Sleeping is the main task of the day: how I live with insomnia

I don't remember when I started sleeping badly. I don’t remember when I stopped bragging that I was “enough” for five hours to sleep. But I remember well how I ended up in the psychiatrist's office, when after two weeks of severe insomnia I lost the idea of what reality I am in. Therefore, today I am telling you how I managed not to turn into Tyler Durden.

How I got to a psychiatrist

From the words of witnesses it is known that I slept completely carefree and beautifully only in infancy. And then something went wrong.

I don’t remember exactly when and what exactly, but all my adult life it took me 40 minutes, or even a full hour, to fall asleep. For reference: Generally, people spend How Long Should It Take You to Fall Asleep? for the process of falling asleep from 10 to 20 minutes.

A disgusting state, when you want to fall asleep, but you can't, a light sleep when you wake up, because the bark beetle is eating the house, getting up 30 minutes before the alarm clock with the inability to "sleep" - it all seemed normal.

And then everything went completely, absolutely wrong.

I worked for a long time at a very nervous job, I started to get sick all the time, I was terribly worried about every little thing, I got used to being afraid of every phone call. When a large and complex project fell on me, I “floated”. I stopped sleeping.

My eyes were literally closing. But when I managed to lie down and close my eyelids, nothing else happened. Thoughts did not leave the head, the body did not relax, and the traitors-eyes, although they were closed, twitched nervously.

The less I slept, the worse my thinking became. I didn't notice the movement of time. Sometimes the minute stretched out, so it seemed like lunch break, even though I had just looked up from work. Or I could spend an hour staring at one point, and 60 minutes flew by as one.

I didn't give a damn about how I looked. Moreover, I confused the days of the week and did not understand whether today is Monday and I prepared a suit for work, or today is Tuesday and I simply did not bring this suit to the washing machine.

When I managed to fall asleep, I dreamed about real life. In a dream, I continued to work, wash the dishes, take the child to kindergarten, be late. Then I woke up, and everything that happened during the day seemed like sheer déjà vu.

I wrote down every step so as not to get confused and not to forget anything. Then I began to forget whether I wrote something down or not.

It is very difficult to remember what else happened in my life then. Everything is in a fog, as if they put a transparent plastic bag over my head, fogged up from breathing.

And then I realized that I had crossed the road and I was almost hit by a car, which I did not notice. How I approached the road, whether I looked around - I don't remember. I just found myself on the sidewalk, and swearing and signals from the driver rushed after me. At this moment of enlightenment, I realized that if I didn’t resolve the issue of sleep now, I might not live until next week. I took a vacation and went … to a psychiatrist. This was the last bastion that I had not yet stormed.

How I Fought Insomnia

Of course, before this incident, I did not just sit and wait for the problem to be solved by itself. At various times, I have tried, with varying degrees of success, all the tips for dealing with insomnia that can be found on the Internet - that's a lot. Even on a wave of inspiration from success, she wrote an article. In general, this is what I did.

1. I played a lot of sports to get tired

Gym, jogging, walking, ellipsoid simulator. Every day I did something that made me tired not only with my brain, but also with my body. Both in theory and in practice, this is one of the best Insomnia: How do I stay asleep? methods of treating insomnia (if not practiced immediately before bedtime). Two-hour walks worked most effectively with mild insomnia, when you want to sleep, but you fall asleep for a long time. In difficult periods, it turned out like this: I puff in the gym, get tired, I do badly, I want to sleep even more, but I do not sleep.

2. Decorated the bedroom

I can say for sure that it is more pleasant to wait out insomnia on a good mattress and pillow with memory effect than on a bare floor and a tourist rug. And if you fall asleep, your back doesn't hurt in the morning. But this is if you fall asleep.

Cold fresh air, warm blanket, dark curtains. When all this appeared in the room, I realized that I really love to sleep, it's a thrill. Only it is not always possible to catch him.

3. Wore socks at night

It is impossible to fall asleep with cold feet (and they are constantly freezing for me), so woolen socks are part of my pajama uniform. However, the inverse relationship does not work: with warm feet, you can also lie awake all night.

4. Saw nootropics

I ran around all the doctors who, in my opinion, could help with this problem: a neurologist, an endocrinologist, a therapist. The doctors decided that I was healthy, and the neurologist prescribed nootropics to normalize something in my head. I don't know how they were supposed to work, but a headache was added to the insomnia, and no other effect appeared.

5. Saw weed

I tried herbs, decoctions and medicines based on them, such as novopassit and persen. At first, valerian and her brothers in action helped, but each herb - no longer than three weeks.

Now I can probably eat a haystack of motherwort and chamomile and feel nothing.

6. Just saw

There was a period when after work or before going to bed I took a shot of something stronger. At first it worked, after a couple of months it stopped, and when the dose was increased to three shots, panic attacks were added to the constant insomnia. I decided that this would not work and it was already an addiction, so I stopped these experiments.

7. Meditated

According to books, articles, applications and advice from a yoga coach. I didn’t understand at all why someone came up with these practices. Apparently, this is not mine at all.

8. Listened to ASMR

There are such strange videos on YouTube, where the hosts are whispering, rustling, tapping their nails on different surfaces. It relaxes and helps you fall asleep faster. But, they say, it does not work for everyone. Rustling sounds helped me better than white noise or pleasant music, but in half of the cases of insomnia, ASMR is only annoying.

How I was treated with real medicines

So, I have experienced a lot of improvised means, but it did not save me. So when I was nearly hit by a car because my mind was asleep, I remembered the neurologist's words that the next stop was a psychotherapist. But since I was very scared (it's hard not to be afraid when you almost died), I decided not to take half measures and immediately went to a psychiatrist - only hardcore.

The psychiatrist did not entertain me with nootropics. She said that insomnia is only a symptom, that I need to be treated, and on the fly made a scheme of drugs, the names of which I will not give - they are prescription drugs anyway.

The scheme included drugs for every day to combat anxiety and stress. And one extra drug in case the business is a pipe. This last one helped me live for a long time. One package lasted for a year and a half.

And then it all messed up again.

I am used to the fact that extra-medication helps me in difficult cases, that the pills keep me normal. And I scored on all those wonderful solutions that I practiced before. For fresh air in the room, for long walks before bed, to the gym.

Over time, the magic medicine for emergencies I needed more and more often, and I could not fall asleep from one pill, I had to increase the dosage.

So another year passed, at the end of which I again suffered from insomnia. When I ate six emergency pills and did not fall asleep, it became obvious that I had developed a resistance to the drug, and at the same time, most likely, addiction to it. What I definitely didn't need was drug addiction in any form, so I ended up with the doctors again.

The second big sleep trip was far more epic than the first. The doctors I have consulted before have not offered me any solutions. I had to look for other specialists in the capital's institute, where I was prescribed completely different drugs, even more serious ones - such that you can not order in every pharmacy. I was also strictly ordered to go for psychotherapy.

How I was treated with heart-to-heart talks

Not that I really believed in psychotherapy, but what else could I do? I chose the most studied method - cognitive-behavioral therapy, because, according to Insomnia treatment: Cognitive behavioral therapy instead of sleeping pills Print research, it helps with insomnia when all else fails.

It turned out that fixing your head through talking is difficult.

The main thing that I learned about insomnia during the sessions is that beliefs are formed in the heads of poorly sleeping people that prevent them from having a normal sleep. These beliefs are:

Misconceptions about the causes of insomnia. We are looking for something terrible in ourselves, because of which we cannot fall asleep: illness, age, metabolic disorders. As a result, we believe that we have some important and objective reason not to sleep.
Misconceptions about the consequences of a lack of sleep. Oh, how bad I’ll work if I don’t get enough sleep. Oh, how hard it will be for me. But not the fact that it will be so.
Unrealistic sleep expectations. We think that we need to sleep 7–8 hours a day, go to bed and get up at the same time, not wake up at night - and that's the only way. In fact, everyone has their own schedule.
Exaggeration of one's own ability to control and predict sleep. When we do not sleep well, it seems that we did something wrong, did not prepare for sleep. We begin to sort out our actions and worry.
Misconceptions about remedies for insomnia. This applies to many of the items that I have tried: alcohol, herbs, and so on.

I found absolutely all the violations, after which we worked them with the doctor. And so - the puzzle was formed, I learned to sleep.

What helped me learn how to sleep

Sleep disorders: what helped you learn to sleep

Sleep has become the main business of my life. I ended up having to rebuild everything so that I could get enough sleep. For example, I choose to work with a free schedule, even if conditions are better with a fixed working day. Anyway, I won't last long in strict regime. I have built a whole system that works well for normal sleep. Maybe someone else will help.

1. Medicines

During the day, on a tight schedule, I take medications that reduce anxiety. I carefully monitor the dose and do not conduct any experiments - I do not prescribe anything for myself. I regularly travel from my city to Moscow to get a prescription and talk to a doctor again. Our task is to make sure that sooner or later I give up pharmacological support.

2. Summaries of psychotherapy

Approximately once a month, when sleep does not come to me in any way, I open the synopsis of our sessions with the "head doctor" and reexamine all the wrong beliefs about sleep. It doesn't help sleep, but it keeps you from panicking.

3. Ability to make up for lack of sleep

I can afford to sleep well. I've noticed that if I don't get enough sleep for several days in a row, the nervous system becomes too nervous. Overexcitement interferes with sleep, as if the body was transferred to autopilot and the brakes were turned off. Therefore, I try not to prolong periods of sleep deprivation. For example, if I managed to fall asleep only in the morning, I will try to sleep as much as possible: I will postpone everything to another time. Or, if suddenly in the middle of the day I feel an irresistible urge to arrange a siesta, I will.

Sleep is too sweet a gift to refuse whenever you feel like taking a nap.

4. Fatigue

Exercising and walking is still useful. For sleep or anything else, it doesn't matter. You have to get tired.

5. Sleepy rituals

In articles about insomnia, they constantly write that an hour before bedtime you need to tear yourself away from gadgets, create a relaxing atmosphere and all that. Before going to bed, adherence to a clear scenario helps me: shower → cosmetics → aroma lamp with my favorite oils → headphones for sleeping with an ASMR roller → an electronic book in my hands with something enchantingly stupid.

6. Pets

The best way to spend time if you woke up in the middle of the night is to cuddle a cozy, soft and joyful animal. I got guinea pigs (so that nocturnal tygydyks were moderate). I advise everyone: they have warm fluffy sides, and they also know how to poke a tooth.