Symptoms of night terrors
Night terrors differ from nightmares. In a nightmare, the dreamer may wake up, but during night terrors they will usually stay asleep.
This difference is most likely due to the phase of sleep in which night terrors occur. Nightmares tend to happen during rapid eye movement sleep (REM), towards the end of a night's sleep.
In contrast, night terrors occur during the first third of the night during deeper sleep, also known as slow-wave sleep or non-REM sleep.4
The signs of a night terror episode can include the following symptoms:
Screaming and shouting
Sitting up in bed or sleepwalking
Kicking and thrashing of limbs
Heavy breathing, racing pulse, and profuse sweating
Dilated pupils and increased muscle tone
Difficulty rousing from sleeping
Confusion on waking
Staring wide-eyed as if awake but be unresponsive to stimuli
Aggressive behavior (more common in adults)
Amnesia of the event (sometimes only partial).