Sometime early morning.
Dream
I’m in my bed and my dad’s corpse is next to me, but his toes are wiggling. It’s freaking me out. I try to move away and stand up and I feel the familiar sluggishness where it’s really hard for me to get up.
Projection
I know then what this is, and that I just need to stand up so I can continue the lucid experience and assert control, but I’m still freaked out by him next to me.
I feel the sluggishness that I sometimes feel that seems to be a partial version of sleep paralysis.
Instead of doing an exhausting continuous push with all my strength, I do it in jerks, trying to nudge my way free gradually. But one of the jerks ends up being physical and I sit up, waking myself up.
This sounds like sleep paralysis within the dream. For me, this happens very easily if within a dream I lay down on the floor or a bed (will predictably induce sleep paralysis). You won’t be able to continue the lucid dream if you’re freaked out, instead you’ll have to heighten your lucidity (awareness of what is happening), observe your environment, and relax back into the dream. Then attempt to move, slowly a little at a time, first with your hands, then arms. With experience you’ll know the right moment to “stand up” and it will happen instantaneously. In most of my similar experiences, I end up in sleep paralysis without the dream, but can then restart a new lucid dream that is much higher in lucidity and clarity, usually with levitation.
I’ve had several that involve some level of resistance as I try to roll out of my body or pull away from it. I’ve always been able to move if I push hard enough. Or I wake up instead, like this one. Other times it’s not an issue, either because I can hop up quickly or am already standing.
Thanks for the comments!