Closing eyes, feels like a big room

[Woll]

Hello,
I just signed up today because I have a question about an experience I have time to time.

Firstly, I have had 2 proper panic attacks in my life which was due to drugs, I knew the risks, I'm over them.

When I was about 11, I remember that I had this occur. It was very strange, and I am getting them now and again to this day. I hope you can help define it.

What happens is, that when I close my eyes I start to feel anxious and it feels like everything is expanding, I am in a huge empty dark space. I can't explain it well. It is not a panic attack but it is the only thing I can compare it too...

Thanks for help.

[108]

can you please be more specific, because when anyone closes their eyes, there is a "huge empty dark space"...its your eyelids covering your eyes

it sounds like you might have imagined it to be something more than what it is, and you are reacting to that?

[ilovetoast]

Oh my word!!!

I fear even posting because I've posted so much recently, but this TOTALLY rings bells with me! I've tried to explain this to others many many times and nobody has ever understood me...I hope it's similar to my experience...

Normally in bed, I feel like for some reason everything else has become massive, like a massive room, and I am tiny in the corner of it! I have sometimes even felt like I've woken and looked around the room and everything is the same...BUT...it is MASSIVE and much further away, giving the illusion that it is exactly the same but it's not...it's much bigger but further away...enourmous! It makes me feel like I am tiny, in a MASSIVE room, it extended to when my eyes were shut too at times!??!

Is this *anything* like the same thing in which you describe?

[Muggins]

I have a very similar experience except that I feel like parts of my body are five times there normal size. If you have watched Beetlejuice towards the end he is sitting nect to a guy with a really tiny head and big body - that's me! Sorry about the ramble but my meds are starting to kick in. Mel
S

[ilovetoast]

ROFLMAO! "that's me"

Is that really you? :D I jest of course...I think there's something in this size exaggeration.

Honestly though, the thought of you haveing a miniscule head is hilarious!:hugs:

[jill]

Hi Woll :D :hugs:

It can be hard explaining things and I think you have expalined it well.

When I was very young, I had something similar, I was in bed talking to my sis, when all of a sudden she just went far away, you know, like in the films when someone is runing towards a door and it moves far away very quickly, I shut my eyes with fear, BUT, could still feel the distance, see the fast distance, it did frighten the life out of me.

Hun, you say you have had panic, but not anymore, am I correct? do you suffer anxiety hun ? If you suffer anxiety this can cause a vast amount of symptoms including this one.

My expearance happened, not long after my younger brother died, so looking back now, I do feel that it was greif, after all, I was only 11 myself.

Woll, can you relate these epesodes to any stress hun? do you have any other symptoms? ohh sorry for all the questions, its just a hard one hun, some people can relate to what you are saying, but sometimes more info can help us help you, Mmm, do you know what I mean?

You take care

LOVE JILL XXX

[Woll]

Yeah it is hard to explain. I don't actually hallucinate or anything, I just start to feel anxious and even slightly dizzy. Sometimes I can just think myself out of it but others I have to open my eyes before I think I will start to panic.

I do have anxiety but not very bad, I'm getting better anyway.

Ilovetoast kind of describes the feeling of it, I remember when I had it when I was younger it would effect my vision when I opened my eyes too, like they were disproportioned and big.

I mean the problem isn't that bad at the moment so long as it's only temporary due to my stressing but I wouldn't like it to carry on.

Thanks for welcome btw :)

[sophia_x]

omg!! i get this and have done for years, i never knew it was panic related, interesting :O i usually get it in bed when im tired and i have to open my eyes to "make it stop". i also get the feeling my tongue is realy big lol

[Madeleine]

Hello all,

OMG from me too! Sometimes when you lay in bed, everything feels massive and far away whilst you feel tiny - weird! I have had this for years! I too didn't know it was anxiety related. I remember having this before, and having to get up in the night and put the t.v. on to 'normalise' myself! The brain, is fantastically clever, but my god can't it be cruel sometimes?!

Madeleine.x

[looking4answers]

Its weird the day you wrote this. I had the same experience. When you close your eyes your eyes are only behind your eye lids. It can feel like that or you can concentrate on a single poiint there as some people do with meditation but really its nothing. When I was young I used to crave this feeling. It was fun for me but as I got older I never really thought about it. We are all anxious so anything that seems out of the ordinary is weird although we have experienced it many times before and never thought anything about it.

[damage7899]

Hi,
Just joined because i have a very similar issue to those mentioned above. I am now 37 and consider myself to be very calm and am unaware of any panic attacks or indeed major panic in my life but i used to suffer the episodes described as a young child and still very occasionally ( one a year ) as an adult. To be honest i have just lived with it - pushing it to the back of my mind but last night my 6 year old son woke me crying and described a very similar experience ie feeling tiny in his own room and that the room was huge and so i have told him i will try and find out what this is and what causes it to help him understand, not feel frightened and overcome the problem.
Thanks for any explanations

[sMINT]

i often get this. i used to get it when i was a child and if i had a cold or flu. i would wake up and just before waking up i would have felt like i was in this huge huge building with a tiny light in the very corner and i was tiny compared to the size.

i get it now from time to time, its quite weird.