this sounds familiar. I used to wake up about 30 minutes after going to sleep with a violent pain in my mid abdomen (probably lower than esophagus). I would have a terrifying vision with it, and think I was dying. Once I thought I had already died, and told my husband I had died--but then I came fully into consciousness. Sometimes this was so shocking that it threw me out of bed, and on extreme occasions I would find myself across the room, where I had crawled after being thrown out of bed.

This was worst before diagnosis of MS (I have a coupla other dx's now too). Getting on the Swank diet helped at least partially, but I can't remember when this mostly went away...gradually. It was gone a long time, but now it is back, ironically, in a form which
I think could be Sleep Apnea. Today I awakened from a nap needing to breathe. I think I am stopping breathing more than in the past, although I don't know if I stopped breathing when I had the very painful episodes while younger. Just as with you, my
painful episodes described did not happen while awake.

Another thing which may have helped was taking Magnesium. Taking magnesium, which was not prescribed until after MS dx, stopped my jerking leg and back movements which occurred while drifting off to sleep, and possibly it also cut down on the waking in pain. The waking in pain could have been a stomach or intestine spasm. I have lots of
spasms, and they could be either from MS or from Porphyria. Stopping spasm seems to be the biggie for me. As I could not take Zanaflex or Baclofen without severe side effects, due to as yet undiagnosed Porphyria, the wise neurologist prescribed Magnesium. I must take at least 900 mg a day, and sometimes 1000 and on a rare occasion jerking will not stop until I am at 1100. This made a huge difference to sleep.

I wonder if the new more typical Sleep Apnea is due to the fact I'm starting Interferon?
I have been on it about two weeks at low but increasing doses, for Polycythemia Vera,
to cut back on high platelets in my blood, caused by my bone marrow, by a mutation which showed up six or seven years ago for "reasons unknown". It's rare, like Porphyria, so I have two rare blood diseases.

When I awakened today taking a deep breath, I realized, as I have a lot lately, that I will
probably be going to meet my Maker soon, and as I a nearly 80 that is not so bad.

I never have the waking with pain any more unless I eat something bad. For me something bad is usually something greasy, as the Swank low fat diet is important for
both my MS and my digestion. Sometimes this comes from eating something hard to
digest, like a turkey weiner which is too "hard" and does not soften up by cooking.

It could be that your problem is a huge spasm caused by indigestion. Something to think about--may seem a simple thing, but it could happen, especially if you, like most of us, tend to spasm.

I find Klonopin works better for me than Lorazapam--is that Valium? In fact I get spasms from Valium.