SEVERE Insomnia and Anxiety Early Preganancy

[Dreaminginpink]

Hi all,

I'm currently around 6 and a half weeks pregnant and for the past week or so have been suffering with SEVERE insomnia and anxiety. By severe, I mean I'm going literally days without any sleep and spending all day feeling absolutely terrible, on edge, sick, no motivation to do anything, exhausted, cant eat etc.

I had an episode like this around 8 years ago when I was going through a stressful period in my life and it went on for months and was horrific, again couldn't sleep for days, wasn't eating etc. The only way I got over it at that time was to go on sleeping tablets and a medication called pregabalin (which isn't recommended in pregnancy)

I've already been to see the emergency mental health team and had a call with the perinatal mental health team yesterday but I don't really feel like I'm getting very far. The doctor prescribed me some sleeping tablets even though she didn't really want to, they worked for one night and then last night I was back to no sleep again despite taking them 😔

I feel like I'm in a state of absolute despair now, I'm sure I will have done irreparable damage to the baby with all these sleepless nights and stress and I feel absolutely terrible. I was just wondering if anyone else has been through anything similar, if so, did it get better as your pregnancy progressed? What medication did you take if any? I feel so alone and just want to feel normal again 😭

Hi
I saw you hadn’t had any responses. This sounds absolutely awful and I really feel for you. I do think the perinatal MH team are your best bet to go back to. Pregnancy hormones can do this and I experienced very significant anxiety in my first pregnancy, my sister had the same. I hope you get some support to get through it xx

If you can afford to pay, a session of clinical hypnotherapy may help!

I suffer from insomnia in pregnancy but not so severe, I've always managed at least 3/4 broken hours a night which is about enough to see me through. To go days without any sleep must be horrendous. Can you sleep at all in the daytime? I always found day napping easier than night sleep.

Try not to worry about the baby, women throughout time have gone through pregnancy in the most awfully stressful situations. It's not healthy for you though and I'd advise going back and seeking more medical advice.

Hey lovely,
I can relate. I have mental health issues and I have found since becoming pregnant my sleep is terrible, I believe it is down to the hormones and friends have experience this as well.
Lack of sleep + anxiety is enough for anyone to be pushed to the edge ❤️

i also have anxiety especially around my pregnancy.i take a couple of medicines to help with my anxiety and bipolar (been on them for a few years). I have felt so much better because of this and I don’t think I would be able to cope without my medication.

the positive is I am completely’normal’ and can cope really well with life on my meds, if I were to come off them I would get very unwell and at crisis point like you are feeling.

My point is you may have some sort of mental health issues and you are at crisis point and the doctors need to take this seriously. You need to be explicit ….you are pregnant and not coping, you are not the expert they need to take over and get you better.
Absolutely tell the doctors you will break and feel you can’t carry on and they must take it seriously.

I’m on quetapine and sertraline (not sure of the spellings!) but they might put you on something else because you are pregnant.
yes I know there there is a small chance this could affect the baby but to put it bluntly I wouldn’t be alive without my medication.
you need to be as healthy as you can be for the baby.

you will not have caused damaage to your baby hun, please please don’t think this.

xxx

Hi OP - I am 4w +6 and also struggling with insomnia and anxiety- I just wondered how long yours went on for, and whether you had a successful pregnancy and birth?
mum tsking prednisone and progesterone and I'm sure they're making things worse!

Hello,

reaching out to @Dreaminginpink and the others as I’m 5 weeks pregnant and been having nights of zero sleep, feel like im at breaking point and not being taken seriously. Promethazine wasn’t strong enough for me.

please help and let me know how you got on. Hoping you are feeling lots better now xx

Hi @Carlotta27 sorry to hear you're going through similar, it's absolutely awful isn't it 😥 it's one of the worst things I've ever experienced 😥 so what happened with me is that for the first 12 weeks I got by using sleeping tablets (zopiclone). I was very lucky in that they wouldn't usually be prescribed in pregnancy but I got under the perinatal mental health team (would recommend this if you haven't already) and they agreed to prescribe them for me. I was actually prescribed them several times as each time I stopped taking them I had such severe anxiety and insomnia I was almost at the point of being unable to continue with the pregnancy, it was awful. Just to add I also tried promethazine and it didn't work for me either, just made me feel dizzy and spaced out.

Once I hit the 12 week mark, the perinatal team agreed for me to go back on pregabalin, which is the medication that helped me when I had an anxiety/insomnia episode in the past. I battled for ages with the worry about any damage caused to the baby from taking the sleeping tablets and pregabalin but from that point onwards my mental health improved, I started being able to sleep again and I coped ok with the rest of the pregnancy. I gave birth to a healthy 8lb baby boy who is now almost 18 months 🙂

I would really recommend contacting your local perinatal mental health team, they are so much more knowledgeable and helpful than gp's and have so much more understanding of these things. I'm still under them now and they are still helping with my anxiety 🙂 I hope you manage to get some help, I know how lonely it is being in this situation so if you want to chat about anything let me know 🙂

I second reaching out to mental health team.

@Dreaminginpink Thank you so much for getting back to me and sharing your positive outcome!

I actually got in tough with the perinatal mentla health team and the prescrbed Mirtrazapene + Promethazine (antihistaimes) which i took last night. They took many hours of wooziness to finally make me fall asleep, and today i have woken up SO groggy and barely able to function. So i got some sleep but this doesn't seem sustinable. My Dr seemed reluctant to prescribe Zopicline...

So did you manage to stop all meds once you mental health improved?

I'm 6 weeks and lacking symptoms so worry i have harmed baby...

You're right that it's one of the worts experiences ever and i just want it to go away!

Thank you for getting back to me xx

Please don't worry about lack of symptoms... I had barely any symptoms, and the symptoms I had would come and go. Like you, I read into every TINY thing. Honestly I can't count the number of times I convinced myself something was wrong. I know have a 13 month old monkey! That said, if you are worried about something, it's always best to check 💕

@Ttcpph that’s really reassuring to hear! Naturally I’m over thinking everything

I have been put in mirtrapezene to
help sleep but it makes me a total depressed zombie in the day. I really hope this resolves soon!

I have a seven week scan on Wednesday so I’m hoping if it’s good news that may help the anxiety and sleep xx