Hypnagogic Hallucinations Causes | Stress and Hallucinations

Stress is often this big evil monster we hear often about which is causing all sorts of damage and havoc on our bodies, not only sleep disorders, and this article will explain that stress can also cause hallucinations, hypnagogic, hypnopompic, or other types.

Consequences of Ongoing Stress

Our body has a very good defensive system against stress and it works very good for the time around the stressful event or shortly after, but if this defensive system is “kept online” continuously then all sorts of things go wrong.

What happens is that when we experience stress the body releases cortisol hormones which are produced by the adrenal gland and the primary function of cortisol is to increase the blood sugar level while, at the same time, suppressing the immune system during prolonged times of stress.

Continuing with the destruction, cortisol, following ongoing stresses, reduces the number of brain cells, impairs brain functions like memory, kills neurons in the hippocampus part of the brain and causes premature aging of the brain. Sleep disorders, depression and other conditions quickly follow after this – quite terrible destruction by all means.

Hypnagogic Hallucinations and Stress

Stress is not directly connected to hypnagogic hallucinations or any other types of hallucinations, but the devastation that it causes in the brain produces abnormal activity in the brain, which is not able to continue performing as normal and starts making “mistakes” due to its impaired functions.

These brain errors, mistakes in processing information, confusions in memory, etc can manifest themselves as hypnagogic hallucinations.

Good News about Stress and Hypnagogic Hallucinations

Well there is a sort of a bright side to this story and that is the treatment bit. Hallucinations which are caused by stress would logically disappear once the stressful events, relationships have been taken care of. So unlike other sleep disorders and health problems where the treatment is very difficult or even impossible in this case of hypnagogic hallucinations it is surely the bright side of the issue.