When you can't sleep what do you do all night??

I usually only sleep about 4 to 6 hours a day a large portion of the year. When I wake up in the middle of the night I'm either staring at the ceiling going crazy, or roaming the night. What do you do when you can't sleep?? What helps??

Talk to your doctor about a sleeping aide. They may knock you out for hours (like 10 straight hours), but they make you feel incredible (at least for me they did). You can talk to your family doctor or your psychiatrist, if you have insurance, I'd recommend it.

I take Nuedexta to help me get restful sleep, but as a kid I had some pretty horrible anxiety so taking sleeping pills is really hard for me to do. I hate waking up to light.

Clairsentience93 wrote: I hate waking up to light.

My mother is the exact same way. She purchased some room darkening curtains, that work wonders on the bedroom. It's dark in there at all times, even in the afternoon, it's dark. If you have a stable source of income, and can afford it, you may want to look into it.

Also, I'm pretty sure there are a lot of sleeping aides that you could try. Nuedexta is one of many, but that's up to you.

I take Nuedexta to help me get restful sleep, but as a kid I had some pretty horrible anxiety so taking sleeping pills is really hard for me to do. I hate waking up to light.

I occasionally take a small dose (50 mg) of Lyrica and it helps me sleep through the night. it isn't a sleeping pill.. it's an anti-epileptic and isn't as habit forming as normal sleeping pills. However you do build tolerance to it so I only take it occasionally. It also can help with anxiety which often goes together with sleeping issues. I started taking it for chronic pain (which thankfully mostly went away) and discovered this effect by accident.

I just go with the flow. I don't have a job or anything, so not sleeping doesn't bother me. I just listen to music all night, mess around on the internet, or watch Netflix. My sleep schedule fluctuates from being an early bird to a night owl. Currently, I'm a night owl, staying up until as "late" as 5 AM. When it gets like this I just run to the store for some Tylenol PM and take those until my schedule returns to "normal". I've tried Melatonin and Trazodone, but they don't work.

When I can't sleep I panic. My husband must sleep and so must my kids as they have to be at school and I have to be fully alert to drive them there. So I've now started taking a sleeping pill and I just take it every night and no questions asked, I just take it. But yeah, when I can't sleep I end up listening to music on my headphones. I can't have much light on so as to not wake up others. It's terrible when I can't sleep.

I love being up in the middle of the night. Lately I've been drawing, journaling, reading, and painting. I should probably be sleeping, but its seductive and enjoyable.

Son wrote:I love being up in the middle of the night. Lately I've been drawing, journaling, reading, and painting. I should probably be sleeping, but its seductive and enjoyable.

This. When I was living alone this was what I did all the time. When I'm manic I get really creative. I have a million ideas and I've noticed that my execution of these creative ideas is better than when I'm not manic. By that I mean that I can write, paint, draw, cartoon etc. extremely well when I'm manic, but not nearly as well otherwise. People say, "whoa, that's cool," when they see something I created while pulling a manic all-nighter vs. alternatives. I can't always stay focused enough to finish the projects, but when I do they're pretty rad.

One night I used sharpie to draw an intricate tattoo that covered one full sleeve, shoulder, side of my chest, and ribs. Fumes probably killed a few brain cells but it was worth it... I also used to rearrange all the furniture and overhaul the whole house. This usually resulted in more of a mess than anything good because there was no possible way I could complete the tasks to my own satisfaction.

Now that I'm living with my SO I don't get away with that as much. Usually if I can't escape the bedroom I listen to music through headphones, play on my phone, or just fantasize/make up stories like a movie in my head to keep me occupied.