I have posted this message on a couple of ghost sites because I want to help people who suffer from this little known syndrome. My story:
I came from a very troubled family. My father was sadistic, and my mother had been instituionilzed for schizophrernia for a portion of my childhood, leaving me alone with my sick, cruel father. I had spent some time in a children's home. As well, we lived in a trailer most of my childhood, because of my father's job. I had a really lousy childhood.
When I was 11 we stopped moving around and settled in a suburb outside of Atlanta. At this time I started to have very frightening experiences at night.
I would wake up and I would be under attack. A hand would be clutching at me, pulling at my hair, scratching and most often strangling me. I wouuld be fighting off this horribly strong attacker, hollering and I would even be off my bed down on the floor I was having such a struggle. Eventually, I would understand that I was fighting my own hand. Once I realized this my hand (my left) would just start acting like my hand again. This did not happen every night or every week, but it happened over the course of several years, 12-15.
My parents never understood that this wasn't a nightmare. I barricaded myself in my room every night. My mama slept with a shotgun sometimes and Daddy was just pure evil and usually spoiling for a fight.
They took me to a psychatirst once. I didn't mention anything to him. I was so afraid, because my of mom having shock treatment, that I kept it to myself.
Back then I told myself that there were two possible explanations.
Demon Possession, which wasn't very likely and I didn't really believe it. The second explanation was that I was unhappy and wanted to die, and I was too chicken to committ suicide while awake, and was trying to do the deed in my sleep. This is what I truly believed.
Eventually, this stopped happening. I married at 16 and shook dust of my childhood off my feet. After my marrriage, I had several episodes of sleep paralysis. The last one occured when I was 20 and pregnant, and I seemed to have a really hard time coming out. I had a lavender/ white flashing light pattern (like a cop light, but lavendar and white)
and then that never happened again either.
So, my life went on until I was in my upper forties. A segment of
20/20 came on Television. The subject of the show was called
Alien Hand Syndrome. This sydrome causes the afflicted persons hand to move of its own violition. There were people who has this syndrome on TV. They had it waking and sleeping. They'd be trying to button their sweater and the alien hand would be unbuttoning.
Little is known about the causes of this syndrome. Even my GP didn't know about it. The internet has lots of examples, but they are in the technical jargon of medical terms and I ususally can't get much out of them.
The little that is known--
Alien Hand Syndrome usually affects young girls, pre puberty to adolescent.
It is thought to be a mis-firing of the frontal lobe of the brain.
It usually goes away on its own.
So, I tell my story, so that other young girls don't have to go through this sydrome without a clue.
