are people who suffer from night terrors really just possessed by the devil?

Question

In a typical episode, you will sit up in bed and pierce the night with a "blood-curdling" scream or shout. This scream can include kicking and thrashing. You may say or shout things that others are unable to understand. You will also have a look of intense fear with eyes wide open and heart racing. You may also sweat, breathe heavily and be very tense. At times, you may even bolt out of bed and run around the house. This response is more common in adults. It may also lead to violent actions

http://www.sleepeducation.com/Disorder.aspx?id=13

is this proof of satan's control over people? or just another medical mystery that people could equate with satan because we don't have the answers yet?

shadow wolf - actually i'm pagan. i don't think anyone read the last line of my post and really "got" the message i was trying to convey

Answer 1

I am a christian and I believe Night Terrors are a medical issue...Poor People...we all experience Bad dreams, but for those who experience Night terrors, it is much worse.

Just an opinion.

Answer 2

Night terrors are caused by intense adrenaline production during the upward chemical release during a REM cycle. It happens with small children quite frequently during growth spurts or periods of stress...sometimes if they are exhausted or sleeping in the heat. The adrenaline rush is registered by the brain as "fear" and a dream, most of the time a rapid succession of dreams,which are often forgotten along with the reason they awoke, will formulate and fear or "terror" is experianced even though the images themselves were not frightening. They will fall right back to a peaceful sleep. The opposite of this is night paralysis where a dream occurs and the adrenaline is released on the downward cycle of the REM sequence and a person will be partially conscious and undergo the sensation of not being able to move while experiencing a full dream sequence...dreaming you are awake but stuck in a dream...weird stuff like that...It has nothing to do with being possessed by a devil. Most of the time these types of sleep issues are rare but occur due to stress, exhuastion or chemical imbalances for various reasons. Anything that is not of God is of the devil...Satan has all kinds of methods to influence our lives and impact us in various different ways but demon possession is an extreme occurance and shouldn't be attributed to everyday "bad" stuff that can happen to someone. Its an imperfect, crazy screwed up world we live in and due the circumstances of being the devils playground this is just one small indicator, a drop in the bucket, of how much we need God. After all, who glorifies God when we have a euphorical bliss filled dream of exhileration. I experience those from time to time and often the dreams are filled with color, vivid scenes of beauty and problem resolving solutions...of course I can never remember what the solution was when I wake up..but I never let that detract from having such an awesome dream. Love in Christ, ~J~ P. S. if you are having issues...listen to christian radio/music before you fall asleep, pray and read your Bible. I do...

Answer 3

Nightmares are just people with active brains, or maybe under stress. Everything we think about during the day or some thing that happened to us, comes back to us all jumbled up into one big nightmare,just the brain letting off steam so to speak. Also people have a choice who they will follow. Sure if a person right into doing Satanic rites and things, yes I would say Satan who knows, weirer things has happened to people.

Answer 4

You are describing a kind of epileptic episode, darling. Epileptic fits often occur in the night and sometimes look like this. Epilepsy is related to disordered electrical neural firing in the brain --not demons.

There also is a disorder called REM sleep behavior disorder (often seen in people with certain neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson disease) in which the chemicals and neurons in the brain that keep the body still while asleep don't work--so people act out their dreams, which tend to be nightmarish. Sometimes they can seriously hurt themselves or their bed partners. They are wholly unconscioius during these episodes.

Neither epilepsy nor REM sleep behavior disorder or night terrors or sleep paralysis are medical "mysteries" and they are definitely not caused by demons. They are caused by neurochemical and neuroelectrical imbalances caused by genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors.

Answer 5

let me tell you a story:

there was once this little boy that had awful night terrors. his mother, a fundamentalist Christian, did what any fundamentalist would do; she took him to a Christian therapist (read quack) instead of a trained medical professional. This quack advocated a theory of "demon oppression" as an explanation for the night terrors, effectively confirming the existence of the bogey-man for this 6 year old kid.

it was never thought or discussed that the cause might be because the kids mom left the kid at home with babysitters all night long (or sometimes even alone) because the mom worked graveyard shift.

i was that kid. that was my mom. and your Christian friends do more harm to children than your fictitious Satan ever could.

Answer 6

NO THERE ARE VARIOUS OTHER FACTORS
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It is definitely not Devil.

Occassionally I have very wild and scary dreams, I am shuddered as I feel someone is asphyxiating me. I struggle to free myself, in the dream that is. I wake up shuddered and then I realize that my hand is numb because I was keeping it as a pillow and the blood circulation was affected.

There are other factors like geographical and security concerns.

Anyway it need not be devlish or psychological.

Answer 7

Did you ever hear of a little thing called the witch trials? An inquiry lead by ignorant fools that held numerous well to do people accountable for all the problems occurring at the time. In reality it was a ploy to attain their land. But you have to understand that it was devout religious individuals, like I'm guessing you are, that condemned their neighbors so quickly for things that later science proved were common physical or psychological ailments. Fanaticism is the veil of ignorance.

Ps
I think the devil would have better things to do with his time than to personally possess someone that has no political influence.

Answer 8

If it is possession then it has a really strange demon attached to it. I have had the same night terror for years and finally went to a therapist who proscribed Elavil. Can we say... cured?

I'm a Pagan and a Witch and like everyone else I have had my personal demons to exorcise!

Answer 9

Since there is no such thing as god or satan (god, supposedly being all-powerful wouldn't allow satan to assault a sleeping human...that would be unchristian of him), I'd say that there is a reasonable physiological explanation for this phenomenon.

Whatever you do, don't listen to christian radio before you sleep or you might actually induce the night terrors..

Answer 10

No its a psychological problem.

Besides what would make you think its the devil? How do you know its not god he brings far far far more destruction and terror on people in the bible then Satan does and heck Satan had to ask for permission before he could do anything.