Trazodone Anxiety

I told my psychiatrist that I was having trouble sleeping and sometimes melatonin doesn't work so she prescribed me 50mg trazodone nightly. She said we could also see if it could help as an antidepressant because I had a bad reaction to lexapro.

Honestly I have so much anxiety about sleeping now. At first it knocked me out but now I can't sleep without it (which screwed me over when my psychiatrist forgot to put in the refill). I also can't tell if I'm experiencing chest pains or just convincing myself that I am. I get really severe medicine anxiety. Sleep is now a time of great anxiety for me. I almost always fall asleep but I toss and turn and wake up in the middle of the night and have such freaking strange dreams. I'll wake up but still believe I'm dreaming and stay in a weird conscious state but still believe I have to abide by the dream's rules or that my dream is also reality.

For example, last night I tried to sleep at someone else's house. I took the traz at my usual time and I could not fall asleep because of the anxiety of being in a new place as well as the medicine anxiety. I hardly slept but I recall believing in the middle of the night that a fictional character from a video game I like and the cat at that house were in a murder plot to kill me. I accepted that there was nothing I could do to stop it, so I should just continue laying awake until they kill me.


I'm going to talk to my psychiatrist at our next visit about getting me off of it. I don't look forward to losing even more sleep by weening off of it. These adverse reactions to meds is psyching me out. I don't even suffer from insomnia, I never needed trazodone. It'll be over soon because my appointment is next week but, seriously, what a nightmare this has been.

Dear artisticguitarist,

I am so very sorry that is happening to you. Sounds just horrible.

I suffer from depression, anxiety and panic disorder and take Trazadone for sleep but have never had any problems with it. There is some research that has linked Trazadone with prevention and reversal of Alzheimer's Disease so I tend to view that as a plus. But we are all different and what helps one of us can not work for others or make them feel worse so I hope your psychiatrist can find a substitute for the Trazadone.

I had very bad side effects from a medication call Tofranil and had to go off of it. Others had no problem with it and liked it. Individual human physiology can have profound effects on the efficacy and side effect profiles of medications.

It is really heartbreaking that you are going through this suffering and ordeal. I sure hope you find what works best for you with the least side effects. Life is too short to be miserable.

Wishing you only the very best!

Sincerely yours, Yao Wen

I take Trazadone for sleep. But I only take 25 mg. per night. I've tried taking 50 mg. But when I do I'm dizzy, disoriented and groggy the whole of the next day. But, then, I also take Clonazapam (1.5 mg per day.) And so it may be the combination of the two that is causing what I experience. (I'm an older person, by the way. So that probably has something to do with it too.)

I can't say as I've had the problems you described. But what I do find is that the Traz knocks me out until around 4:30 or 5 a.m. Then I wake up having to go to the bathroom; and sometimes I get back to sleep... occasionally I don't. Most of the time I just doze fitfully once I return to bed. When I lay awake at night I tend to have a lot of free-floating anxiety & mild paranoia that crops up. Sometimes I just have to get up and walk around the house for a half hour to an hour or so in the night because I just can't tolerate laying in bed awake.

I have had a few interesting experiences though and I'm not sure if these started before I started on Traz & Clonazepam or if they started after I began taking them. But several times I've just begun to wake up around my usual 4:30 a.m. or so having to go pee. And as I was beginning to awaken, I was confused as to whether I was in bed or in the bathroom. So I wasn't sure if I should pee where I was or get up and go to the bathroom. So far, at least, I haven't had any unfortunate accidents as a result of this confusion.