Stress Induced Nightmares & Sleep Paralysis

Nightmare(?): Skull

Warning: Story contains art that depicts graphic content!
Note: I don't know if you would consider this to be a nightmare? This happened last night at around 3 something in the morning. Date of Event: September 27th, 2020
All art in this story belongs to me!

I'm sitting in bed with my dogs. The lights are still on but the tv is off. Everyone else is asleep and it's dead silent. Of course it could just be my imagination being overactive and me growing more and more tired. I had been stressed all day and feeling drained. A friend and I had been messaging each other over discord all night because I couldn't get myself to fall asleep and wanted someone to talk to. I'd try to close my eyes every now and then to see if I'd fall asleep but to no avail. Usually when I can't sleep but have my eyes closed I just see darkness. This time when I shut my eyes I saw the silhouette of a skull with eerily dramatic features.

  I open my eyes knowing I hadn't fallen asleep when I checked the time. Again it's probably just my tired mind playing tricks on me. Shutting my eyes again I see the skull once more. It's in the light now. It looks to have rotten, greenish-gray flesh that has been peeled from the top of its head down to its cheekbones. The nose hole and teeth are exposed where the flesh has also been peeled away. What unsettles me the most about the image before me is the fact that it has unnaturally large eyeballs sitting within its dark eye sockets. They're the eyes of a corpse; dull, empty, and glazed over. There's a hint of redness around the outside of them as if they're irritated. It's silent as it just continues to stare at me motionless.

   I open my eyes and blink a few times not really bothered much by what I saw. 'It's just my imagination' I tell myself. I start to finally feel sleepy as I shut my eyes again. All I see at first is emptiness. Suddenly the skull pops into view only mere inches from my face but this time it has a tattered pine sticking out from the bottom of it. It stares into my eyes as its jaw slowly opens and closes with the sound of raspy breathing escapes it's mouth. The breathing sounds painful as if it's struggling to take in air. It suddenly freezes in place still making eye contact when a crack begins to form from between its eye sockets and up and to the back of its head. A minute seems to pass before the crack opens up aggressively. Its eyes roll back slightly and its jaw hangs open yet no noise escapes its mouth. Sharp teeth sprouts from the edges of the cracked opening. Inside I can see what looks to be its bloody, rotten brain pulsating inside. A thick blood-like liquid oozes from the opening. A single sickening breath chokes out from its mouth. I blink my eyes open a bit uneasy but know that it wasn't real.