Insomnia with no cure.

I am 41 and have had Insomnia my whole life. I can remember all the way back when I was 5-6 years old, the last one to bed and the first one up (7 kids). I would tap on the neighbor kid's window at 6:30 to come out and play (he was not happy). It wasn't so bad when I was younger ( I could get by on less), but now that I'm older it's taking its toll. I lie in bed just hoping to get 15 more minutes of sleep after only getting about 4 restless hours. I've tried all kinds of meds and some will work for a short time, but it rears it's ugly head once again. I'm am not depressed or mentally disturbed so it gets annoying reading some of these doctor's websites that say it's the fault of the person; they don't have a clue of the everyday horror that this condition presents. My Grandpa used to say, "Don't judge a man till you walk a mile in his moccasins" (he was half Native American).

I just stumbled on this forum and it's nice to see I'm not alone. When I read some of these posts it's like looking in a mirror. I appreciate all the comments and testimonies and just wanted to say "thanks" and "God bless" to all of you who wear the same moccasins.

I pray you all have a good night sleep and sweet dreams.

Cycling Temazepam helps me some. Here is what I was told about people like you (and me) from a prominent Dr at a prominent university. We are just screwed, but there may be help in a few years. There is a gland within the pineal gland that "misbehaves" and sleep hygiene is pretty much useless. Here were his analogies.

Insomnia is like a river. If a normal person has a cup of coffee at night or some other sleep taboo, they wade into the river of insomnia. People like me are already in the river in a canoe with no paddle. If I have a little caffeine, it just means I drift a little farther out from shore into the great insomnia river, but I am there to begin with.

Things like benzos help by artificially turning off the brain. A normal person can flip off the switch, their lights (brain) go out, shuts down and they sleep. All I can do is put a dark cloth (Sleeping pill of choice) over the light but I can't flip the switch off. Not yet anyway. He said some big advances are coming in this area in the future. I hope he is right.

He strongly believed the insomnia epidemic was related to lifestyle changes over the last century.

Notice which activities make you tired during the day, no matter how unrelated to bed time activities they are, such as talking, washing dishes etc. I like talking and it makes me relaxed, so I go to bed and talk to myself until I'm tired and fall asleep.

Hello skidder.

If you dont think there are any underlying causes it sounds like you have conditioned insomnia . Have you ever heard of 'restricted sleep therapy'? It is very effective for conditioned insomnia. What you do is restrict the amount of time you spend in bed, this trains your brain to associate going to bed with falling asleep. Usually you start out spending just 4 hours in bed, going to bed at the same time and getting up at the same time. The quality of sleep should improve greatly. Once this has happened you can start slowly incresing the amount of time you spend in bed. If the quality of sleep starts to lessen then decrease the amount of time again. You shouldn't think because you've had insomnia for so long that you cant take control of the situation.