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Mac and Taylor – my sleep also seems to be impacted by the effects of coronavirus. Taylor I also live in the Bay area in a county with the Stay in Place order. My job is considered essenstial so I am still working and that’s where the stressors coming from. Our staff has dwindled so the job demands are higher and my hours keep changing and working more into the night, not really late but 9-9:30pm. The pressure to be a team player and keep things going is just enough to upset my fragile nervous system. Four nights in a row now taking Ambien so I can sleep about 6 hours. Just prior to this I thought I might be on the edge of recovery having a month of many nights falling asleep quickly and averaging 6-7 hours sleep per night with minimal Ambien. The last couple nights I’ve listened to some guided meditations, they relax me and slow me down somewhat, but sleep is no where to be found. I’ll make myself slow down today and practice mindfulness and tonight if I can’t sleep, I’ll just accept it and not sleep as I have a day off tomorrow and if I end up being a zombie I can just stay home. I don’t want to take Ambien for 5 nights in a row.
And Deb like you, even when I thought I might be recovering, I still had many nights of light sleep. I’d go to bed about 10:30-11pm, then suddenly notice the clock at 1am, thinking I had been awake that whole time. Some nights not being able to fall back to sleep until 2am.
A few of you wrote about being fragile without realizing it. This is certainly my situation. It seems to take so little to upset my sleep. I am seldom stressed about sleep itself anymore, but day to day stressors that would upset a normal person, maybe causing them to stay awake at night for an extra 20 minutes or so causes me to stay awake for hours.
I had 18 nights of normal sleep, then the past 5 nights back to irregular patterns. Two nights calling it an Ambien night since not asleep by 1am. The other night I actually fell asleep right away but had that weird lite sleep, started waking between 12:30am-1am. Then wide awake until 2am and so decided to take an Ambien. One night when I did not have work the following day, I skipped the Ambien and evetually fell asleep from 3:30am-6:30am and felt exhaused but at least had enough sleep drive to sleep 8 hours the following night.
The last month I’ve had home issues with termites and plumbing, got my car towed, got an IRS letter, and work schedule hours changing and increasing. Everything except my work was quickly resolved, my work hours should change in a few weeks. Not really major stressors, but they really seem to upset the subconsious part of the brain. Back in November I had nearly 3 weeks of normal sleep like now. Hoping I will fall back into a normal sleep pattern soon.
Mac – About your work, I agree with you that it probably contributes a lot to insomnia. Maybe before your insomnia, you were aware of work stress and could cope with it. But now that your brain is stressed and hyper-aroused from having chronic insomnia, looking at screens all day, and having the daily stressors of interacting with new people, its difficult for your mind to settle down on an unconscious level, even if intellectually you feel you have low anxiety.
This is how it is for me. I know if I didn’t have to work I’d have a much better recovery. Last week I started to do well, 7 nights of falling asleep quickly and sleeping for 6-7 hours. Starting to do more long distance walking and exercise. Then two bad days of work put me over the edge. Saturday I was suppose to work from 9am-2pm, then a lot of people called in sick and ended up working until 6:45pm, with no lunch, yesterday same thing, supposed to work 10-2, agreed to see one more client at 2:30 that was supposed to be simple, but ended up being difficult and stayed until 5:30, again skipped lunch as I thought I would have it at home a lot earlier. No exercise and late meals really threw me off and ended up taking Ambien at 2am to sleep at least 4 hours, since I have to work until 9pm tonight. I realize now as much as I’d like to be super helpful and go beyond my work expectations, this is not possible at this moment in time. I will stick to my assigned schedule and learn to say ‘”no”.
Mac – if you have any extra $$, you might try getting a consultation at a MedSpa, maybe there are some non-invasive facial treatments that might help with under eye circles and bags. I feel like I really got droopy over the last year and in a few weeks will experiment with injectable fillers in my cheeks. Also have you ever considered getting a sleep study done? I had one last July, and the results showed I definitely stayed in the light sleep stage longer than normal, and even though there is nothing to cure that at the moment, at least I know what’s going on and sometimes I can calm myself down by telling myself, “I’m was sleeping, I’m in the light sleep stage” because often I feel as though I am not sleeping during this time.
Hi Deb and everyone,
Still feeling only about 50% recovered. I’ll have 3 bad nights in row, then may get better slowly for 3-4 nights, then a few bad nights again. As I’ve mentioned before, it is the light sleep stages throwing me off. Sometimes I can’t tell if I’ve slept the first two hours. Then often I wake at 1am-1:30am, and can’t go back to sleep for a couple of hours. My good nights I sleep 5-7 hours, and every couple weeks may sleep one night for 9 hours. I still take Ambien as needed. I actually had Zzzzquill the other night, not for sleep but because I had a cold, for me it does nothing for sleep, but at least worked quickly for sinuses and cough.
I listened to a guided meditation recently the does the typical body scan, and then afterwards suggested to scan for what feels good? It seemed so positive, usually focused on what feels bad. So the last few nights where I’m up after the light sleep stage, I try and stay calm by focusing on what feels good (usually my stomach/abdomen are very relaxed) and then try to expand that goodness outward. Other times I just try the Let Go and Let God thoughts to come, the trick is not to focus on anything too much as then your mind is active/working instead of drifting and spacing out. That is not always easy.
As far as acceptance goes, I’ve just accepted I’m damaged goods for now and maybe forever. Details and memory are more difficult – I used to be so good with both. I’m just glad my job right now is working with numbers and not lives, like in health care.
This quote is from the Sleep School – hopefully it will inspire a bit more patience with ACT and recovery. I believe a few of us are at the 6 months point of practicing ACT, so maybe more improvement will be noticeable soon. I’m trying not to get so frustrated with recovery time, but I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t display a bit of frustration once and a while. For me after about 6 weeks using ACT I was able to drive longer distances out of my neighborhood due to less fatigue. At about 10 weeks, I was able to take on a simple part time job, now at 6 months into it, working more hours at a bit more complex and detailed job. So some progress…
How long will it take me to recover?
“The results of our 2015 in-house clinical study showed that significant improvements across a wide range of sleep measures occurred within just 5 weeks, including a 50% reduction in self-perceived insomnia severity. Further significant improvements were then reported at 10 weeks, and then at 6 and 12 months, all of which culminated in 86% of the participants becoming ‘normal sleepers’, despite previously suffering from insomnia for over two decades.”Hi Deb and everyone – I have not posted recently because I’ve been all over the place. I had some good nights then 3 weeks ago had a bad night – that was OK, I accepted that but then the next night when I couldn’t sleep I really got frustrated. Then I struggled and got desperate, and decided to try one more prop or gimmick to try to induce sleep and walked down to my neighborhood cannabis shop and bought a vape pen, a controlled dose of THC to help with sleep. For someone without chronic insomnia, this may help, it did make me a bit sleepy and mood was OK, but certainly did not put me to sleep. My job has me working about 3 nights a week till 9pm-10pm, which is not bad for the average person or for me prior to insomnia, but now it amps up my mind too much, making sleep difficult. I’ll will have to deal with this until April.
I will have 3-4 nights in a row of sleeping normal, then a series of bad nights. As others often mention, the light sleep is so common and annoying. Some nights I can get to sleep right away, but I’m in light sleep and wake up 2 hours later often then staying awake the rest of the night. It seems to take a couple hours just to stop struggling so I can just relax and be comfortable in bed, but eventually it happens. I re-read a chapter of the Sleep Book which helped with acceptance again. Then a couple nights ago as I was leaving work, this thought popped into my head, that maybe my brain is damaged, that the medicine I took almost a year ago did some damage to my nervous system and I am changed for the long term or forever. Whether or not this is true, it helped me with acceptance because I realized in my frustration that my goal was to get back to “normal”, I wanted to get back to being the old me, and this wasn’t happening as fast as I’d like, leading to struggle and frustration. Whereas now I realized there might not be an “old me” anymore (maybe an older looking me, haha) and just to accept that I am who I am now. I hope this makes sense to you all, but it has helped me relax a bit which is what my brain needs.
I used and am still using a low to average dose of hormone replacement therapy. I use an estrogen patch and progesterone pill.
That was fairly effective until I was prescried a medication unrelated to menopause, which is what led to the chronic insomnia.
Hi Deb! I’m so sorry you are having such a difficult time. I’m back and forth with good and bad stretches. I had about 10 nights in a row where my mind would just not shut off. If I had to work the next day, I’d take an ambien, and if not I’d barely sleep, one night not sleeping until 5am, but then was able to sleep until almost 8am (usually the pets wake me early). My last two night were better sleeping 6 and 7 hours, doing mild Stimulus Control helped. Thanks for posting the info from Dr. Kat – not to compare your different experiences with the one you are having now. I am doing that because your brain wants to make sense of things or fix things based on past experiences.
You mention light sleep often, I have that too. I just ordered a FitBit that tracks your sleep. Has anyone on this forum tried a sleep tracker to see how long you are actually sleeping and in what stages? I know back in July when I had a sleep study done, I felt like I did not sleep at all but the doctor said I slept enough for them to get a study so I’ve been curious about my sleep stages since then. And I had hoped by now I’d be over insomnia, but not yet. I’m always hopeful we will all recover, it is just a super long process.
Hi Steve, regarding acupuncture and herb recommendations – they have not recommended any herbal products for insomnia, but have offered some supplement advice for two other conditions. I feel if someone asks for herbal stuff they will offer, but they don’t push it. I take ashwagandha once or twice a day for stress. I know that no supplements will get me to sleep. My last three nights were bad, aggravated by my spouse so today I will try another acupuncture treatment, hoping to sleep well tonight. Even though I’ve had some bad nights recently I feel as though something has improved. The last two times I went to acupuncture during the day, I was able to relax and almost sleep, my mind becoming lazy and drifting, although I could faintly hear things in my surroundings. In general, in the past, I was not able to ever nap or drift off like that.
Sorry you have regressed too. Like you, I often have issues with the first hour of sleep. I think I am in the light sleep stage for too long and then for some reason it feels like my brain cannot progress into the second stage of sleep and then I wake up. Often I can go back to sleep quickly, but not at all this week. It’s awful insomnia seems to take so long to improve, but at least we are improving. I remember reading some of your posts earlier in the year where you hardly slept at all, so when I read you can sometimes sleep 6.5- 7.5 hours, that is good news and I sincerely hope you can achieve that again soon.
Today is my 10 month anniversary with insomnia, ugh. Last night my mind and body thought is would celebrate by staying up all night! This is the first no sleep night since mid-November, and that is because since then I’ve been taking 5mg of Ambien on the nights where I just don’t feel like I’m going to sleep, about 7x since Nov. But since I didn’t have to work , I thought I would just lay there and rest, and try to stay calm. I did have energy to vacuum, and hike the dog for 25 minutes, go food shopping, pay bills and will make dinner. But if I had to do critical thinking, that would not work very well.
I was starting to get better sleep since about Christmas, last week 5 nights in a row of falling asleep in 5 minutes and sleeping 7-7.5 hours. Then a couple days ago falling asleep quickly stopped. I liked what KarenP wrote about practicing mindfulness – daily. Once I start to feel better I get out of that habit, and like her, stress brings insomnia on much more quickly than my life prior to insomnia. So now I’ll listen to some guided meditation this afternoon. I also wanted to mention I got really great sleep after my last two acupuncture sessions that were 6 days apart. Here’s hoping the sleep drive will kick in tonight and I and everyone else here will have a deep and restful sleep tonight!
Hi whitelori!
About ACT and practicing mindfulness – when I first started there were a few nights when I got zero sleep because I believe I kept my mind active all night practicing. However during those nights I did learn to relax, accept and let go so the next day I did not feel so exhausted compared to the nights of doing CBT-i or just laying there stressing out about my situation. There are still nights where I monitor my sleep too much making it difficult to fall asleep.
I tried to practice “welcoming” negative thoughts during the day, it was good for me as they were very uncomfortable and I wouldn’t want to face them all night, and then I could see how they would pass and not be so scared of them. For example I’d go on a 45 minute hike, at the beginning of the hike I’d be welcoming several different negative thoughts and I’d name them. At the end of the hike, I’d check in and realize some of the thougth were gone, had dropped off, sometimes replaced with joyful feelings. I think one the most favorable things about ACT was feeling more rested, even if I was not sleeping or sleeping well during the night, learning to relax in bed definitely increased my daytime energy, and with more energy I would feel a bit better, get more tasks done, and while doing them I would start to forget about insomnia, the thought of insomnia would not dominate my mind.
Hi Glynis and chronsombch!
If you were to read through some of my posts in the ACT part of this forum, you’d realize that I too have a very unsupportive spouse. Last spring when insomnia very extreme and I felt like I would die, I would get negative comments about my mental health, make comments about everything I ate or drank, and he had no problems about making lots of noise around the house while I was trying to fall asleep between the hours of 10pm-1am. Often I was just on the verge of sleep, but couldn’t with all the activity going on in my house.
I actually tried speaking with a therapist and she said I don’t need therapy for me, but certainly questioned why my husband’s behavior. So if I continued therapy it just would have been how to cope with him, rather than fix anything about me. I did see a sleep doctor 2 or 3 times. He is also my husband’s doc. Anyway, this doctor was so compassionate and encouraging, I told him all about my home situation. Just those couple times sitting with these professional people and joining this forum, really helped so much. And also due to spousal snoring or CPap noise, I started using earplugs, it does help but sometimes I end up hearing my own sounds like breathing or heartbeat too much.
Happy New Year Everyone!
It’s so nice to read your updates.Pam- OMG, you have been through so much! You mentioned acupuncture, how long did you try it for and how many times a week? During my worst times of insomnia, last spring, acupuncture did help a little, mostly by reducing anxiety and there were a few nights where I actually slept for 7 hours after a session. I’m in my late 50’s, and I know starting in my 40’s my hormones did affect my sleep. I’m on HRT now and recently requested a slightly higher dose, my doctor objected, but I insisted because I was having so many night sweats and getting so hot. They have decreased with the new dosage. I know how you feel with the dark circles and bags under your eyes. I’ve always looked young for my age, last year a man in my neighborhood who is 9 years younger than myself wanted to date me. He had no idea of my age or that I was married. This year after insomnia, I feel I look my age, and aged if you know what I mean. I am seriously thinking of getting a liquid facelift, some injections to put volume in my cheeks.
Steve – my sleeping time pattern is similar to yours. I believe last week when I averaged my hours of sleep over 7 nights it was about 6 hours – that of course includes one night of 3 hours and another of almost 9 hours. Compared to 6 months ago I was averaging 2-3 hours of sleep per night, so hopefully, over the next six months I will be close to a normal sleeper. Also, I still am in the light sleep stage for longer than normal, especially at the beginning of the night. I also seem to have trouble transitioning from REM (dream sleep) back into stage 1 of light sleep, often waking after dreams.
Deb – thanks so much for all your insights and sharing and being open with your life and your journey for recovery. Honestly, I don’t think I’d be sleeping better without you.
For anyone new to this forum, for reference, I started ACT on 8/1/19, 5 months ago. It’s a slow, but steady process, especially for me since I’ve had a lot of personal stressors with jobs and marital, and family health issues. Stress definitely affects my sleep more so than pre-insomnia days.
Deb – have a great time in SF! SF is so beautiful. I live about 90 miles south of SF along the coast. Hope you get to hike in the Redwoods somewhere, that is just about my favorite thing to do. If you feel like driving, then Monterey/Carmel area is wonderful too. And of course I hope you will get some good sleep and have energy for the day.
Greetings everyone!
Mac – so good to read you got 8 hours of sleep! As I read your post I started feeling refreshed myself remembering how good that felt.
Deb – Sorry to hear about your delayed recovery, but given your recent circumstances and stressors (even though they were positive stressors) I believe most normal sleepers would experience temporary insomnia before a big event like a party or traveling. Your party sounded delightful and I’m sure it will be fondly remembered for many years.
My recovery has not been stable either. At the beginning of November, I had almost 3 straight weeks of good sleep. Hardly any onset issues. Then there came new job issues and schedule changes and it seems the tiniest change or stressor will upset my sleep. And so since about Nov 20th, I’ve taken 4 Ambiens. I know my brain is slowly recovering, but I need to emphasize, slowly. My previous job was in retail, seasonal help so my hours were crazy, sometimes only 12 hours a week or then up to about 35 hours, having my stop time be anywhere from 4pm till 11pm. My body didn’t like all the variations. My new job has better pay and benefits, but will eventually require shift work, but for now I have 3 weeks of training from 7am-4pm. About 4 days before starting, I set my alarm for 5:15am so my body would adjust to the new schedule. I have sleep onset issues like Deb, and so it was so frustrating not sleeping until 1:30am or so. The night before my first day I did take an Ambien, I called it at 11:30pm. I’ve been trying to use the bed for only sleep, not even reading at night. I read on the sofa, and for 3 nights in a row, I was so cuddly and felt so relaxed around my Christmas decorations in the living room that I just fell asleep on the sofa in a very short time and slept for almost 6 hours most nights. The last couple weeks have had mostly 5-6 hours of sleep per night. With last night sleeping 7 hours, probably because my training went a bit better yesterday and I decided I am not doing anything extraordinary for Christmas this year, giving a gift to myself to just de-stress and relax and my family will just have to accept it. Even on my days off I am still waking about 5:30am so not to upset my sleep schedule. I am still trying to practice ACT and mindfulness, whether it being sitting in my car for a few moments focusing on my breathing, or deciding to just accept my insomnia at night and decide to just relax in bed and throughout the day trying to remember to lean into my anxieties or uncomfortable feeling. But since having good sleep, it does take a while now to get to the point of acceptance when I’m struggling with sleep onset issues.
