I remember hearing on TV about this condition which I seem to have where a person is asleep, nothing out of the ordinary (no dreams/nightmares). Then suddenly they may open their eyes and be totally awake mentally, but their body is physically still paralyzed from the sleep. The show mentioned this as a cause of alien abduction reports where people wake up but can't move anything, and they also have a dream on top of this. But in my case, I just begin to wake up, and naturally want to stretch and move, but feel "restricted" to the point my whole body jerks and I sit completely up (often in the middle of the night). It's not something that happens on a regular basis, so I don't see it as a problem, but just something I would like to share and perhaps get feedback from others. Anyone else have a similar condition where they wake up "out of sync" and feel like they can't move for a brief moment? I'm sure this is more common the other way around where you begin moving around before you're mentally in the awake state. Anyone know the term for this, also? Thanks!

It is a form of Narcolepsy.

Here is a site you might by interested in.

Sleep Paralysis

Thanks. I thought it had a different term, but that's the condition I seem to have. I just never thought of it as a form of Narcolepsy before. Personally, I don't become fearful or 'aware of another prescence' around me, I realize right away that I can't move and I try to force myself to move, amounting to a lurch into the sitting upright position. It happens so quickly (around a second or less) that I at first thought it to be caused by a dream (which I rarely have). I'd be interested to know how many other people have similar experiences, diagnosed as such or not. Thanks again, joc.

your welcome If it happens frequently you may want to see a doctor. It could be a symptom of something else and you should never self-diagnose an illness from research
you've done. Take care.

It's not frequent at all; it happens maybe once a month, if that. It's just random and probably linked to something genetic, since my aunt has Narcolepsy. As long as I don't think I see little green men playing with my 'little man', there's no problem. Just curious since it's not a popular sleep disorder topic other than what you'd find as a skeptical response to alien abduction stories. Anyway, I thought this would be the best place to look for information.

Actually the best place to find information would be to type in Sleep Paralysis into your Google search engine. That's where I found the link, although, I have studied Narcolepsy so I was already familiar with your question.

btw, welcome to the forum!

Thanks. I was just under the assumption that it was called something other than that (which is quite obvious, since I gave it that title). But most sites don't list it as a type of sleep disorder. And then again, how many open-minded medical sites are there? I doubt WebMD would have a section on "Sleep Paralysis parallels alien abduction reports".