Night Terror
Sudden awakening from sleep, persistent fear or terror that occurs at
night, screaming, sweating, confusion, rapid heart rate, inability to
explain what happened, usually no recall of “bad dreams” or nightmares,
may have a vague sense of frightening images. Many people see spiders,
snakes, animals or people in the room, are unable to fully awake,
difficult to comfort, with no memory of the event on awakening the next
day.
I am about to let the world in on something very personal to me.
But I do it because I think it will be a blessing to those who read this.
Lima, Peru: I am lying in my bed extremely tired but I can’t fall back asleep. 30 minutes ago I had just had a really bad night terror. My body was completely flung out of the top bunk bed where I was sleeping. I can hear the other 3 guys(Eli, Robby and Matt S.) I am staying with talking about what happened. They ask me if I am okay. I snap back in a rude manner. I feel really angry for no apparent reason.
I then notice something really weird. I can not move. I want to get up to open the door of our room but I can’t. My body will not move.
They then ask me if they can pray for me. I feel like responding angrily but because of my previous revelation of not being able to move I agree.
I have suffered from night terrors since I was 8 years old.
During night terrors I have jumped a flight of stairs. Hid underneath my bed. Crawled across the ground. Tried to run out of my house. I have woken up in other parts of where I am staying sweating, heart pounding, scared out of my mind. I have bruised my knee and cut up my hands trying to escape whatever is terrorizing me in my dream.
It is has been a constant source of shame and embarrassment my entire life. The fear of staying at a friend’s house because what if it happens there? The embarrassment of waking up the next day with people that have never seen a night terror before. People would react differently. Some would freak out and others would just make it into a big joke.
But to me it has never been a joke.
They got really bad my junior year in college. Growing up I had one maybe once every 3-4 months. My junior year they were happening 2-3 times a week. My roommates couldn’t sleep and I was getting pretty concerned. I will pray for healing I told my roommate. So that is what I did. I believed God would do it.
I told my roommate that God healed me and they would not happen again. That same night I had another one. So I decided to go to a Christian counselor during Christmas break. Maybe he can figure out what is wrong with me.
He talked to me about the physical side of night terrors and what I could do to minimize them. I followed his advice and over the past two years although I still have night terrors they happened much less frequently.
The biggest thing he convinced me of though was that this was just something I had to deal with. It was just part of who I am. Kind of like someone that has bad eyesight or diabetes, this was just something I had to deal with. And so I accepted it as part of my life.
Two nights before I had my night terror in Lima, Robby was told by the pastor that leads us at debriefs that he needs to pray these night terrors out of my life before we left Lima.
It was our last night there. We hadn’t prayed.
The three guys gather around my bed to pray for me. They are nervous because the room feels very different. Not to mention that when they are in the room they feel sick and when they left it they felt completely fine.
They begin praying and as they do I feel very weird. I begin sweating and I still can’t move. They start praying against whatever evil presence is in the room. My chest starts to heave up and down and my legs begin to flail up in the air.
I tell one of them to go get our leader Rusty. Because I am feeling like we need more people to pray against whatever is terrorizing me.
Rusty comes but I get this strong feeling that all the guys need to be there. I tell someone to go wake everyone up. Its 2 a.m. and all the guys get up and come into the room to pray for me.
Robby is now on the bed with me with his hand over my chest. The guys are praying passionately and they encourage me to do the same. But there is a huge problem.
Read the rest in Night Terror Part II
