Yes, it happens to me semi regularly. However I am aware each and every time “Oh crap, it’s that sleep paralysis thing going on - let’s see how long it takes to push through!” and I try to make a game of it. Can I will myself past the wall?
And yes there is usually an intruder situation happening in my brain. I have noticed the regularity of the event is tied to the amount of stress I am dealing with at any given time.
I saw her about 30 years ago standing in the corner of my room. I don’t remember having the experience again.
What still happens occasionally, though, is I’ll hear someone say my name which wakes me up. And since they’re not saying “Mom, Mom, Mom,” I know it’s not one of the kids.
The best experience I ever had was feeling like I was floating when I was half awake. I’d never felt so comfortable–I couldn’t feel the bed at all.
It happened to me once, years ago. Couldn’t move and had the the overwhelming sensation that there was a dead old woman laying next to me on the bed, on top of the covers, and that’s what was pinning me down - at least on that side. Pretty damn surreal.
I saw my landlady one time back in the 80s (unfair to call her a hag, but there you go). Dreamed she’d come to my bedroom door and opened. I couldn’t ask her what she wanted but she was gradually coming closer, then she blurted something out and rapidly closed the distance. At which point I woke up without any waking-world paralysis. Unsettling.
Yes to the sleep paralysis, no to the “hag” or to any sort of presence.
It is annoying to be awake and “stuck” but I’ve found that if I can try to mentally relax, and think about other things and lull myself back to sleep, I either DO fall asleep again fairly quickly (and then wake normally the next time) or I “un-stick” and can move around again. It seems for me that if I can fall asleep rather than un-stick, I feel better and less mentally unsettled by the experience.
I’d say it’s more annoying than terrifying, but then I pretty much knew what was going on when it happened. Probably helps that I never “felt” anything in the room with me. I wonder why?
What I really hate is the falling-asleep “crash” when all of my muscles and nerves are loosening up as I fall asleep, and then my brain goes “OMG I’M FALLING” and I feel like I just crashed back into the bed as my muscles spasm up again. That sucks, because it gets my heartbeat going so fast that it takes forever to relax down to sleep again, and it’s usually really late at night because I was soooo close to being asleep before it happened.
I experienced this (with visions of intruders, not The Hag) when I discontinued an anti-depressant. I was dreaming that there were intruders in the house, and I was trying to scream, but found that I couldn’t, although I was partially awake and aware. It was quite frightening at the time.
Just today as I was napping I dreamt that there was something on my chest, so I started to breathe. I was able to start to breathe in. Then I woke up, but I had not started breathing in real life. So I immediately started, and it was weird because it was like I took an extra-long breath without my lungs being full.
I used to experience it in my 20’s. Notable times involved a swarm of insects descending on me from the ceiling while unable to move, or rabid rats leaping from the bedside dresser on to the bed.
The most interesting recurring thing I would get during paralysis was a total disassociation from my body and being totally convinced that each of my limbs was a separate entity. A feeling of lying in bed with a whole lot of other individuals who happened to be my arms, legs and torso.
I read an interesting book that describes this and other forms of hallucination, called “Hallucinations” by neurologist/popular science writer Oliver Sacks. Fascinating stuff. He makes the point that many people experience various forms of hallucination (but may not recognize it as such).
Thank goodness, I have no personal experience of this particular type! Sounds highly unpleasant.
The other kind of night hallucination I sometimes have reminds me of the beginning of an alien abduction story. I open my eyes and for a second or two see the window on one side of the bed with the curtains wide open and a very bright light streaming in, or if I’m facing the other way, I see the bedroom door open and a very bright light coming in from the hall–when, normally, the door and curtains are shut at night and there’s no brighter light on than the nightlight in the bathroom.
Once, I saw this bright light streaming in from a window at the foot of the bed–except there is no window on that wall. There couldn’t be, since the other side of the wall is the neighbors’ bedroom in the townhouse next to mine.
Had one bout of it as a preteen (11 or 12) after getting up early, then going back to sleep for a couple of hours (this was summertime). When I woke, I. Could. Not. Move. Managed to finally make a faint noise, then it broke the “spell” and I could move just fine. I stumbled out of my room to the kitchen, sat down at the table, and burst into hysterical sobs - most likely scaring the hell out of my mother, as this was not typical behavior for me.
The next time or two it happened I at least knew that I was unlikely to die. It’s been 40+ years and I still remember that with a shudder.
No hag, though. Closest I ever came to that was “waking up” during the night and “seeing” someone climb through my bedroom window. I don’t think that was sleep paralysis per se, though quite possibly a similar phenomenon.
I remember a situation from my early childhood… I was sleeping in bed with my parents and woke up to a silhouette that resembled Veronica from Archie comics, which my sister used to read to me at the time, the mid-length hair with the curls at the neck. So seriously not the usual “Hag”. 
My most vivid experience was a few years back. I was napping on the couch in the middle of the afternoon in my small apartment when I heard my front door open and my neighbor (who I did not get along with and who had never been in my apartment) was standing over me. Seriously creepy!
It’s interesting how people of a certain culture tend to share the experience based on their cultural expectations. I think our modern day version is probably alien abduction - I think a lot of the people who claim it had some sort of sleep paralysis experience that seemed very real to them and it stuck with them.
I’ve had sleep paralysis on and off for a long time. I don’t know how frequently it happens because I tend to forget it happens unless something else reminds me, like the memory from a dream. In fact this thread reminded me that I had a minor incident of paralysis yesterday that I wouldn’t have remembered otherwise.
I’ve never seen the hag, but I’ve hallucinated insects crawling on my bed and pillow before which is unpleasant. The sensation of someone or something else being just right outside of your vision happens a lot - which is really disturbing, being convinced that just right outside what you can see is some sort of malevolent presence, but you can’t even turn your head to look. I’ve also hallucinated the sound of my doors opening and shutting and sometimes a bright light coming from it.
The episodes used to really bother me when they started. You’d wonder at first if you were actually spontaneously paralyzed. You’d scream as hard as you could in your mind and nothing would come out.
I could awaken from these episodes - I’d have to use all my might to wiggle even just a bit of my finger, and gradually I’d be able to wiggle the whole finger, and from there my hand, and very slowly you’d regain control of your body. But it’s a hassle, it’s better just to relax and fall back asleep.
When I lived with my first husband, It happened a number of times.
In the winter, he would leave for work before sunrise. I’d “wake up” just at dawn, while the light was still dim. I’d see my husband standing in the bedroom doorway. When I tried to ask what he forgot, I couldn’t speak. Then I’d realize it wasn’t him, but some amphorous, menacing figure all in black. His face was in shadow and he was much taller than my husband, his head touched the top of the door jam.
I’d become paniced, then shortly, I’d wake up for real. It was the same time of day.
After it happened a couple times, I was able to tell myself it was a dream, but I still couldn’t wake myself up. I just didn’t panic.
It hasn’t happened in years. (Touch wood. I’d hate for this thread to bring it back! 
)
I had sleep paralysis several times a week over several months about a year ago. I would concentrate on moving my finger until I could, and that broke the spell. It was always scary but I knew what was going on, and never legitimately feared for my life. Never saw a hag, but I had (what I can only think to call) pressure hallucinations. It would feel like someone was trying to rape me while I was frozen. Although I knew there was never anybody there, it was still really freaky!
I get sleep paralysis a couple of times a year. I get the feeling that a demon is about to materialize in my room and I can’t move.
Also, when I’m really tired and start to fall a sleep and especially if I half close my eyes, I get what I call “morphing” for lack of a better term, where an object, say the clock on the nightstand or a spot on a comforter will change into something else entirely, opening my eyes fully will break the spell.
Also waking up from a dream feeling like I’m falling, my body jerking in the midst of falling asleep. One time I dreamed there was a Gargoyle materializing before me. I yelled and woke up to my cat’s face a couple of inches away from mine.
I’ve never had sleep paralysis per se. Some people get the “running through quicksand” dream because their legs are shut down during sleep; but in my case it’s just I dream I’m trying to run and saying “why the Hell don’t my legs work right?”
I did have some problems with The Invisible Scary Skeletons a couple of times but not recently.
In addition to the sleep paralysis incidents I described a few posts up, I’ve had variations on this dream also. I always assumed they were exactly the same thing, differing only the whether I was actually asleep or sort-of-awake when it happens. If sort-of-awake, then it was a sleep paralysis episode. If asleep, then it was accompanied by a “running through quicksand” type of dream.
ETA: My dreams didn’t actually involve running or getting all out-of-breath. They were more like walking somewhere, and suddenly encountered an invisible force-field that bogged me down.
2 cases of sleep paralysis (both before I’d ever heard of the phenomenon - quite scary).
I found I could open and close my eyes, but do nothing else.
Being the horribly rational person that I am, I decided - either this will clear by itself or I will die (I live alone); might as well go back to sleep and see what happens next time around.
It only took a minute or two (so it seemed - I could not see a clock) before I awoke normally.
No hallucinations.
Lucid dreaming is much more fun - especially if you get to stage direct them - I wonder, if I go over to the pool, what will happen? type choices. I still can’t enter the state voluntarily, not can I have complete cotrol as to setting and companions.
Woops wrong thread.