Meaning of 寝落ちしてた and differentiating 寝 as either sleep or lying down?


I interpret 寝落{ねお}ちしてた as "I fell asleep", but I can also see it as "I was
lying down". As for whether or not 寝 in a sentence implies sleeping or simply
lying down, is that determined merely by context, or are there definitive
cases?




「寝落{ねお}ちする」 could not mean "to lie down" regardless of the context.

It means "to unintentionally fall asleep", "to fall asleep while doing
something", etc. As far as nuance, it is somewhere between "fall asleep" and
"pass out".

The safest phrase choice for "to lie down (without sleeping)" would be
「横{よこ}になる」. That is because 「寝る」 can mean both that and "to really sleep".

