[Incarcerated]

Hi, I'm just going to start this.

I generally sleep late, so I don't know if this is because my sleeping hours are so changable or if there might be something wrong with me.

I was at a friends house the other week, and she fell asleep at around eleven. I was okay with that, I told myself I'd fall asleep because I had to, so I rested my mind as well as I could. I never fell asleep that night. When I got home to my own house, I was fine until around 6 pm. Then the 24+ hours i was awake suddenly caught up with me, but I stayed awake. After about an hour, I was fine, my sleepiness gone. I ended up going to bed at 10 pm(I fell asleep in 10 minutes thankfully, although that isn't surprising since I was up at least 30 hours).

This isn't the first time I've done this, it's happened a lot this summer. I'll go to bed at 11, then I'll lay in bed for hours, check the clock and it'll be 4 am or so, and I haven't slept a bit.

I haven't told my parents about this, they are very early waking people(sometimes i'm still up when they awaken). Their only solution to this would be to wake me up at 7 with them - which means i'd get around 4 hours of sleep everyday. I live with 4 hours of sleep during the school year, I refuse to live with it when I have a perfectly good chance to sleep a reasonable amount during the summer(I take advantage of things, I don't like wasting opportunities,it's silly in my opinion).

Before this started getting extremely bad(It's every night now), I woke up EVERY night about 2-3 times, but I could fall back asleep. This had been going on for months, but I never took much notice of it.

I've been a crazy sleeper since I was little,my body temperature is really messed up. I'm naturally cold all the time, as in I wear long sleeves during the summer and sleep with 7 or so blankets on my bed in the winter with 2 layers of clothes on.

So, is it worth my time persuading my parents to take me to the doctor, or should I take their advice and wake up earlier?

Sorry this is so long, thanks for your time.'
Take care.

[Taonuviel]

If you'd been getting 4 hours of sleep and your body is only letting you get 4 hours now I wonder if it's just resisting a change.
I was getting the waking up nightly thing and I think it corresponded to being on Lamictal - did you have a med change around when it started?

[Incarcerated]

Crap,sorry for taking so long to reply. No, I don't take any meds.

[happiedasiy]

Incar,
Everyone is different. I am a night owl, and seem to have more energy at night.
Some things you can try are, turning your clock away from your view and tell your body it's bedtime. Also a heating pad at your feet will help keep you warm and relaxed. And if you fall asleep by midnight Monday-Friday , waking up at 8am you should be fine. Sorry at your age, Friday? Anyway 5 nights a week with this schedual and then if you want to treat yourself to extra sleep on Saturday/Sunday mornings by waking up by 11am.

[medkev13]

Your melatonin levels might be low and your seratonin levels high. How much excercize/physical activity do you get during the day? Try taking melatonin at night before you go to bed. Melatonin is natural and not habit forming with no side effects to speak of, just fyi.

[Yoda]

Melatonin is a good place to start. I take 5mg sublingual in addition to my other meds.

I am bipolar and have similar sleep problems that you describe. I am now taking meds so my sleep schedule is somewhat better but I still cannot regulate a consistent sleep/wake time and that is very difficult because I sometimes am so sleep deprived I am not alert enough to drive and have had to cancel appts with pdocs and such. I think mine is a manifestation of mania or hypomania.

You should consider prescription meds. Most docs are hesitant to give "sleep" meds such as xanax but the xanax helps me. If you are bipolar though there are other drugs that can help you regulate your sleep. For me bipolar has more to do with changes in energy level than mood swings.

[medkev13]

Insomnia is common in bipolar in general. The biggest danger with that is that insomnia can trigger a major spike in mania. Energy levels, btw, can be linked to mood swings. If you go through a long depressive phase, your body is going to want to balance that with the consistent high energy of a matching manic phase. That's one of the ways bipolar causes insomnia. There's also the racing thoughts, as well...but now I'm splitting hairs ;P