Anyone with insomnia/sleep issues/take sleeping tablets for advice

[sundowners]

Hi
I have had sleep maintenance insomnia- ie. I wake 2-5 am and never get back to sleep for a year. Think it was triggered by a high intensity period of stress/worry which has then altered my body clock permanently into thinking waking so early is ok. Im about to start counselling. Tried everything else- Sleepeaze, Nytol, candles, sprays, melatonin so please don't suggest that!

Been treated by a sleep clinic- nothing has worked apart from sleeping tablets.

I started taking a month ago off and on- Zopiclone. Now taking say 5 nights out of 7- tried without it last night and I was up tossing/ turning all night. Literally did not drop off once.

I have 2 young DC/work part time and am so chronically shattered I just cant imagine doing without them right now. I thought given the amount of pre Christmas events/build up/kids days out and Christmas day itself I'll take until Christmas day, then from Christmas over 5 days gradually try to reduce my dose to wean myself off them? As DH will be off work so thought even if I don't sleep (much) during that period at least he'd be around to help with kids during day so I could try and get some rest then. I don't really get affected in day in a negative way after taking them, other then the metallic taste in mouth.

I clearly remember waking after another awful night of barely any sleep Christmas day last year, plastering my face with thick make up to try and hide my eye bags (doesn't work!) drinking to get me through it and feeling utterly shattered and depressed at how rubbish my sleep is. I just don't want to feel depressed on Christmas day- or special pre Christmas family/friends events again.

Would be so grateful for your thoughts and info about how you manage tour sleep/taking tablets etc?

I had sleeping tablets a few years ago after lack of sleep due to a traumatic event. I know how you are feeling and would say some sleep through what’s the most hectic time of year but also a time you should be feeling positive is better. Even with the aid of tablets. As long as you do try to get off them but I recall threads here with some posters saying they are long term, constant sleeping pill users.

I've been struggling with early waking for the last 4 yrs. Not sure what triggered it. I've been taking Sominex for several months, which work well for me, but it meant fibbing to the pharmacists everytime as they are only supposed to be short term use only. Finally I went to my GP, who referred me to a counselling service. I had a telephone consultation, and was offered a place with an online sleep programme called Sleepio. This is a 6 wk course, and I am currently 5 wks in. I admit to being very doubtful of the programme, but I'm going with it and to my amazement things are looking up for me! I still don't sleep 8 hrs straight through, but I no longer wake at 2am and stare at the ceiling until getting up. Have you seen your GP?

I've had issues with insomnia for about 15 years. Tried all of the OTC sleeping pills, Kirkland ordered online, zoplicone, yoga, meditation, reiki, CBD oil, gestalt therapy etc etc.

It often takes me up to 4 hours to fall asleep, and sometimes I wake up every 2 hours.

If anyone finds the solution please let me know!!

Ouch OP that sounds so tough. It is quite a lot of zopiclone to be taking. My insomnia isn’t nearly as bad but I do go through patches. I use zopi sometimes but I find a couple of Night Nurse capsules really helpful, although I have to take them around 8pm so I don’t feel zonked in the morning. Antihistamines are good too.

Have heard excellent things about CBT for insomnia but never tried it.

Sleep deprivation is the utter pits, I feel for you.

I came off Zopiclone very gradually - so I began with taking one, then dropped that to a half. Then after a week of that, dropped that to a quarter. Then a week later, a quarter every other night. I still have a few tablets kept safely in my bedside table - knowing they’re there as an option really helps me, and perversely enough as a result I hardly ever need them. They’re my back-up plan.

I take Kalms, just the standard ones, and use Rescue Remedy (the night one) at bedtime. I also do a short, simple yoga practice as my very last thing before I get into bed. I’ll look for a link to send to you - you have to sign up for an email but I’ve never received a single one and it’s free.

Hope you get sorted - it’s so, so tough.

The yoga - www.supersleepyoga.com/

I’ve had insomnia for years and when I do get to sleep I wake pretty much every 2 hours. I take prescribed or OTC drugs only when I know I don’t need to be anywhere the next day as they make me feel so bad.

What I have found has helped me is to stop worrying about it. I used to panic about how tired I’d be. Now I just accept I’m tired. Sounds odd I know and I don’t want to patronise anyone, but you can survive on very little sleep. I got 4 hours last night. 2 bouts of 2 hours. Yes, I’m tired today, but as I accepted that’s all the sleep I was going to get last night, I’m ok.

I saw a documentary presented by Michael Mosley on insomnia where they trialed various things. He tried a prebiotic (NOT probiotic which is different) fibre sachet added to a drink before he went to bed. His feedback after 7 days was that it had worked for him. Apparently it does something to the bacteria in your gut that helps sleep. I'd recorded it ages ago and watched it recently and thought I'd give it ago but haven't got round to ordering them. This is what he used - it was the once a day sachet I think.

www.bimuno.com/prebiotics-and-sleep

They also sell it on Amazon.

The other things tried were a hot bath before bed time and a cool bedroom (drop in body temperature makes you sleepy), mindfulness meditation and I think something else that I can't remember. The fibre drink thing had the best feedback as something that worked but the hot bath was also good.

The other thing you could try is moving bedtime. I was referred for CBT for sleep - it didn’t work for me, but my insomnia was different, it was based around anxiety about a specific thing (DSs SEN). It worked on the principle that you figured out your preferred wake up time and went to bed a certain number of hours before that - so if I wanted to get up at 6.30am, I was meant to stay up until 1.30am.

My GP referred me to this app called Sleep Station - you could try it. I won’t lie, it made me more anxious about sleep and I found other techniques more helpful, but it is supposed to be a very effective technique for the majority of people (80 - 85%, I think).

“ so if I wanted to get up at 6.30am, I was meant to stay up until 1.30am. “

Did you find you slept all the way through?

Watching with interest OP. Has your GP said the zopiclone has to be tapered off?

I didn’t - it made me too anxious about going to sleep (ridiculous, I know!). But my insomnia wasn’t sleep maintenance, I was fine once I went to sleep, I just couldn’t drop off. So for me the right thing to do was knock it on the head, use the pills and find ways to relax during the day and deal with my underlying stress - for me that’s Kalms, running, yoga and a better bedtime routine. Oh, and DS making a big leap with his speech therapy! And of course, the reassurance of having the magic pill if I need it.

It is an evidence-based therapy though, so well worth a try!

Spudlet thank you

I thought it was an odd recommendation. How’s your sleep now? Does your GP let you keep a stock of magic pills?

I get bad SAD and find it harder to cope with insomnia in winter.

You say you've tried everything - Sleepeaze, Nytol, candles, sprays, melatonin.

But have you tried Trazodone? Amitriptyline? Nortriptyline? Mirtazapine? There are lots of options out there, with lots of doses to play around with.

Good luck.

The principle behind it is really sound - the idea is that you improve your sleep efficiency, so that you spend the majority of time in bed asleep, rather than lying awake. That way you build a new association between bed and sleep, rather than bed and lying awake. There are other things to it as well, like spending as little time as possible in the bedroom during the day, things like that. It is meant to be very effective, it’s just that my insomnia was a symptom of anxiety, so I had to address the anxiety to deal with the sleep.

My sleep is generally good again now, my GP told me to keep a couple of pills back and said if I went back in (say) a year and asked for more, he’d prescribe them. But I shouldn’t stay on them every night.

I take Mirtazipine, and while it really helped me sleep when I first took it now it makes no difference. I still have insomnia.

What I've found very helpful is learning self-hypnosis. I learned it to help with anxiety, but now I can use it for all sorts of things, including getting to sleep. It's surprisingly brilliant at getting me to sleep, as hypnosis involves getting into a very deeply relaxed state. All I have to do now is focus very intently on slow, deep breathing, and off I go, fast asleep. It might help you, but you will have to put the work into learning how to do it.

As a pp poster said, I think one of the most important things when suffering from sleep deprivation is to try to reduce your anxiety around it by accepting it and realizing that if you don't sleep, you will still get through the next day. I used to get myself into such a state re lack of sleep but when I just accepted that it was what it was, I felt so much better and less stressed by it. And you can survive on very little sleep!
Also when you're less stressed and anxious about it, you tend to sleep more!

I'm suffered insomnia on and off since childhood, mostly issues with falling asleep but some sleep maintenance issues too. Over the years I've tried quite a few different meds and found Atarax to be the most helpful. A couple of years ago I had therapy for anxiety (schema therapy, a kind of CBT) and since then I've had very little sleep issues, would be worth trying therapy discussing that period of stress which triggered this for you.

I think chronic lack of sleep can do more damage than sleeping pills. My grandma took one every night and she lived till 95. Have you tried 10mg Amitriptyline? I sleep like a baby on it and it’s non addictive.

“I think chronic lack of sleep can do more damage than sleeping pills”

Agree. Can’t get the docs to agree though! I had a 95 year old neighbour who was routinely allowed them every night from the 1960s till she was admitted to a home at 92!

I’m watch this with interest.

Zopiclone works for me but my doctor is understandably cautious about prescribing it. I can get it when things are particularly bad though.

I have found a US allergy pill works well for keeping me asleep but not actually falling asleep. It is diphenhydramine. I bought a bottle of about 100 pills (smallest available quantity!) from the supermarket last time I was there on holiday. I think you can take 6-8 pills in a day but one pill at night keeps me asleep. Two means it is hard to get up in the morning.

I have been told to try a magnesium supplement but haven’t yet so that is an option.

I said allergy, I meant antihistamine - similar but different

As a pp poster said, I think one of the most important things when suffering from sleep deprivation is to try to reduce your anxiety around it by accepting it and realizing that if you don't sleep, you will still get through the next day.

Thats true but an equally distressing part for me is just getting through the night. I know this sounds ridiculous but it's just so bloody boring. Lying in the dark still for 4-8 hours is horrible.

I take 1/2 tablet of doxylamine (an antihistamine available otc where I live but not in the UK afaik) almost every night. I often go without it but by 2-3 am I'm bored to death and desperate! So I usually end up taking it. At this point I think I'm just going to accept it that I'm going to take it for the near future.

Watching with interest OP. I have just woken up from a lovely zopiclone night.

I alternate nytol phenergan and zopiclone. Nytol and phenergan both can work well for me but find v hit and miss.

My gp is very reluctant to give me more zopiclone though and I only have 2 left 😳

As a chronic insomniac since a small child, two things that I found worked for me: a kindle paper white and a Fitbit.

Having the kindle means I can read in bed if I am awake and stops me worrying about the fact that I am awake.

Fitbit monitored my sleep and helped me to work out how much sleep of which type I need to feel rested. I worry about it a lot less than I did, and I can survive on a lot, lot less than I thought.

I did see a sleep programme which suggested not going to sleep until the time you want to wake up one day and gradually easing the time earlier. I think it’d be knackering, but would probably sort the early wakings.

You’d need to not be in work to manage it though.

Overall, the only time in my life I have slept 8 hours a night and not woken was when I finished work. I think stress/anxiety is a massive trigger for me, so reducing that is the key I think.