What It Takes To Fall Asleep

[sun seeker]

Franciemarnie, thanks for sharing, it sounds like for you the timing of your anxiety makes perfect sense. I'm sorry that happened to you.

I use a similar grounding technique, focusing on each sense in turn. It helps a bit. For me though, I'm not necessarily very anxious when I can't sleep. It's more of a physical feeling... I know anxiety is also a physical feeling, but this is a different physical feeling... erm... I'm not doing very well at describing this. The closest I can come is the feeling you get if you've drunk a lot of coffee. Wired, unfocused, can't stay still, as sensitive as the princess and the pea. The waking early may well be depression-related for me. Which is too bad because that's when I really want to sleep!

Yes, I intend to get some new earphones soon. I love cats too but they sure can be a handful when they're little! My kitty is my company and really helps me stay grounded. I don't think I've ever seen grass wallpaper, it sounds nice.

 

[franciemarnie]

sun seeker - I think I know what you are talking about. I mean, what I have is not anxiety at 10 pm. It begins that way at 5:00, but by bed time, it has become something completely different. I may be exhausted, and usually am, but it's like there is an engine inside of me ready to go 180 mph at the slightest movement. I am hyper alert. Every part of me is AWARE. Too aware. It's almost inhuman - the feeling, unrelated to my daylight hours feeling. It is tremendously difficult to calm down. It's tensely vigil. It's like a machine almost. In fact, it reminds me of our family car in high school. I would start it in the garage and the engine would be too strong, but if I pressed down quickly once on the accelerator (while in park), it would calm down and drive smoothly. I have spent a lifetime trying to find a way to push the pedal down in me as efficiently.

Waking with despair at 4 am is the worst.

I want a kitten again! And a dog. And a horse. I'm like 12 (plus 40. Ha!)

 

[TonyG]

Anxiety is my main cause of not being able to sleep and it is extreme at the moment so only sleeping pills work, and of course I wake up feeling the same, Its Monday now and I took, well let's just say a couple of sleeping pills on Friday night and slept right through Saturday and woke up Saturday afternoon, went back to bed and slept until 1pm Sunday, that was last night and I went to bed early and got up at 6:30am this morning feeling great, some issues at home causing some stress at the moment so the anxiety is building once again, I just have to make it through work tonight and I see my psycholigist tomorrow morning.

 

[scout86]

I have a similar problem. No solution. At least not yet. My T has made a bunch of suggestions. Some of them seem to help some of the time. He thinks, in my case, at least some of it is more ADHD than PTSD. I generally seem to sleep fairly good about 1 night out of 3 or 4. (My T says that's not "getting a good night's sleep." it's "being exhausted".)

It's weird. I can doze off on the couch, mid afternoon (if I'm home) no problem. I can feel sleepy early in the evening, and think "tonight I'm. actually going to get some sleep. Then when I'm actually supposed to be sleeping, no luck. Now and then it helps if I get up and wander around the house for awhile & then go back to bed.

 

[KwanYingirl]

@scout86 i do the same. I call it my nocturnal migrations. Sometimes I'm dissociated and wake up having no memory of how I wandered off. I agree with the hypervigilance factor. I have to be careful about watching TV before bed. Some shows can be triggering.

 

[sun seeker]

It sounds like a lot of people can relate, in fact many of you have it worse than me. Sorry about that guys!

Last night I took some Benadryl and that got me a good long sleep. I can't do that too often though.

Really I think it comes back to finding a good therapist. Still working on that one.

 

[franciemarnie]

sun seeker - I agree. Keep looking for a good T. My sleep has gotten 100% better with release of trauma energy with somatic T and bodywork.

So glad you got some sleep.