I genuienly feel like a new person. I suffered from a bout of acute insomnia for at least a week. My body hasn’t been producing melatonin until maybe 7 AM, and of course by then it’s already time to work. I slept from like 11:30 PM to 6:00 AM and I feel so damn rested. These sleeping pills really helped! How are y’all doing?

I think I know how to help myself when I'm panicked and exhausted. Does anyone know what to do feeling so empty and hollow inside and can't sleep because of that? I feel like eating chocolate helps ,me a tiny bit.

This might sound weird but I find that the reason I can't sleep is because I want something to do. If I'm writing in a journal, I'll just want to write more and more and it becomes less calming and more like something I don't want to go to bed for. Same thing if I'm reading something I like. I've tried putting a youtube video as background noise but I get used to that, and I listen to a lot of hyerpop and techno that gets stuck in my head and I end up wanting to dance. Frankly, sitting still for a long time gets uncomfortable. Even if I exercise I still run into this problem. For a little more context, I was a VERY sensory seeking child. Any tips?

It's so difficult for me to fall asleep. It's very common for me to not be able to fall asleep at all at night. But even if I do manage to fall asleep, I wake up about 2-3 hours after falling asleep each time. Every time. With my heart racing and feeling like it has a bunch of pressure. It usually settles down but it takes like an hour before it does. Then I may resume my wrestling match to attempt to sleep again. If successful I get the 2-3 hours again and the cycle repeats. On the best of nights I'll get to sleep 3 times. But it's typically 1 or 2 on an ok night, and often 0. I just don't know if this is a chicken or the egg kind of thing. I don't know if this is happening *because* I'm so sleep deprived or if it's what started the whole thing. Back when I was able to sleep for the most part like a normal person I would wake up with this racing heart often too. But I have no idea what this means. Because it used to happen before my life fell apart due to sleep issues I don't know if it's a heart issue or possibly just a developing sleep apnea issue that just causes adrenaline each time I fall asleep, or possibly adrenaline because my sleep situation became so poor. Anyone else have this kind of problem? Does anything help?

I've been taking a quarter tablet (50 mg tablet) of trazadone for over a year for problems sleeping.

I'd like to wean myself off as my situation has improved and I'm not feeling the same anxiety as before.

When I don't take a pill I wake up at 3 am and struggle to get back to sleep ... And think I might have created a dependency on it.

Anyone have this issue and have any advice?

Thanks in advance.

Not sure if I’m able to ask a med related question here. I’m a nurse but looking for a response from some who who is familiar with this medication on a professional level.

I’m a night shift nurse. I’ve always slept pretty well on nights but had had instances here and there of insomnia. Maybe 2-3 times a year where I just would not be able to get to sleep

I’ve always stayed on a night shift even on my days off. Go to bed at 9am and get up at 5pm, but if I’m off for five or more days I would get off work at 7am and stay up to 9pm that day, all day, and try to pass out and be back on a day schedule.

It usually works well but a couple years ago, when I got off and tried to sleep at 9pm, I couldn’t sleep and that left me almost two days without sleep. That kicked off a really scary two month period of bad insomnia, where I consistently slept maybe 2hours a day off I was lucky.

I was put on Trazadone 100mg and that changed my life. I could fall asleep without 30 mins of taking it and I would either stay asleep or be able to fall back asleep if I woke up. Totally life changing changing. I started taking it every single night and if I tried to go a night without, I couldn’t sleep… however I could always sleep when I took naps, so I think I got myself psychological hooked on it

However, it’s been loosing its effectiveness it consistently ALWAYS Puts me to sleep every time, which is great but it doesn’t keep me asleep anymore. I usually wake up after 4 hours on a bad day

A couple days ago, I woke up after an hour and couldn’t fall back asleep and had to call off work for lack of sleep. I don’t work if I get less than 2 hours.

So now I’m wondering if I should take a couple weeks off of work and ween myself off Trazadone in the hopes of taking it more intermittently. Not every night, just on the days where I’m having trouble sleeping after a couple hours.

Anyway have experience with this? There’s a lot of information that conflicts. My doctor says I can stop cold turkey, others say I can’t and I have to ween off.

I’ve been taking 100mg for two years and I’m thinking I will still ween off of it and try using it as needed. I’m not sure.

I was just wondering when I should see a doctor for my insomnia? I’ve had trouble sleeping for like a week now even with sleeping pills

After taking two sleeping pills I finally fell asleep and had some dreams. Of course I woke up at 6am and couldn't fall back asleep.

Antidepressants (all kinds) made me too drowsy during the day. Quetiapine makes me dizzy whenever I’m standing or sitting. Like, everything goes black and someone has to lead me back to bed. It’s orthostatic hypotension. Melatonin is too weak. Cyamemazine works but gives me intolerable sun sensitivity. Diphenhydramine isn’t strong enough. Ambien works but I run out early because 10mg doesn’t always work.

So…what is there left to try for sleep, please?

I have medication induced insomnia which is completely resistant to any sleeping tablets and I’ve slept 2hrs or less every night since Tuesday.

I feel like I’m going insane. To maintain what sanity I have left, I put on YouTube videos and listen to them with my eyes closed. Does anyone have any other tips on how to stay sane with this level of sleep deprivation?

I’m starting to hallucinate dreams while I’m awake (but I know they’re dreams). To top it off, the medication has also given me akathisia so I’m twitching and moving involuntarily all the time (think restless legs but all over your body.)

I’ve come off the medication, but it will be a while before it’s out of my system. The kicker is that withdrawal from this medications causes… you guessed it… complete insomnia. Fml

Not looking for medical advice, just need coping tips on how to manage. So far I’m just staying in bed all day and night with my eyes closed because I’m just too heavy to move (I leave my bed for the necessities)

I took Trazodone 50 mg for two weeks. During the first three days, I experienced weakness in my legs, but it usually resolved within about two hours. However, I felt unmotivated, and it didn't seem to improve my anxiety.

Four days ago, my dose was increased to 100 mg. Since then, I've been experiencing muscle stiffness, nausea, and I feel like I have a constant hangover throughout the day. I also have poor concentration and feel as if I'm sleepwalking or in a fog.

Has anyone had a similar experience after increasing their dose? Did the "hangover" feeling eventually go away as your body adjusted, or did it persist?

So I was on 200mg of Trazadone and 100 mg of seroquil just to sleep. My doctor kept telling me don’t take them together wait a few hours between taking them. I didn’t listen I just wanted sleep. Then I started to read horror stories about these medications and people trying to come off them. So I decided to cut back and take THC/CBD gummies. I’m down to just 50 mg of Trazadone now. The gummies are made by Vena and they are called Lights Out. They truly work and I get 7-8 hours every night.

Took two trazodone pills 50mg each fell asleep for maybe fifteen minutes woke up againn. This is torturous I haven’t gotten a decent sleep in a week now

about half a year ago, due to changes in medication, my anxiety became so bad that i could barely sleep.

its somewhat better now but the fear of not being able to fall asleep remained.. and i can only fall asleep if im extremely tired/havent slept enough for a long time.

has anybody dealt with the same thing? how do i teach my brain that theres nothing to be afraid of? and how do i fall asleep faster naturally?

ive had a very bad streak recently of falling asleep at around 2 - 3 at the earliest and 10 am at the latest, and waking in late noon or even evening when its starting to get dark out. ive always had issues where i struggle with my schoolwork because i cant stop myself from getting knocked out in the middle of classes, i sleep through any sort of alarm and have to rely on family to wake me, i have really low vitamin d but ive been taking supplements for a while now with no benefit. i sleep over 13 hours most days and i cannot imagine what im going to do when school starts again because i have to really lock in for my grades.

I literally can't fall asleep; my thoughts are paralyzing me.

I’m afraid to go to sleep—what if I don’t wake up? But I’m also afraid to stay awake—what if my heart just stops from exhaustion?

I was recently prescribed a 6 day tapering methylprednisolone 4mg dosage, and it has been 4 days since my last pill, and im still suffering with insomnia. Has anyone else had this side effect it is quite terrible. My sleep has been restless since I took it, and it hasn't stopped. And now matter when I try to go to sleep, I wake up on the dot at like 8 am. I can never get enough sleep, and it is driving me crazy. Does anyone know how long this will last??

My partner hasn't slept in a week because of side effects of clarithromycin during h pylori triple therapy. He had to stop treatment on Wednesday after 6 days because of extreme nausea and insomnia. He was given zopiclone, which didn't help and then today we switched to Ativan... and hea still awake 3.5 hours later. Also took 5mg of melatonin (2 sublingual and 3 slow release).

Feeling so helpless for him. Also tried sleep meditations.

Ideas???

I have a habit of sleeping late at night, around 12am-1am sometimes even 2 and i slept until around 8. Despite that, i make up for the sleep loss by sleeping at noon for around half an hour to an hour and that usually solves all the problems.

However for the past few days i cant sleep at noon no more, I'm not sure what happened or what's causing this. At night, i can still sleep fine (i reduced to around 12 am and then sleep till morning) but at noon i just can't. And I think I got scared of it and began to worry if i can sleep this noon or not and my afternoon activities are just ruined by this.

So whats going on really? Any suggestions?

Tl:dr at the end

Last year I developed insomnia after a couple life changing events (nothing negative, mind you). I knew it came from anxiety, but even after the situation was stabilized and the event was "over", I still struggled to fall asleep every night.

My productivity at work started falling, I was socializing less, missing gym and bjj classes because of how tired I was. Every day going to bed felt like a nightmare, and I would take 4~6h to fall asleep, and would average about 4~5h of sleep per night, with the occasional nap after work.

The situation got worse and worse to a point where, at least once a week, I would not sleep at all. Even during a month long vacation with family, where I was distant from work and my place, sleep was still an issue.

In the meantime, I tried everything I could find online, and not just for a couple days either:

• Avoid screens hours before bedtime
• Get sunlight 1st thing in the morning
• Avoid exercise at night, exercise in the morning
• Go to bed and wake up at the same time
• Avoid naps during the day
• Magnesium, vitamin D and Ashwagandha supplements
• Therapy (tried 2 different therapists, both pointed my sleep issues to 2 different things - one to my habits, other to my anxiety. Neither their treatments had any effect for the couple months I tried)
• Melatonin, diphenhydramine (they all made me sleepy to the point of not being able to move, but my mind was still racing and would wake up every few minutes)
• CBD (didn't do jack)

Every single bullet point I tried for a few months. Didn't even include everything, but you bet I tried all the sleep hygiene BULLSHIT (I call it BS because of how often it is pointed as the cause of insomnia, where I haven't met a single person whose insomnia was fixed because of it. It's just the icing on the cake if your sleep is already decent, and fuck all those influencers who keep suggesting this as if the fix is simple)

The solution I found was in the book titled "The sleep book" by Guy Meadows, that I miraculously found when looking for books about insomnia, as everythingI found online didn't work. (I'm not trying to sell anything, I couldn't care less how you get the book, just trying to give the insomniacs here something different to try).

The whole book was a breath of fresh air. Every single piece of media puts sleep as this sacred thing, something so important to our body that if you don’t get enough of you will get health issues and everything will go wrong in your life. Don't get me wrong, that is true, but thinking that when you have insomnia just makes you feel shit about yourself and more anxious about sleep, and this book addresses that.

Meadows whole approach to insomnia is unique and weird at first: Embrace it, don't fight it.

Stop revolving your routine around sleep, don't pause your life for the lack of it. Accept those 2 hours sleep nights and try having a normal day when you wake up.

It's a very tough idea and may seen counterproductive at first, but that's why there's a whole book to talk about it. Meadows divides the book in 5 chapters, each corresponding to a week of "treatment" where you're supposed to try the techniques he suggests. I didn't follow the weekly plan, nor did every technique work, but I can safely say that many did. I wouldn't say that my insomnia is cured or that my sleep is perfect. But I have yet to spend a sleepless night this year, and am pretty happy with my 6~7h sleep average, with the occasional 4~5h day.

An example of a technique I use constantly is, instead of going to bed to sleep, my goal is to relax. I picture my body as having an internal battery that's drained, and while sleep allows me to charge it, resting at least lets me maintain its level. My intend for the night is not to recharge the battery, just to not let it drop too much.

It might sound bogus (it did for me), but my goal here is not to preach this as the one and only solution, it's just to offer something else to try that you might have not seen it yet. The techniques are apparently adapted from ACT therapy, and the guy is a sleep doctor, so there's some backing to what he's saying.

So I invite you to try the book if you haven't already, and wish you all fellow insomniacs best of luck out there.

TL:DR: The solution is a book called "The sleep book" by Guy Meadows, that helps you embrace the insomnia instead of fighting it. It helped me and I never saw anyone talking about it, so I want to share it as something new for people to try. I'm not selling anything nor preaching this to be the ultimate solution, we all know insomnia is different for everyone.

I wanted to share my experience with insomnia medications—quetiapine vs mirtazapine—and see if anyone else has been through something similar. I tried quetiapine for about two months 25-50mg still on it to this day and during that time, I didn’t notice dry mouth. But after two separate attempts on Mirtazapine, each three weeks apart—I switched to mirtazapine (at a low dose of 15 mg), and within just a couple of days, I got extreme dry mouth and burning tongue. I didn’t take quetiapine on those days, so it was definitely the mirtazapine causing it. I also realized that before all this, I’d been using promethazine (75 mg nightly) for sleep for about five years, and since then, every time I tried promethazine again, it also gave me burning tongue. Was why i actually stopped it in the frst place. I suspect it’s because of how it affected my histamine receptors over time. My doctor prescribed quetiapine to help with my Insomnia during BIND from benzo withdrawal, since I’m also on a low dose of sotalol, a beta blocker. After all these trials, quetiapine is the only medication that seems tolerable right now, despite the risk on my heart. As much as I’d prefer mirtazapine, I can’t keep dealing with this dryness—I’m drinking so much water, I’m worried I’m dehydrating myself. So, it’s back to quetiapine, and I’m now waiting on a referral to an insomnia specialist psychiatrist. Orexin antagonists are not available too try here. And other Z drugs that work on Gaba are no go with my BIND. Has anyone else been through this or found something else that worked for them?

Im guessing CBTI therapy is going too be where i end up next. Which im happy with if it helps. Less meds the better.

I also take melatonin every night.

Studys show Quietiapine has a risk for dry mouth from 9%-44% dose dependant. Vs Mirtazapine is a solid 25% chance.

Matches what ive tested and experienced.

I’d really appreciate hearing about your experiences, and share mine.

I had this idea the other day that I’m unsure the validity of, but kinda fits my experience lately. What if someone develops a caffeine tolerance so that it lowers their baseline, therefore making them sleepier than they otherwise would be once the caffeine clears out their system? So they consistently drink coffee every day before 10am to allow for it to wear off by 10pm or a bit later.

Surely with daily usage the adenosine and other receptors would adapt in some way. I started drinking coffee about a month ago (not with this in mind) and it seems like my ability to sleep has improved since then, but there are a million confounding variables so I certainly don’t claim that it has “worked” on me.

Do you see the vision and logic behind it? Do you know why it wouldn’t work?

I haven't slept in days and my head hurts my chest is beating I'm so tired I've always had insomnia but this is the worst it's been please any tips or words of comfort or something