I don't know how many of you are prone to sleep paralysis and hypnopompia. I am, to an annoying extent.

As with everything in life, there are good and bad things to be derived from mornings spent tripping balls in a state of total helplessness. On one hand, it's an odd and unsettling experience which, if you're working on a novel, like myself, can be used to torment your favorite character in entertaining ways. On the other hand, it can be highly inconvenient, and not just because it can make you late getting up.

For instance, consider false awakenings. Among other things, Wikipedia has the following to say on their subject:

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A false awakening may occur either following an ordinary dream or following a lucid dream (one in which the dreamer has been aware that he or she is dreaming). Particularly if the false awakening follows a lucid dream, the false awakening may turn into a ‘pre-lucid dream' (Green, 1968), that is, one in which the dreamer may start to wonder if he or she is really awake and may or may not come to the correct conclusion. More commonly, dreamers will believe they are awake.

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That pretty much nails it for me, except I don't have lucid dreams as a rule - or maybe I do. To be honest, I'm not completely sure what precisely a lucid dream entails. I don't often end up both asleep and aware of being asleep is what I mean.

Sleeping usually plays out one of four ways for me. Sometimes, I sleep without any dreams, or I can't recall having dreamt, which amounts to the same thing. Alternatively, I might recall having dreamt but the actual dreams elude recollection. But most often, I dream, and it sticks: I will wake up with the whole sequence of dreams partially or entirely preserved for repeat perusal, which can be good for a chuckle or a cringe over my morning oatmeal. On the occasions when the dream leaves an impression and involves nothing obscene or too compromising - and I don't have anything better to do that morning - I record it.

Option four is my least favorite of all: I end up caught in a loop of false awakenings. I usually go through at least four of five before I manage to wake up for real.

Today, I wake up with a headache from hell - entirely undeserved, since I'd had no alcohol that night. My alarm clock glows at me in silent accusation from the dresser. I remember that I've already been awakened fourty minutes ago, when my boy called me from work to say good morning, as is his custom.

(I work from home and almost always sleep in late. In general, I can and will sleep as long as I'm allowed. My record is eighteen consecutive uninterrupted hours. I'll readily admit to being horrendously lazy, but it isn't just that - I really do have a difficult time attaining wakefulness.)

I have only the vaguest recollection of speaking with him. No matter; the phone call may have failed to rouse me, but I'm here now. I'm ready to start the day. Upsy daisy.

...

I said, upsy daisy!

...

After several minutes of continuous fail, I sag back into the mattress. I can't move a muscle. The sun is shining cheerily into my pupils, and someone invisible and infinitely cruel is crushing my head in a vise. I give up and close my eyes for a second to regroup in the soothing dark.

When I open them again, I've lost half an hour.

I try to move again. Success! My legs swing over the edge of the bed and I am up and about. Oddly enough, I don't feel sleepy or heavy, and all my muscles are obeying me perfectly.

Uh oh.

The world dissolves.

...

When I open my eyes, I'm still in bed. The alarm clock informs me spitefully that it's been another fifteen minutes. Irritated and now in need of the watercloset, I tear away my blanket, roll out of bed... and plunge hundreds of feet to the ground from the thirty-fourth floor.

I land back into my bed and open my eyes. It's been another ten minutes or so. Herds of drunk mountain trolls are holding a clog-dance in my skull. I am in desperate need of either cyanide or paracetamol - whichever one I can get to first.

It turns out to be paracetamol. Three capsules down the hatch - then back to bed and screw getting up. It'll happen when it happens.

When I wake up for the last time, my head is relatively clear; I can move all my limbs; and when I get out of bed, I feel the shag of the carpet under my feet. All good signs. However, my headache is still in full force. Did I take that paracetamol or was it just another dream? I taste bitterness. Did I or didn't I?

It's a moot point. I probably didn't, but I can't risk taking more - my liver and I are not on best terms. By mid-afternoon or so, the headache goes away on its own, and the day can finally begin in earnest.