WarpMyMind

I know a girl that occassionally has night terrors. She'll get up in the middle of the night, acting and speaking like she's awake. Then she'll go back to bed and won't remember a thing when she gets up in the morning.

I know that she's obviously in some kind of altered consciousness when she has an episode, so I assume that opens up access to parts of her mind. Maybe as long as the door is open, I can enter a suggestion or ask some interesting questions, you know? Is there anything I could/should/shouldn't do when I'm around when it happens again? Does anyone have any experience with people who has these?

I was asked this question by a guy on chat fairly recently.

Unfortunately, I can't give you any advice, as I've been unable to find previous research on the subject. However, I will reiterate what I told the guy: Ask her first. Whether this is a suggestible state or not, she's almost certainly feeling vulnerable and afraid. Even if you have the best intentions in the world (which the other guy certainly didn't, trying to take advantage of a friend's memory lapse. I hope your plans are more honorable), having your mind tampered with is already scary to most people. You don't want to make that worse.

Different people's minds are different. So discuss it with her, talk about exactly what you'd think of suggesting. And then (assuming she's comfortable with that), try it and see. I'm sure there's plenty of people on here who'd be glad to hear your results.

My intentions for suggestions were honorable, I guess... Mostly to help her deal with sleeping and the night terrors. Though my thought to ask questions for potentially honest answers probably wasn't so honorable. :oops: Mostly I was concerned with what not to do so I don't make matters worse.

My advice is to wake them up.

A common but untrue belief.They are only a danger to themsleves if they stay in that state.

OOOps pressed post by accident - there are also the many known cases of family members that have been murdered by there sleepwalking relatives. You say your in fight /flight mode when having your night terrors,to me says you could be a serious danger to anyone asleep as you might involve them in part of your night terror mistakingly.

You know I just thought about something. I think that it may be possible to use lucid dreaming to deal with these night terrors. It couldn't hurt to try it.

I've read about different things that can cause night terrors. But I guess the point of my original post is what you can do with the person once they're in that state. It just seems like such an opportunity...