Having trouble getting up and staying up in the mornings...

[Changing4Best]

Having Trouble Getting Up and Staying up in the mornings... What Can I Do??

I have been depressed a bit, even suicidal, so I know that is part of it. I also have been physically sick with a sinus infection and am on antibiotics. I am having a really tough time getting up in the mornings. CPTSD added into the mix, and I am dumbfounded as to what to do to get myself up in the mornings and stay up.

I am dragging myself out of bed something like an hour after my alarm goes off, dozing off in be tween. The only reason I even get up is because I know I have to take my medicines (and eventually go to work).

I get enough sleep. I even sleep right now more than 8 hours, I think. Not sure. I have not been timing when I actually fall asleep, so maybe I am not getting enough sleep, or enough GOOD QUALITY sleep? However, I think I am getting enough sleep.

I go to bed around 8 PM and set my alarm for 6 AM. I even set it for 6:30 AM this week, to see if that would help, but it hasn't.

Any suggestions? Does this happen to you at all??

 

[EveHarrington]

Yes, I'm struggling with this right now. I know a big part is my medication.

 

[Changing4Best]

I went off one medicine that I thought might be causing this a few months ago. For awhile, awhile after I went off the med, I seemed to get better at getting up, but recently it has been so hard! It could be some of the meds I still take, true, but I really cannot go off any of them. They all help to keep me sane and some of them help me with physical problems too.

 

[Marisea]

Had this problem all my life. Would rather be in bed than anywhere else. Safe and stress free.

 

[Changing4Best]

Yeh, I know what you mean. I have been dealing with bullies and such where I work, handled that by setting a boundary, going to a higher authority and complaining too, but now the bully is giving me the "silent treatment" which is not much fun either. So, yeh, stress is everywhere in one form or another. Like someone doing something unexpectedly that sets your day in some kind of weird line-up that you weren't planning on. All kinds of stuff comes up! Yeh, bed is a safe place for me too. You have a good point.

 

[Chiqui]

@SheilaKathy I have this problem for years now. Due some chronic insomnia and my circadian systistem broke down. I just can't be awaked in the mornings...!!! Also believe I am scared of «normal life» and avoid mornings and problems.
Hope you find some answers to your problem.

 

[Changing4Best]

Well! I actually woke up at 4:20 AM this morning and have been up since, although I have been sitting and resting in my recliner on and off during most of this time. I had my usual coffee and breakfast and did my devotions, then just prayed and "vegetated" for a bit. I decided to try to stay awake, rather than go back to bed, kind of as an experiment. I wanted to see if maybe I might have been oversleeping these last mornings, making myself too tired by doing so.

So far, this morning I don't really feel tired, although I kind of just feel blah and bored maybe. I am not dreading my day, nor am I looking forward to it particularly. I am just sort of facing it and saying to myself, "Well, today is another day. Let's make the best of it, me, myself and I."

 

[Tornadic Thoughts]

I have to get things flowing by first oxygenating my cells via diaphragmatic breathing, then healthily hydrating upon rising via lemon water and herbal infusions, and then moving my body in several different fun and enjoyable ways to get my heartbeat up and get my body to sweat some toxic crap out to continue to feel awake the rest of the day.

Bathing helps big time, too, especially when I dry brush prior to showering, or if I soak in the tub with epsom salts. It feels like water some how washes away much of what weighs me down...so much so I may bathe more than once a day on a really shitty day. I often envision stuff going down the drain and that can help in just letting it go.

I don't eat solid food until 11ish or later. I usually have some fruit juice after the other hydration and typically have fruit for my first meal. That's the opposite of what I used to believe I HAD to ingest to feel awake. Total opposite, as I used to be a bacon, eggs, and toast, along with pancakes, waffles, and cereal w/bovine secretions consumer, especially when I was still taking prescriptions and had to take stuff with meals being highly recommended by highly misinformed professional folks.

I stretch before I even get out of bed to make moving much less painful, too. If I have to pee really bad, I go take care of that and brush my teeth, then return to bed, sans the covers, to do my stretches. From there, I drink lots of lemon water and herbal infusions in between bouncing on the mini-trampoline, dancing with the hula hoop, or just dancing and singing like a fool to my favorite songs. If I skip any or all of those things, I feel sluggish and totally off my game the rest of the day.

I used to struggle with many sleeping issues, especially being a shift worker for decades, and took many different meds to try to address it. Cleaner more mindful consumption habits, breathing on purpose, healthily hydrating and stretching, and increasing fun activity levels seem to have been the answers to lessening my sleeping and waking dilemmas, along with many other issues I'd long been told were simply not fixable or reversible.

 

[I need to heal]

Having Trouble Getting Up and Staying up in the mornings... What Can I Do??

I have been depressed...

Hi SheilaKathy,
Am sending you huge hugs & let me tell you why - for to share your feelings openly with others - in just being raw, shows your beauty, your sense of humanity & humility.
I think you don't really want someone to give advice & tell you what you need to do, it is more that you want help in understanding what you are going through. For that reason alone, know that you will be fine & let's hope this community of PTSD people will bring some peace of mind. PTSD is hell but after now having had my worst bout yet - nearly ten weeks bedridden, unable to work, let alone trying to leave the house, unable to answer the phone, barely able to get dressed, confusion in processing the most basic of things, no desire to see anyone or conscious need to eat, I then had a 2nd car accident (both less than 12 months apart), after the first accident that saw me hitting a brick wall from having spent 3yrs moving away from DV, workplace bullying, cyberstalking, online fraud/deception, my abuser infiltrating my workplace by the people I worked with, the car accident was the final straw it slammed me into a wall, I literally unraveled & fell apart, a place I had wanted to believe in that was 'people caring for people' had become toxic & was 'people hurting other people' - it made me lose heart! I even had staff telling me it's okay if you want to scream - so much trauma - the migraines have been intense, depression kicks in badly when you have to accept the losses you've faced: restriction of mobility, retardation of mental ability, focus issues, deterioration of health, emotional unbalance & distress from being under long term intense duress, reduced agility & foggy acumen.......sometimes drowning but also hanging onto hope.........hope that becomes less......& less..... & then with feeling like I was back where I'd been nearly 4 years ago, one step away from the street - how I'd somehow put myself back into the same position to be used/abused & broken in every way - oops look victim mode, yet again how we tell our tale of woe; the 2nd accident then hit- so I have a choice to make - as do we all; roll over & give up or let the accident 'push me out the other side. And sometimes just maybe that's what it takes; a worse pain than the current one you're in that will unlock your door & enable you to move through to the other side.
Maybe that's really messed up or perhaps it's a stroke of genius.... only time again now will tell.
One thing the last ten weeks has taught me is that we move from feelings for which we've been so raw to then becoming numb - let pain become your friend SheilaKathy- our depression is when we struggle & fight against what is happening to us, pain will motivate you, it will force you to feel it & then compel you to defeat it, & maybe set you free
Anyway, I give thanks - because you have helped me, writing always has & will continue to be my best therapy, find what brings in your passion, what makes you feel happy & do everything you can, no matter how long it takes to bring this into a new world reality.
-Find a cause/volunteer
-Get a friend to join you for a walk or meet you at the Gym
-set your alarm clock in a place that needs you to get out of bed to turn it off
-buy a shower gel & loofah, feel yourself making movements that lather the soap over your body, the warmth of the water, the scent of the gel, the softness of your skin
-get a pet, taking care of something else removes the focus from you
-last but most important of all - you are Amazing, don't think too much just simply do, & always continue to feel but don't let it overwhelm you.

Having Trouble Getting Up and Staying up in the mornings... What Can I Do??

I have been depressed...

Break your routine. Have a night where you stay up all night or really late, let yourself go completely - turn up to work an absolute mess, or just don't go at all.....challenge the status quo, exhaust yourself with adrenalin (find a natural rush), a lavender & epsom salt soak in a bathtub, a massage or foot rub- the key to your return to sleep is breaking your current habit with sleep

 

[Changing4Best]

Well, I went to see my chiropractor today and will be seeing my MD on Monday. Today is the last day of a 2 week antibiotics prescription and that might be what has been causing this, not to mention the sinus infection. Chiropractor said I was a "mess" and did her best to put me back together again. She said I have not been this messy since months ago. I had to agree.

I purposefully decided to stay in bed this morning until I had to get up and go. I did not let myself feel guilty about it. I think that helped. Sometimes you just have to go easy on yourself, when life has been tough, and believe me, with having had to deal with bullies at work, and at the building I live in, life has been TOUGH. So going easy on myself seemed to be the right thing to do.

 

[theshadowoftheliving]

I know that sometimes I feel exhausted because even though I "slept", I didn't really sleep .... laying in bed doesn't always equate good rest. Maybe you just haven't been sleeping well? Meditation or other things to relax might help.