My story

Hi all am new to the forums but not new to insomnia. Recently insomnia has come back in my life with a vengance. It started on 1/13/14 when i woke up with vertigo. Next night it happened again. Since then my sleep patterns have been slowly adjusting. At 1st i was just staying up later til 2-3am only to fall asleep but wake up seemingly every hour then off to sleep again. I felt ok since i was dreaming .. then in mid Feb it hit me hard... since 2/14/14 I have not slept in 10 of those days.. can't say not sleep at all.. if you count 1 hour per day as sleep. When i lay in bed i try to nod off but then feel involuntary movements of my body just as i am about to sleep. I have taken ativan no more than 1 mg as little as .5mg and it helped a bit but i don't want to get addicted. Problem is what doctor do you see ?? Do i see a shrink.. a neurologist etc. I am on the verge of losing my job and it is scary. Can i ask what is the longest you have gone w/o sleep. Odd thing is that no matter how sleep deprived I am i have seemed to lost the ability to sleep and to be honest don't feel too tired.

I hope you are well.

I used to live in the U.S. and developed insomnia gradually. It worsened after breathing difficulty.

I thought I could shake it off and took Ambien, Mirtazapine, Clonazapan, etc.

They were ALL temporary and had pernicious side effects. I decided this was not the solution.

I used to do acupuncture daily just to be able to get out of the bed and walk.

I also had severe anxiety due to inability to perform at work and saw counsellor with no telling improvement.

After 3 years, I quit my job and came to India. Thanks to my parents support and friends I found few things to give miraculous effect.

1. Cranio - Sacral Therapy - A danish touch treatment of remove subtle blockages in the brain and spinal cord

2. Breathing - A powerful breathing technique that you do for 1 hour straight taught by an org called Art of Living.

3. Pranic Healing (available world over) - This is like Acupuncture, Reiki. In India there is a very powerful place called Oneness University. You can reach out to me for more details.

I hope you get well!

Deepak

Hey there sorry to hear about your issues. I myself am new to the forums as well so not sure I will be of much help. Have you tried any other prescription sleep aids? I have tried a handful since I started experiencing insomnia after the new years and some work to an extent. I find that they work from time to time or at least they get you hypnotized enough to just lay in bed and space out to where you don't care as much. My sleep has been getting worse too over the past few weeks. Figure I am going to reach out to a psychologist and see if I can do some CBT to help out. You definitely need to seek some help from a professional be it a Dr. first then a pshyc next. Believe me a I feel your pain as well as I sit here sipping on my beer before I take some Temazepan or Ambien not sure what I am going to try tonight but just hoping I get 4 hours of sleep. Good luck and hope you get better!

Hi Renee,
I'm sorry to hear about your sleep problems. I know exactly what you are going through; I had severe chronic insomnia for almost 20 years. I've been able to overcome it and get off all the medications I was taking (SSRIs, Ambien, Ativan). I've been sleeping well for 3 years now.

Here are some things you can try that might help:
First, make sure that you are not staying in bed too long. I used to think I had to be in bed for 10 hours just to get 7 hours of sleep. But all that time spent in bed not sleeping just caused a lot of frustration and worry, which in turn caused me to not be able to sleep at all. So if your optimal amount of sleep is 7 hours, you should spend no more than 7 1/2 hours in bed.

Second, worrying about your sleep and thinking negatively about it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. It only causes more sleeplessness.
Whenever you think about your sleep and start getting frustrated or anxious about it, stop and take a moment to identify what it is you are feeling. Are you experiencing frustration, anger, anxiety, fear, discomfort, judgment, sadness? Once you identify what it is you're feeling, then just ACCEPT it. Don't try to resist it or fight it, just let yourself feel it. ("I'm feeling frustration right now, and it's OK") Then consciously LET GO of the feeling. Feel it leaving your body as you exhale.Keep doing this with every emotion that comes up until you feel a little bit of peace.Then just relax into the peace that you feel. As you practice this, it gets easier and easier to let go of these feelings.

If you do this throughout the day whenever you have any thoughts about your sleep, you will begin to feel more peace and less resistance to falling asleep.

I hope this helps. Keep us posted on how you are doing.