I never thought the arm was someone else, but a few times my arm was so asleep that I could not move it and it was completely numb.
Is that sensation really caused by loss of blood flow? You’d think that if your arm wasn’t getting enough blood for your nerves to function properly and had been cut off like that for possibly hours it would cause some damage. I think it’s more likely to be caused my pressure on an important nerve or something.
Badtz Maru: As a regular sufferer of this affliction, I asked myself the same question and checked it out. Good news, it seems: the blood is still oozing its way around when a limb “goes to sleep”. All that has happened is, the nerves have been blocked off.
flails wildly in the darkness as numb hand grabs his face
Glad everyone is enjoying this thread so much.
It is making me think I should start some threads on some of the even more embarrassing things I have managed to do to myself.
Lighten up and face the truth, Stofsky. Fiendish mentioned
Clinton because he has a REPUTATION for being in strange
beds and compromising positions: Hotel rooms with unwilling
prey, backstage with nightclub singers, with a 21 year old in the Oval office, behind the scenes with a lusty Janet Reno, Greg Normans hot tub (which wouldnt have been found out if the idiot wasnt such a clutz) etc. etc. Havent you been watching SNL the past 8 years?
Geez, if you cant handle a little well-deserved “crapping”,
as you say, maybe YOU should stand in line to “comfort” the
poor guy.
I did something similar but more extreme on a school bus in high school.
I was doing homework on the way to school (about a 40 minute ride). I had scrunched down in the seat and put my knees up on the seat in front of me. My jeans dug into the back of my knees pretty well in that position. I was so caught up in doing my homework, when I looked up, everyone was getting off the bus at the school.
Oh crap, get up quick. Well, I had no sensation in either leg from the knee down. I was totally screwed trying to get off the bus. The only reason I stayed upright was because I maintained a death grip on nearby seat backs.
ScottH, sounds like you’ve managed to give yourself quite a scare! When this happens without the weird sleeping position, it’s a documented neurological problem (sorry can’t find the cites) related to loss of body sense and sensation. Like Hemlock, it’s noted by awaking to a sensation that the hand is a strangers and attempting to throw it out of bed.
I recall that patients with severe cases of this dissocation would insist that someone had sewn hands onto their arms! Seemed to be a morning thing that would go away quickly. I think one indication of rationality would be to add “Is my arm asleep” to your mental checklist! Though I’m sure it would be creepy, nontheless.
-AOS
I’ve never experienced this phenomenon personally, but my dad told me that years ago he went to sleep, his arm fell asleep, and then he nearly dislocated his shoulder when he awakened with this thing in bed with him. Thinking it was the cat he tossed it out of bed–where it flopped over the edge.
I would have paid to see that, but I think I was a baby at the time.
The Vacant Lot had a particularly funny song/skit based on waking up with your arms asleep.
Here’s the transcript. There’s also an mp3 link from the site to a performance of the song.
This reminds me of a hilarious comedy song done by a some bunch on Comedy Central a few years back (no, not the Kids) One guy singing a honky tonk style, while a geek flails around behind
“Slept on his arms last night
Now he’s got no feeling in his left arm or his right…”
No, but seriously, does this remind anyone but me of the Ray Bradbury (I think) story of the butcher whose left hand starts a life of its own? For instance he wakes up, and his hand is groping at his throat…
Hope you can sleep tonight…
Psst! Zach, see my link above.
Okay, I’m busted. I reponded before reading all the posts. I won’t do it again, I swear!
BTW, Thanks for the link, HomeBrew. Hey, what’s it like being drunk?
Speaking of drunk, I had a friend in college, affectionately known as “Rabbit,” who passed out sitting up in a chair with one arm hanging over the chair back, so that the top of the chair was pressed against his armpit area. Several hours later Rabitt awakened with his arm completely paralyzed.
Minutes later, no change.
A couple hours later, still no feeling or control of drunken arm.
next day, still no change!
Believe it or not, it was several weeks before Rabbit had regained full function and feeling of his bourbon arm.
He switched to beer, fortified wine, and funnels after that.
Kinda like sober, only more fun.
[Douglas Adams]Ask a glass of water.[/DA]
But if you went to sleep with a handful of coke it might make your hand numb. Sooo…if you wake up with a numb hand on your face it’s probably Bill Clinton who’s in bed with you and the only reason Bush is there is he’s trying to pry the coke out of Bill’s hand? Or something?
Maybe I should go back to sleep.
What was that movie? The living dead?
His hand is attacking him so he grabs a chain saw and starts hacking off his hand.
He is laughing hysterically saying, “now how’s laughing”
I think in the sequel he has the chain saw where his hand should be.
The point being - don’t keep a chain saw beside your bed okay.
Aside from the random dead limb while sleeping, I have very good recall of my first experience with sleep paralysis. OK, pretty good recall, because I honestly don’t remember the year - somewhere around 1992 or so. Oddly, I was in my doubting phase of religious belief, and it was the night before Easter, and I had asked God for some sort of sign that he was real - so I drifted off to sleep, only to bolt awake at some point. I found myself staring the ceiling with an odd tingling sensation coarsing up my legs and throughout my body (sadly, nothing sexual) and was completely paralyzed. While my body just kind of laid there, I was panicking inside… at some point, the ol’brain went back to sleep, but I remembered it clearly the next morning and thought maybe I had gotten my sign. That is, until a day or two later the Discovery Channel discussed the topic of sleep paralysis.
Moral of the story: The Discovery Channel made me an atheist.
LOL I had the exact same thing happen to me! I’ve always been afraid of thunderstorms so I would go downstairs and sleep on the couch where the noise was not as loud.
Somehow I managed to get my arm over my head so my hand was resting on my face.
Scared the HELL out of me! I remember waking up with a panic and then trying to fling/slap this cold “thing” away from me several times. When it continued to flap down onto my face, I decided to find out where this alien hand was coming from.
I sat and patted my way down the arm until I realized it was attached to me! I breathed a sigh of relief that I didn’t scream and wake up my parents!
My dad snores and one night when I was sleeping on the couch he was snoring like Darth Vader’s iron lung and scared me do death until I remember that it was just a movie and it couldn’t actually be happening!
This reminds me of the Oliver Sacks (doctor from Awakenings) book, “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for A Hat.” He has several studies of people who refuse to believe their own limbs (attached to their bodies) are their own. Very interesting book about how our minds can betray us.
The last time something like that happened to me, I got up without realising my leg had gone dead on me, and promptly fell over unto the lap of a guy. Had to sit there for quite a while before I could muster enough feeling in my leg to get up.
Good way to meet a cute guy, for those who are looking for ideas.
As for me, that never happened again. Way too embarassing. Now I check my leg to make sure it’s not asleep before I put my weight on it.
Which brings me to my sleeping related questions…