[fromthesnow]

Hi, I have been struggling with insomnia since around 1 month, but I am really scared. I went 1 day without sleeping at all, as the anxiety was waking me up every time I went about to fall asleep. At some point I just didn’t feel sleepy anymore, and the next day was terrible. Then my sleep improved but after a week, same thing happened. I was freaked out and my doctor prescribed Zolpidem. I took it only for 2 days and the 3rd day slept like 5 hours- no pills. Then for 2 weeks everything was perfect.
Until last Sunday, the anxiety feeling came again at night. I managed to sleep about 5 hours, but Monday was hell, I slept max 1 hour. Tuesday was ok, but instead of “drifting off” I passed out around 12, but got around 7 hours in 2 blocks of sleep.
Then hell started. My husband left with my son for a sport tournament in another country, and I stayed home with my parents who are visiting. I slept ZERO. And came to work on Thursday feeling terrible. But the worst part is that last night, Thursday night, I thought I was going to sleep early because I was really tired but here I was, 3:30 am when I decided to have 5 mg of Zolpidem. I slept around 5 hours.

I am very scared. Reading stories in this forum of people living of 3 hours of sleep / week. I used to be a good sleeper just 1 month ago. Did my body forget how to sleep? I don’t feel sleepy anymore watching a movie, for example. I want that and I don’t want to take sleeping tablets.

If you say CBT-I works, I will give it a try. I just don’t know how to play with sleep restriction when you are not even able to sleep.

I feel desperate, please help.

• This topic was modified 5 years, 2 months ago by fromthesnow.

[Martin Reed]

Welcome to the forum and I am sorry to hear about your current struggle with sleep. To be honest, it’s not very surprising that the sleep issues returned since medication isn’t a long-term solution for chronic insomnia.

Let me reassure you that you have not forgotten how to sleep, you are still capable of sleep, and you can sleep without sleeping pills! Feeling that you have somehow lost sleepiness or no longer feel sleepy is quite common and is typically a symptom of hyperarousal — you might find this video helpful: How to improve sleep when you don’t feel sleepy and don’t know how to get sleepy.

Sleep restriction works even when you aren’t getting much sleep because it restricts sleep to a certain window of opportunity. Since it’s absolutely impossible to suspend sleep indefinitely, by only allowing yourself the opportunity to sleep during your sleep window you will eventually sleep during the sleep window.

The sleep window is really helpful for building sleepiness and reducing the amount of time you spend awake during the night. As you start to spend less time awake during the night, you will likely find that your sleep-related worry and anxiety will fall, too — and this often leads to further improvements in sleep.

I absolutely think that you’d find CBT-I techniques helpful since they will help change the way you think about sleep and help you implement behaviors that will give sleep the best chance possible. The techniques aren’t easy, but if you are committed and determined, you will almost certainly notice improvements in your sleep.

I hope this helps.

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