Insomnia and suicidal feelings

[Sunland]

I posted about this problem before but I don't know so sorry for being repetitious. I am suffering from insomnia now for a while and I spend my nights wishing I were dead, wishing my son had a better mother and the mornings crying. I can't do this anymore. I just want to sleep. The gp wants to give me medication but I can't because my son wants to still breastfeed and I'm worried if I knock myself out with sleeping pills I'll not wake to hear him at night. I am devastated that feeling like this I am ruining his life with a miserable tired mother. I don't know what to do. I don't want antidepressants I just want to be able to sleep.

Hi there. This sounds awful, you poor thing. Insomnia is tortuous. You are NOT a bad mother - you are avoiding medication so you can still bf - that is really selfless and putting your baby's needs first. Baby loves being close to you - that tells me that babe knows you are his safe, warm and loving mummy. There is no one better in his eyes. How old is baby? Could you consider gradual weaning? If baby is old enough there is absolutely no harm in doing this and helping him learn to sleep without feeding. Alternatively, do you have a DP so you could pump to a bottle and DP could night feed? Then maybe you could take yourself to a quieter place to sleep where you know you won't be disturbed.

Also have you been totally honest with your GP about your thoughts? If you can't take meds, have you been referred for counselling of some sort?

Hi @Sunland thanks for your message I’m so sorry to hear you are feeling like this. I have been in the same situation when I was breastfeeding m. I genuinely believe that you need to look after yourself first because if you aren’t taking care of yourself you can’t give the best to anyone else. Post natal hormones are insane and very unpredictable, you are not alone. It is very hard for someone to tell you what to do because it’s always tough. How old is your little one? Might you consider trying a bottle of expressed breast milk before bed time for your little one? I’m just thinking that sleep deprivation nearly killed me. And such a cliche but nap whenever your little one naps. Sending lots of love to you and just do one thing today for you and no one else! Maybe a shower or a walk or favourite song 🎶 xxxxxxxx

CBT is actually more effective over the long term than sleeping medication, would highly recommend trying that. I saw a dr who specialized in CBT for sleep and it made a WAY bigger difference for sleep than sleeping pills. The other thing worth noting is that very low dose antidepressants actually make you sleepy- I was prescribed these as needed for sleep. I think mirtazapine is what I was prescribed. Most anti Ds are fine to take while breastfeeding (I was). You don’t need to take every day and you wouldn’t have to wean off etc . Worth discussing with your GP for sure. They were the bandaid that got me over the hump until I had enough CBT practices in place (about a month) to sleep ok on my own again. I sleep great again now & most of my (extreme) anxiety around never sleeping again went within a couple months of starting CBT.

Ps- insomnia with a baby is literally hell. You get plenty of parents giving you advice about sleep when baby sleeps and blah blah blah, but when you can’t fucking get out to sleep when your baby IS sleeping, it makes you want to rip out your own eye balls. It is a special kind of hell, but it WILL get better. I was at the point where I was jealous when my husband had knee surgery because he got to have a general anesthetic and SLEEP and it sounded like the best solution ever.