Why do I wake up and see faces?

[elitekid]

I wake up some nights and see a random face. This morning I woke up and a woman's head with white skin and black hair was next to my clock on my bedside table. I know these aren't ghosts or anything because the first face I saw was my cousins, he was half pig and he was peeking around my covers grinning. Apart from faces the only other thing I've seen is a naked woman's body laying across my ceiling.

[elitekid]

Yeah I'm on antibiotics if that helps? but I've been on them for months now and I've only started seeing faces upon waking up. So I kind of ruled that out. I'm considering hypnopompic hallucinations because I usually get them after I've experienced a lucid dream which I seem to have had a lot of recently. I'll wake up and the face I see in my dream still remains while I'm awake. Once the person in my dream said "You are not f*cking sleeping." so I woke up and saw the persons face next to me on my bed and it slowly faded.

[KatEyes]

Episodes of seeing things that aren't actually there can be a side effect of some medications. Others are sleep related, due to sleep disorders, sleep deprivation, or sometimes specific to while falling asleep or awakening (hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations). Others due to lack of oxygen during sleep apnea events.

If you are getting adequate and good quality sleep and do not have sleep apnea or on suspect meds, seems hypnopompic hallucinations could be an explanation since you describe them as upon awakening. I have a friend who has this happen due to a med she must take. She keeps a flashlight nearby and when she wakes up and sees it, she shines the flashlight on it an the image disappears.