The 21st of September 2008 I spent the night in a remote campground in the Lewis and Clark National Forest in Montana. This is one of my brother’s favorite campgrounds and I had camped here with him in 2005.
I arrived at the site about an hour after dark. There was one other camper, in a motor home on the other loop. Normally it would make me a little nervous pulling in and sleeping in a strange area but I had camped here before and I remembered the surroundings. The campground is along a creek nestled in the bottom of a little valley. Recording conditions were going to be perfect. I got out of my car and looked around. There was no wind and the creek was dried up, obviously only running during the winter and spring. The air was perfectly still.
I placed my microphone outside on my car’s driver side mirror and ran the cord through the window to the recorder which I placed on the dash.
I woke up four or five times during the night and looked around but seeing nothing quickly went back to sleep. At about 4 a.m. I woke up and just felt like something was very close to my car. I started to sit up and look around but couldn’t. Even though my mind said sit-up my body did not respond.
I quickly went back to sleep.
So what was this feeling I had? Was some animal close to my car? Was I paralyzed, why couldn’t I move? Was it just a bad dream or the old hag syndrome. Was it infrasound?
To read about the old hag syndrome see:
Starting at about 4 a.m. the recordings do show that something was close to my car. Now I can not say whether it was a deer, perhaps a black bear or some other unknown visitor.
Click here to listen to sound clip:Â Â Â Grunt 2
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Spectral View
Click here to listen to sound clip: Â Â Rock Hitting Glass 1
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Spectral View
The campground was very quiet and what was outside my car was very quiet also and although you can hear rustling the only sound of sufficient volume is this one sound clip. I do not know the maker of the sound. So did I record the Old Hag or something else?
Hi Stan-
This has happened to me three times. Once in a remote camp in the Sierras when something was moving around outside the tent, and twice as a teeneger when it seemed that something was looking into my bedroom window.
The paralysis is frightening, but the fact that I fell asleep each time is also quite curious since I was literally petrified.
Curious…
Stan, I have experienced sleep paralysis and it is the strangest experience. Even though everything in your being is screaming at you to wake up and defend yourself, you just can't wake up. It's quite possible that you are acutely frightened at what you think might be taking place and you are just flat out paralyzed with fear. The thing is, when you wake up you remember the experience and the reaction to what ever you thought it was defies understanding. During my experience, I was aware of a knock on the door and I opened it. The door lead to the back porch of my apartment. It was the dead of winter and snow was blowing around that night. When I opened the door I remember a great fear and immediately closed and locked my door. As it turned out, that door WOULDN'T lock so I wasn't really protected after all. I will always wonder why I got up and answered that door – or maybe I was having a nightmare and didn't and I only thought I had. If I actually got up, I was walking and acting in my sleep. I've had other experiences like it. The thing is, I do not normally have nightmares so maybe at those times, something really did happen.
Laurie,
Sleep paralysis does not explain the recordings of objects thrown against the car headlights. This is the only time I have ever experienced this type of event. Thanks for sharing your experience.
Stan,
Sorry I didn't see your response sooner.
No, sleep paralysis does not explain the recordings of objects being thrown against the car headlights. The recordings do, however, serve as proof that you were actually hearing something during the night that frightened you and out of that fear made it impossible for you to wake up to see what it was.
While yours and my experiences are not even remotely the same, the fear that lead to the sleep paralysis is the same. While you woke up to proof (the recording) of your experience, I had none and was left with wondering if it was a real experience or a nightmare. I believe I had a genuine experience and I've had that type of experience more then once.
Whether or not you experience the "Old Hag" syndrome or "Infrasound" via bigfoot, I don't know. In my case I prefer to think that nature has provided me with a way to be alert while sleeping when potential danger is nearby. I've had more then one experience of being shocked awake by a loud sound of thunder and lightening. I find that when I am awoken like that I am, first off, very frightened and can't really reason what has happened and why I'm scared. It has been more then once I must have shot up in bed, and I was assured by my husband that the loud noise was only thunder and lightening. My reaction at those times is very similar, and maybe even the same as my suspected experiences of sleep paralysis. The difference being, I was able to verify the experience with my husband in the morning – just like you were able to verify your experience with your recording.