CW: insomnia, detailed descriptions of distressing hallucinations, may or may not be triggering for some people

hypnagogia trouble

hi kids!!!

I can consider myself pretty lucky in that I have slept exceptionally well for the last few years, even when subjected to highly irregular sleep schedules, sleep deprivation, and all sorts of other profoundly unhealthy behaviors. this didn't always use to be the case though. back when I was a little kid I would have nightmares all the time, and I was absolutely terrified of the act of falling asleep -- who wouldn't? you literally lose consciousness! and you are more or less aware of the whole shebang as it happens! how terrifying is that?

and yet at some point I learned, uhm, not to care, I guess? my mind was finally at peace throughout hypnagogia, and other than the occasional hypnic jerk or head explosion, falling asleep was a relatively painless process.

i.e. until yesterday, when I decided, in my infinite wisdom, to read basically every wikipedia article related to sleep onset (and later sleep disorders.) funnily enough I ended up in that rabbit hole while reading about mind machines (hey who doesn't want to see some cool form constants and hear singing voices every once in a while?) but ANYWAY, the point is that I equipped my subconscious with all the necessary tools to make me feel anxiety about sleep AGAIN.

actually I was in pretty high spirits when I headed for the bed last night. I dare say my mind was pretty calm; I had basically forgotten about all of the important research I had done earlier in the day, and it wasn't until a few minutes passed that shit hit the fan. my recollection is very vague so I'm not sure whether I'm going to get the order of stuff right. I think what really set off the whole thing was a hypnic jerk (?) after which my subconscious started torturing me about being perfectly aware right there, as I was about to enter stage 1 NREM; so of course the only natural response to dealing with that anxiety is to cling to awareness like it's the last thing you're going to do! and cling to it I did, desperately trying to close my eyes as I kept opening them again seconds after, keenly aware of all the strange signs of sleep onset -- disorganized and illogical thoughts that make perfect sense, words you can't pronounce, and... indeed as time went on the hypnagogic hallucinations kicked in, and as if all the above wasn't enough, now I had to deal with strange whispers, my bed being rocked back and forth unceremoniously at a fairly high frequency, a freaking laser show on colorful static every time I closed my eyes (which progressively started bleeding into my open eyed vision) and more importantly, the panic ellicited by all the aforementioned phenomena. frankly I am amazed that I didn't just turn on the lights and try to wake myself up, I guess I was being held hostage by the bed in a strange way that's hard to really put to words. like the choice was never really given to me at any point, you know? maybe my head was already too busy with everything else... not to mention I really had to sleep at all costs, I was already sleep deprived from the day before, and I really couldn't afford to not sleep for the night.

this went on for what felt like hours (and to be honest might literally have been -- I logged off IRC at around 1 in the morning, which means I probably made it to bed by around 2; and I'm prety sure at one point I heard the bell tower strike 5) at which point I involuntarily thought something along the lines of "hey, wouldn't it be funny if I started seeing spiders, which I so delight in seeing?". yeah, spiders promptly appeared. spiders of all sorts of strange shapes, not too realistic looking, not necessarily scary, but very unsettling. and after one of them persisted after I opened my eyes, superimposed on the wall over the angle formed by the bottom edge of my bedframe and the window, I decided it was time to abort mission. so I groggily got out of bed and stumbled my way to the fridge to hydrate myself, which seemed to return me to a more or less baseline state of consciousness.

I drank some, and decided to take some melatonin. I have been off melatonin for quite a while now, (after finding out I could actually sleep quite well without it) but I still keep some around. to be honest I have no idea whether it actually did anything. after a while I did end up calming down and falling asleep, but at first, the second I made it back to bed my entire vision literally started swirling around the center, even with my eyes open. anyway, I don't really remember what happened at this point too well, but at some point the fear slowly started evaporating away. it was an extremely gradual process, like I could feel myself regaining my bearings bit by bit in a process that lasted probably about an hour, but eventually I fell asleep proper.

this last bit actually brings me hope that this wasn't just myself inducing myself into it with fear and paranoia, but rather that something really went wrong in my head, which means that today it will hopefully be back to normal? I hope??? I am honestly terrified of sleeping today, which I'll do in maybe a couple hours. I honestly fucking hope I won't experience the same thing again, because I really fucken need sleep!! aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahkjsfsdkljhfl;ksdjhfaklsd

dream

ahem- anyway, now that I started telling the tale I might as well finish. once I fell back asleep I had a dream, which was surprisingly calm. I mean, it wasn't the most pleasant dream I've ever had, but considering what preceded it I'm honestly more than happy to have had it. perhaps it wasn't as vivid as you may expect a melatonin dream to be, but it was enough for me to hold on to it even as waking amnesia kicked in.

I don't recall it super well, but I do think some themes from recent dreams recurred -- there was some sort of hike up a fairly broad gently sloped dirt path under the shadow of oak trees on either side, and mossy boulders also on the sides I would get up on occasionally, the top side of which would reveal itself to be quite expansive and intricate. it also included the "hard-boiled wisdom" trope, so to speak, potentially emanating from some young guy (instead of the stereotypical old beareded man) though I'm not sure whether this was merely a vague idea, purely semantic in nature, or whether it was actually reified into a flesh-and-bones dream character (if so I really can't recall it.) anyway, this section was pretty vague, and I'm pretty sure I've had it in the past already.

after that happened, I found myself in a sort of "concrete maze", with large walls neither far nor near from my position, kinda like the concrete house section of myhouse.wad. I slid down a concrete ramp as a steel door opened to allow me passage onto a ramp that went back up (presumably to the outside world, though I'm not sure whether there was a middle section here I'm missing.) my family was there (parents, maternal grandparents and possibly sibling (?)) and talked with the sort of "affable condescension" characteristic of dream people in that sort of emtional landscape (sorry, this really can't be put to words too well.) as we went back out into the outside, we found ourselves under a bright clear blue sky on a somewhat flat tract of land, the exterior concrete wall behind us, and a terrace that overlooked the ocean in front, with forested sections on either side. the theme of hiking survived to this point, since someone mentioned that we were going on a hike. it was going to be a 50km hike, but the way back was going to be 60km; I distinctly recall both numbers. anyway, I think I woke up at around that point.

closing thoughts

I really, *really* hope this won't happen again tonight. I still can't tell whether the melatonin helped at all. the symptoms greatly worsened once I made it back to bed, but surely orally taken melatonin couldn't have possibly reached my bloodstream THAT fast. maybe the gradual calming down process WAS caused by the melatonin; but who knows, maybe it would have happened on its own.

I still haven't managed to track down what the labcoats call this. it matches up decently with the symptoms of night terrors other than the fact that a) I did not run around the house screaming and kicking random objects, b) I am a grown adult, and, perhaps most importantly, c) I was most certainly *not* asleep, and I did *not* experience ANY amnesia about the whole shebang.

hypnagogic hallucinations are a very broad topic, but I did find this paper which presents some anecdotal evidence that melatonin really may help mitigate them (so my intuitions were probably right?) :o

Liudmila Lysenko and Sushanth Bhat, 2018

I am still terrified of going to sleep tonight. I guess if the hallucinations haunt me again I'll try taking a 5mg dose of melatonin. (read: will eyeball a few drops, I can't actually measure the dose lol, this is cheap OTC stuff whaddayawant.)

ughhh, I prolly do need to start heading to bed though. oh wellll. I hope you may have an easier time finding sleep. I hope I will too. I hope. take care folks. <3

oh also, I haven't proofread any of this, I'm too freckin tired. TOO bad, you WILL put up with my sloppy writing and you WILL enjoy it.