where it hurts, but didn't find anything. Might be some nerve issues. I still think there's some swelling, a disk fucked up, or something. It's not HORRIBLE but yesterday when I sat up and walked for just an hour and some change it didn't feel so great.

[Jessifer]

Heh, yeah. Before I knew what the hell I was going through I thought it was maybe some weird dreams or something. Usually I end up falling back asleep and waking up fine with all systems operational later on.