[morganjane]

I've had trouble sleeping, either falling asleep or more often, staying asleep, most of my life. I also have insanely vivid dreams so often when I do wake up I feel more stressed than when I went to bed. There's nothing like spending your non-waking hours running from homicidal maniacs to make you not want to face the world the next. So I end up drinking way too much caffeine, which isn't helping my health and ends up being a vicious cycle, damaging the next night's sleep. I only use sleeping pills as a last resort; last night I gave in and took one and ended up having horrific dreams about overdosing all night. Does anyone else have issues like this? How do make sure you get enough sleep without giving in to the desire to spend way too much time in bed?

[Abe Froman]

Well unfortunately I can't relate to the stressful dreams. I mean I have had them in my life, but it's rare.

But I figure I was sleeping maybe 2-3 hours a night. I finally said something to my doctor and I did a sleep study in May. Of course I have sleep apnea. I got a CPAP machine and it took two weeks to get used to. Long story longer, all seemed fine for a while. Then in July the depression got really, really bad. Suddenly I had major insomnia. Sleep maybe an hour a night.

I had to break down and get some Klonopin but it only lets me sleep 3-4 hours. So I'm tired all day. I don't have the option to stay in bed. I'm a full time student taking 18 hours in my final semester at the age of 36. I literally cannot afford to fail. So I just have to keep going to the doctors and hoping I can make it to December.

I wish I could offer help. Best of luck.

[morganjane]

Ugh. You sound like you're in worse shape than me. I've considered asking a doctor about the CPAP machine, but I'm afraid that as much as I toss and turn, I'd end up throwing the thing across the room in the middle of the night.

[Altered Moment]

Are either of you taking SSRI's or SSNRI's? Notorious for causing sleep disturbances and vivid dreams. Of course depression messes things all up too. I take Remeron for sleep and it works great. Much safer and better than benzos and the ambien type.

My pattern ,from the AD's I am pretty sure, is wake up every two hours and have to get up to wake up before I can get back to sleep. Tons of very vidid dreams but usually good ones. The biggest problem is not getting enough of the right kind of very deep sleep we need so much.

Remeron solved it for me and I think Fetzima is not as bad at causing it as the others have been.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[morganjane]

Not taking medication of any kind right now. I've tried a couple of different kinds of off-the-shelf sleeping pills, but they either have no effect or make me extremely fuzzy the next day.

[Altered Moment]

Yeah I do not like the off the shelf ones. Diphenhydramine HCL (Benadryl) is what they all are. Antihistamine.