Ellen Page

Ellen Page

Ellen Page struggled to differentiate between dreams and reality as a child, because she suffered from "incredibly vivid" sleep hallucinations.

The Oscar-nominated actress would regularly wake up in the halls of hotels after a bout of sleepwalking and be convinced she had seen a range of bizarre items - including a deep freeze.

And the Juno star admits she found her dreamlike states "scary" - because she was never sure if she was still dreaming or awake.

She tells Britain's Sunday Times, "I guess you'd call them night hallucinations. I've often found myself sleepwalking and waking up in halls of hotels. If someone saw me, they would think I was awake, but I am seeing something else and I am communicating with it, whether it is a person or where I see something as obscure as a bird's nest or bugs. And, one time, there a deep freeze in my room.

"It feels real to me and it is incredibly vivid. Luckily, it is happening less as I get older, because when I was a kid it was scary. It created a lot of existential dilemma, because you start having these questions, like, 'Is this person really perceiving me?' Nobody can ever say anything to me to convince me they really exist, because who knows? It has never fully gone away, although, luckily, I can't recall when last it happened."

 


Tagged in