In response to my last posting, about a patient of mine whose house is haunted, Allison Jornlin wrote:
So what relationship did hypnogogic/hypnopompic hallucinations play in the haunting:
* Did the hallucinations cause the family to imagine ghostly happenings in the waking world?
* Did the hallucinations offer a gateway for some actual entity to come into the waking world?
* Did a ghost cause the sleep disorder which resulted in the hallucinations?
I'm interested in hearing Dr. Rosen's conclusions about this very intriguing case. Did Dr. Rosen experience the ghost himself? Are there any similar cases available for the interested research[er] to review?
Unfortunately, I did not get to personally meet or experience the ghost, and, despite trying to be as open minded as possible, am still not convinced that one actually exists. It is therefore not possible for me comment on what may have allowed him to enter the waking world and to become part of this family's life. However, it is important to stress that this child did not have hallucinations upon falling or arousing from sleep ("hypnogogic" and "hypnopompic", respectively), and felt (as did the rest of the family) that the ghostly presence and its activities were unrelated to his or their sleep.
Hypnogogic and hypnopompic hallucinations are thought to be caused by intrusion of REM sleep (the stage when we dream most vividly) into wakefulness, thereby introducing dreamlike imagery into what otherwise feels like perfectly normal wakefulness. These can be very frightening, generate severe anxiety, and even can cause some to start doubting their sanity. These hallucinations are one of the hallmarks of narcolepsy, a condition that affects ~1 in 2000 individuals in the US, also characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness, sleep paralysis, and cataplexy (weakness that comes on with emotion or laughter) . The explanation of what causes this phenomenon is recent (REM sleep itself was only first described in 1953). Before this was understood, other explanations were entertained, including visitations by otherworldly, generally demonic beings, such as incubi, succubi, and vampires. The fact that these creatures were felt to be active exclusively at night is not coincidental.
For some, however, the experience of these hallucinations is so powerful, that attempts to explain them away by complicated explanations of disordered wake and sleep states seem quaint, if not ridiculous, all the more so if they can be understood as something else (nocturnal otherworldly visitations) which fits into a culturally accepted frame of reference.
