Insomniaaaaaargggghh thread

[Dex Sawash]

Get off the amphetamines asap

[Midas]

Some good recommendations in this thread about establishing nighttime routines and eliminating distractions. My only immediate advice is to stay away from sedatives. Alcohol is one of the most powerful suppressors of REM sleep that we know of and the next day side effects from taking sleeping pills can be significantly deleterious to cognitive functioning.

I'd recommend reading this if you haven't already:

Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker

It gives a holistic introduction to why we sleep, an accessible examination of how and why we dream and provides a number of active steps you can take to improve your nighttime routine. It's great.

[Twit 2]

You maybe need to look at your vaping nicotine intake Twit2? As any occasional smoker knows, nicotine is the enemy of restful sleep.

This is true, cheers. Mainly, I think my bipolar is the enemy, but I've made the decision to go on meds for this for the first time in 12 years. I've reduced by vape from 12mg to 3mg so that should help. Also stopped drinking coffee in afternoons.

[touchingcloth]

Insomniaaaaaargggghh, forever till the end of time
From now on, only you and I, we're staying u-u-u-u-u-up
Insomniaaaaaargggghh, an everlasting piece of fart
A beating hate within my heart, we're staying u-u-u-u-u-up

[purlieu]

Absolutely no joke intended, have you tried wanking? It works for me about 90% of the time when I have insomnia. I can find myself awake at 4am and post-coital slumber is literally the only thing that will stop me being rabidly awake.

Music-wise, get yourself on the first album by A Winged Victory for the Sullen. Lie still and let yourself sink into it. Phenomenally relaxing record.

[Kankurette]

Absolutely no joke intended, have you tried wanking? It works for me about 90% of the time when I have insomnia. I can find myself awake at 4am and post-coital slumber is literally the only thing that will stop me being rabidly awake.

Music-wise, get yourself on the first album by A Winged Victory for the Sullen. Lie still and let yourself sink into it. Phenomenally relaxing record.

Yes, and sometimes it works. Not always though.

Does going to bed earlier help, anyone know?

ETA: exercise doesn't always help, especially when it triggers a pain flare. Also, I feel like utter shite if I don't nap in the day and even if I don't, I still have problem sleeping.

[chveik]

the problem with the happy pills is that they might make you sleep way too much. you can't win i guess

[Kankurette]

Barry, it was Nytol that gave me restless legs. When you can barely stay awake but your legs are trying to Riverdance, it's not much fun.

[pancreas]

Let me prescribe:

1 night weed
1 night booze
1 night benzodiazepine
1 night pregabalin

Cycle the above to prevent build-up of addiction and tolerance.

Add in a Z for a 5 night cycle. Add in an opioid for a 6 night. Chloroform for 7. Taser yourself for 8.

I could keep going ... ?

[imitationleather]

But what if I like doing all of them at once?

[pancreas]

So would I, but I have found it difficult to hold a chloroform flannel to my face while tasering myself. Any tips?

[imitationleather]

Duct tape.

[Cerys]

I managed to knock my insomnia on the head.  Then I read this thread.  I have now been awake all night and I hate the lot of you.

[pancreas]

I managed to knock my insomnia on the head.  Then I read this thread.  I have now been awake all night and I hate the lot of you.

https://www.chemicals.co.uk/chloroform

[Cerys]

TV and films have lied to us too much for me to trust that.

[Kankurette]

I[m in a real mess at the moment. Went to bed about 1, woke up at 2 and took painkillers to help me sleep, finally fell asleep about half 3, woken up at 5am by cat demanding food, went back to sleep, woke up at 11:40, found out I had a massive translation job due for tomorrow afternoon, tried to copy the template, template wouldn't copy properly, and I just burst into tears and could not stop. I'm at my wits' end and I honestly feel like I'll never be able to sleep properly again. I think the heat is part of it, but I feel like shite and it's a beautiful sunny day and I have to work and I just want to go back to bed, preferably forever.

[Largely Babble]

Taking painkillers is not a sensible way to get to sleep (I'm presuming opioids). The anger you're feeling today is almost certainly a withdrawal from them alongside the tiredness.
All ideas that drugs can help you through sleeplessness are wrong. From weed to actual sleeping pills. Mostly because the sleeping pills either are so ineffective as to be placebos (Nytol for example - it's not even a sleeping tablet, just an anti-histamine, the side effect of which is drowsiness). Even barbiturates or hypnotics have a maximum recommended usage of days rather than weeks because tolerance is quickly developed.
And stuff like weed, while it seems like it's sleepy-making - it's actually a simulant and makes it harder to sleep.
Sadly the only way to deal with insomnia is to tackle it head on. If you know what's keeping you awake (stress, anger, too much coffee etc) then tackle the cause not the symptom. If you do not know what is keeping you up, doctors. Sleep studies if necessary. But with so many things in life, self-medication is never the answer. It's only ever an indicator.

[Kankurette]

They're prescription painkillers for fibromyalgia, not OTC, and I'd be taking them anyway. I can't take Nytol as it gives me restless legs. I drink decaf in the evenings because normal coffee gives me nocturia.

The anger I'm feeling today is because I've got 32 pages of medical notes to translate into English and I can't even read half of them, and it's supposed to be done by 4pm tomorrow. It's not because of my meds.

[JaDanketies]

Coffee is definitely a self-fulfilling drug and is often the basis for many of many bad sleep cycles I've got into.

- drink a boatload of coffee in the morning
- then don't feel tired at bedtime
- so drink alcohol and smoke weed to unwind
- and then sleep poorly because I drank alcohol
- so drink a boatload of coffee the next morning
- and the vicious cycle continues.

[All Surrogate]

All ideas that drugs can help you through sleeplessness are wrong.

I have to say I disagree. In some cases it is appropriate to use drugs to combat insomnia. At the moment the drugs that are available are very far from perfect and so should be used very carefully, but sometimes imperfect is better than sleeplessness. Although I take quetiapine primarily for mental health reasons, one of its effects is to help me sleep. I try to take as little as possible, but I take it regularly, and it remains effective.

[Largely Babble]

I have to say I disagree. In some cases it is appropriate to use drugs to combat insomnia. At the moment the drugs that are available are very far from perfect and so should be used very carefully, but sometimes imperfect is better than sleeplessness. Although I take quetiapine primarily for mental health reasons, one of its effects is to help me sleep. I try to take as little as possible, but I take it regularly, and it remains effective.

Yet the insomnia remains. You wouldn't have to take them regularly if it didn't. Drugs just push the problem down the road.

[Kankurette]

That's not why I take them. I take them for chronic pain, they just make me sleepy. I actually don't like taking specific sleep meds because they never work. Even if I was sleeping normally, I'd be taking them, especially since my pain's gotten worse recently - I think I might have arthritis in my hip. I've already got it in my knee and wrist.

[Largely Babble]

That's not why I take them. I take them for chronic pain, they just make me sleepy. I actually don't like taking specific sleep meds because they never work. Even if I was sleeping normally, I'd be taking them, especially since my pain's gotten worse recently - I think I might have arthritis in my hip. I've already got it in my knee and wrist.

I genuinely feel your pain. I too am arthritic. Fingers, wrists and shoulders at the moment. Getting my medication and sleeping routine right has clearly been a long task for me as you can see. I'm glad you're getting double effect from the pills. I'd just be wary of relying on them in case you can't sleep.

[Kankurette]

I am careful not to go over the daily limit. I'd get constipated, for one thing.

Are you on any prescription meds for yours? Methotrexate or whatever?

[canadagoose]

(Topic diversion) How the bloody hell do you get your doctor to prescribe more things for chronic pain? I've been on co-codamol 30/500 for a year or so, and even then it took ages to get to that point. I only get enough to have two per day and, as you can imagine, they don't last all day. I mean I can ibuprofen + heat pad (not this time of year...) + freeze gel until the end of never but it'd be nice to have something else effective.

[JaDanketies]

(Topic diversion) How the bloody hell do you get your doctor to prescribe more things for chronic pain?

I know it's obvious, but have you tried telling them that the stuff they are giving you isn't working?

[canadagoose]

I know it's obvious, but have you tried telling them that the stuff they are giving you isn't working?

I mean, it does work, but it'd be nice to have something that works even more, or for the times that I don't have enough. I seem to get a lot of "eeeh, I dunno" responses. I don't know why.

[JaDanketies]

I mean, it does work, but it'd be nice to have something that works even more, or for the times that I don't have enough. I seem to get a lot of "eeeh, I dunno" responses. I don't know why.

It's cos if they prescribe you any opiate stronger than codeine for a chronic condition, they will fairly assume that you're going to become addicted to it.

[canadagoose]

It's cos if they prescribe you any opiate stronger than codeine for a chronic condition, they will fairly assume that you're going to become addicted to it.

Well, quite possibly. I imagine there are other medications available, though. Same as for anxiety, when I was off my old antidepressants and on a different one for a bit, I had horrendous anxiety and I still can't listen to music I listened to then without my stomach churning, I couldn't get anything more than propranolol. What's the key? Do you just need to kick up a fuss? Thing is I wasn't raised that way and it feels wrong! Argh.

Sorry for topic diversion, please feel free to carry on.

[Largely Babble]

I am careful not to go over the daily limit. I'd get constipated, for one thing.

Are you on any prescription meds for yours? Methotrexate or whatever?

No. I looked at the prognosis and balanced it up against the dangers of the side effects and chose for personal reasons not to go down that road. It's a shame because I have psoriatic nails which are pretty ugly to look at, but then again, setting about what is basically chemo to make my nails look nicer seemed silly.
Now it's ten odd years later and it's turning in to full blown arthritis, I might consider it again.
I just have 500/30 Cocodamol thingies. I get through probably 80/90 or so a month. Somewhere along the way I stopped getting constipated with them. Amazing how bodies are really good at self correction sometimes - and then other times they go "Shit! Better grow a whole load of substandard cells here for no reason..."
When I was in hospital for an op, unrelated, a few years back a doctor commented on my heroic morphine intake and then when I said I'd been on those doses of cocodamol for ten odd years she said she was actually surprised the morphine had any effect. Ha!