Severe Insomnia

[Pearl001]

Hello everyone,
I began hormone replacement therapy 2 weeks ago primarily to address severe insomnia (falling asleep but waking after 1-2 hours and unable to return to sleep, some nights no sleep at all). I was prescribed Estradot 50 and Utrogestan 200mg to take for 2 weeks each month. ( Also take magnesium glycinate each night , also tried other things like phenergan, valerian, hops, tryptophan, melatonin, cbd gummies but nothing works. )
Unfortunately I am not experiencing any improvement and feel disheartened after reading many success stories where women's sleep significantly improved right away. 😞
I understand that I should give it more time to see if things improve, but cannot imagine not sleeping for another 3 months or so.
I'm curious to know how quickly your insomnia improved with HRT or if you needed a dosage adjustment.
Thank you.😘

It's very early days and everyone varies.

The medical advice is to give it 3 months but I appreciate sounds awfully long at the moment for you!

Depending on your age, you might need more estrogen.

50mcg patch is a medium dose.

If you were on gel , you could try 3 pumps (or even 4) because your patch is roughly the same as 2 pumps of gel. Women on gel can go up to 4 pumps which is high, like a 100mcg patch.

Thank you @JinglingSpringbells. Yes, you're spot on. The wait for improvement does seem dreadfully long. Hoping my sleep bounces back sooner than 3 months - it's really tough to carry on with life without proper sleep. 😫

Maybe if no change in 6-8 weeks, ask for an increase in the patch?

I'm on just over 2 months and there's been no change in my sleep duration which is so frustrating but I have noticed I'm getting slightly more deep sleep on some nights which does give me some hope. But no major immediate changes at all. I think I may be a slow burner as I didn't see any improvements at all till very recently. I think it just takes some people a bit longer!

So sorry OP - sadly it does a bit of a while

with the phenergen- just to check you’re taking 2 x 25mg tablets not the 10mg ones? I found it didn’t work for me till I did that

I started hrt 10days ago (evorel patch & utrogestan) primarily fir insomnia & unbearable anxiety. Feeling horrendous mood wise but sleeping through the night. Insomnia is awful, I hope yours improves really soon.

@JinglingSpringbells Yep, I spoke to my doc yesterday and she said to wait for another 2 weeks and if no improvement by then, she would be happy to give me higher dose. So annoying the HRT is a lots of trial and error 😅

@SpongeBobRectanglePants Yes, it's very frustrating! I felt disheartened reading about women (including Davina) who saw progress in just a few days. Seems like you're on the right track with getting some good deep sleep. Fingers crossed you'll be sleeping through the night very soon! 🤗

@Theeyeballsinthesky Thank you for giving me more hope, just need to be more patient.
I tried 1x25mg and 2x25mg of phenergan on few occasions and the stronger dose made me drowsy and helped me to fall asleep but then was up in 90mins and had bad restless legs 😓

@Turtlerunner Glad your sleep is back! You are right, nothing worse than not sleeping well and trying to push through the day. May I ask what is your Evorel dose and where you place it? X

I would see if you can get a referral onto an CBTi (i for insomnia) programme like Sleepstation (and there are others) through your GP. I was a civil servant so I got it through the civil service charity.

The HRT helped quite a bit but the specialist insomnia programme was the first time CBT had ever really worked for me and it is quite tough at first. Normally CBT feels a bit superficial but not this time! It actually involves analysing your sleep patterns (or lack of sleep patterns) and then reducing your sleep times(!) for a while until you start feeling properly tired and then it extends your sleeping hours until you find a sleep schedule that works for you. You could probably do it on your own but you do need support as insomnia is horrible and you feel so lonely at 3am.

It takes weeks, it's quite hard when you have life and work to do but you have counsellors on tap to ask questions. I think the combination of HRT and the programme was a life changer. I had to stop HRT when I got an ovarian cyst and I was worried the vast improvements I had made would melt away but I have never had the same issues again in two years. I don't feel so anxious any more when I go to bed.

I'm on Evorel 25 to start with & I've been putting it on my hip.

@Staticgirl Thank you so much for all the info, this is very helpful. I think once I am on the right dose of HRT I would look into something like this if I still have issues. Have you done the CBT programme through the Sleepstation? X

Thank you! X

The progesterone part of the cycle is what really helped me so stick with it. I also found a decent magnesium supplement with a range of different magnesiums was much more effective. I use one from Longevity Box but there are others out there too. Not cheap but having a decent sleep is priceless!

Yes I did and it really helped me. In fact, two years later, I think I am sleeping better than I have ever done in my entire life as I have always had a bit of a problem with insomnia even when I was a kid. If you can get a free referral then it is worth a try. It is quite a tough programme but it is worth it at least for me.

I worry about being too evangelical about it as it probably doesn't work for everyone and I don't want to sound like a paid shill for them but I just had such a good outcome....

Very interesting, never come across magnesium mixed with so many types of mags, will definitely give it a try! Thanks for the recommendation!
I began with the progesterone part and now have 2 weeks off, so just sticking with it and hoping for improvement.

Very happy for you @Staticgirl ! Insomnia is horrible 😣