Nightmares/Abnormal Sleep after Quitting Drinking
 

How long does this usually last? Today is my 6th day sober and last night I had the most gruesome dream I've ever had and it really disturbed me so bad that I couldn't get back to sleep for the rest of the night. (thank god for coffee today!)

And when I saw gruesome I mean it. I dont' want to post the details here because I don't want to upset anyone but lets just say I jumped awake so bad I kicked my poor cat who was fast asleep by my feet and spent the rest of the night crying.

For me stuff started getting back to normal at day 9. Or at least much better. The early days 1 - 8 were nasty bad for insomnia and awful nightmares for the brief periods in which I did sleep after the first 36 hours. Like you, I don't want to upset anyone but they were 100 times worse than anything I've ever had. Also had what I perceived as auditory hallucinations in that half-asleep state. Like someone was right next to me yelling in my ear when I did drop off. It gets better fast.

I hope they improve soon, because I keep waking up my significant other (and our lazy cat, lol). I have no trouble actually falling asleep, it's just waking up several times a night that is throwing me off.

I'm sure they will. The first couple of nights I couldn't get to sleep, but after that it was where I would get to sleep but wake up 30 minutes later followed by a night of waking up about every 5 to 10 minutes from dreams and panic attacks. After a few days of that I thought I was going nuts. I still have sleep issues but I'm able to manage them better now. I've been an insomniac for over 40 years.

For about 15 years alcohol helped me get to sleep and stay asleep, then 5 years of needing more for the same effect, then a couple of years of hitting it way too heavy as it started backfiring on me. Like needing a 1/5 just to get any sleep at all. I'm not quite 1/2 a year into this but it is way better.

Yeah I used to just drink until my body got tired enough to rest, of course I now realize that wasn't the best thing to do because I feel like a vampire being awake half the night and look like hell all day at work. :p

Rest assured that's all fairly normal - even the gruesome dreams...
I began to get back into a normal sleeping pattern after a week or so, but timelines vary.

See your Dr if you're concerned about this or you think it's going on too long FF :)

D

I didn't have bad dreams like that. Although mine were about drinking though and it was always real like because my mind basically showed me what I was doing while drunk as hell for that last 4 day bender back in August 2011. Those dreams kept recurring every other night. It showed me how I was and even though most of the dreams were in first person view (From my eyeview) it always helped me when I woke up knowing it was a dream and being relieved and sober. I haven't had anymore drinking dreams for 2 months now and I'm 4 months sober. Once in awhile a dream will pop up about drinking but I always manage to say no in my dreams now thank god lol.

I had them almost every night when I drank...they faded within 10 days of getting sober I think.

Yes .... Sleeping is a tough thing. I relapsed with my drinking - for many many months. First time cleaning up, I'd literally not be able to sleep until 4 or 5 in the morning. I found a supplement at GNC called GABA that helped with that a little bit. This is my second go at sobriety, and as expected; sleep is a problem as are dreams. The dreams I can handle because I realize they're just dreams, however, the way I feel when I wake is less than pleasant and feels borderline like depression. Fortunately, for myself, I can shake that feeling after a half hour passes. Hang in there and good luck!

I had some pretty off dreams. I really struggled with sleeping for a lot of the first 2 months, things settled down, I think around the 4 week mark. Didn't get back to good for a while after that, but stopped being a challenge to get to sleep.

I dreamt really vividly for a long time, up until 10 weeks or so. I'm finally at the stage where I can sleep fairly easily, restfully, and through the night.

I still get vivid dreams, but nothing like I used to - it will get much better soon. Try some relaxation tapes before bed? Might help? There is one called "Sleep Deeply" by Darren Marks which is good. A little annoying, but it seems to work for me.

- Hamlet

Last night I didn't dream at all but I woke up every 20 to 40 minutes, and then of course my spoiled rotten cat decided to wake me up around 3 a.m. for no apparent reason so I am awefully tired today. I hope my sleep improves, today is 1 full week sober.

It took me about 3.5 weeks to get back to normal.

well i suppose there is nothing i can do except wait it out

here are some non medical tips for sleep - something might help FF?

Insomnia? 42 Simple Tips to Help You Get to Sleep - Insomnia treatment, cures

D

Thanks. :)

Hi Flyerfan

I'm not much of a poster (but I read the forum almost every night), but after reading your post, I had to chime in.

Nightmares and insomnia was/is a huge problem for me. I would go days without sleep, and when I was able to get a few minutes of sleep, it was not good sleep.

The nightmares were so bad. I know you had said you would not go into detail and I won't either. Other than to say nightmares are very bloody, violent, and gory. If not nightmares, I would have very vivid sexual dreams. I sometimes also wake up scared sh*tless from the nightmares, and last night night I even woke up barking. Yes barking.

I am taking perscribed Ativan at night which has seemed to help. Due to health issues, I also take Vicodin as well as Methadone (not because of any addiction).

In the past 1.5 years I have attempted to get sober on more than one occassion but never got past a week or so. In early December I had the pleasure of detoxing in jail where I spent 5 days. I am now on 1 month and 5 days of being sober.

Sure, I sometimes think of drinking (I was drinking to 2 liters of vodka a day), but when the thought crosses my mind, I think about that 5 days in jail, detoxing with no meds, the coldness, the sweats, the shaking, the anxiety, heart pounding out of my chest, blood pressue out of control, how mean the prison staff was to me (I was treated as if I were Casey Anthony or someone like her), the hurt i've caused, when I think of that, the thought of driking quickly leaves my mind. I let the tape play, listen to the "song" til the end. I've heard that "song" before and the ending is always the same and I don't like it. It's always predictable.

I am done with alcohol for sure this time. How do I know this? Well, I would not hang out with a friend that I do not get along or fought with. Alcohol was a friend that I do not get along with and constantly fought. Why should that friend (alcohol) be any different. There is no difference.


Good Luck
A.M.L

Last night I slept soundly for 9 hours without any dreams at all. This is the first time I've slept in 3 days, thank god. :)

Good for you FF! Don't get discouraged if tonight or in the days to come you only get 3 to 5 hours at a stretch. My early weeks were like that after the initial 'hell' period. I'd have a few days of not-so-good sleep and then a full night of sleep. After a while everything got tons better.

FF - Hang in there and I hope you have more nights like last night. Don't get discouraged and hang in there. Early week are hell but it gets easier.

FF, keep letting us know how you are doing.
Those dreams and rough nights will settle down, we all had them in the beginning.
Are you going to meetings in Wilmington? A sponsor is a God-send to the newcomer.

Bob R.

Hey guys, last night I stayed up till 1 a.m. because we had house guests over, I slept soundly till 7 this morning.

2granddaughters, no I'm not going to any local meetings. I have major anxiety and I don't quite have the courage to go face to face so this website has helped me greatly. I do have a sponser so to speak, a guy that I work with has been helping me and checking up on me.

I've been sober for seven days, so we're pretty much equal in our time abstinent from alcohol. The only disturbing dream I had involved me going back to drinking -- talk about a nightmare! Since quitting drinking, I am actually sleeping better. When I was a drinker, I would sleep for 10+ hours per night (if given the opportunity) due to over-consumption of alcohol. Now, I wake up early in the morning (7 a.m.) and go to bed at a sensible hour.

As for hallucinations, I experienced "closed-eye" hallucinations during the first few days of withdrawal. I would see dancing figures in great detail before I fell asleep when my eyes were closed. I'm not experiencing that anymore, thankfully.

Day 11 and last night I woke up just about every hour again. I guess it's probably going to be unpredictable and such for a while.

I'm with you, FF. I've always been a bad sleeper, waking up at all hours of the night unless I was blacked out drunk, and then I'd be out so deep that a bomb going off next to my head wouldn't wake me up. Now that I'm sober, I'm experiencing insomnia even worse than before. Ugh. Last night I did feel tired (since I only slept 2 hours the night before), so I went to bed around 9:30, but woke up practically every hour on the hour. It definitely makes you feel run down. But I knew to expect it so I'm waiting it out.

I went and got a natural sleep aid that has L-tryptophan, valerian and melatonin and am going to try that tonight. I've tried things like that before and they work on and off, but they don't seem to work for me if I take them every night. I figure if I can get one good night of sleep in between the nights that I DON'T sleep, maybe things will even out. lol

When we drink, our sleep cycles aren't the same as when we are sober. Well, basically we're not sleeping at first so much as passed out/unconscious! Our REM cycles, the part of the sleep where we dream, are reduced so we don't dream as much.

So we stop drinking, and our newly sober brain is trying to sort itself out. It suddenly has a lot more REM time than it's used to. As always, it draws off our subconscious to create dreams. But what's going on in the subconscious mind of most newly sober people? ANXIETY AND FEAR! So we don't dream about puppies in tulip fields, we dream about things that make us anxious and fearful.

I know, I've had some DOOZIES.

So part of it is the sleep cycles 'rebooting', part of it is all the anxiety/fear/hurt/anger/painful memories bubbling up. The bad thing is it takes a while for the brain to get back to 'normal' sleep cycles. The good thing is it does, eventually. For me it was a good 10 days before I slept 'well'. Everyone is different, but it WILL get better as the nights go by.

Some things that I found helped: melatonin & valarian root, and telling myself I was going to have only pleasant dreams over and over before going to sleep. It may sound corny, but it seemed to help.

exactly
 

Yes this is exactly what just happened to me I have been going to AA meetings my 6th day sober today and I just had the worst nightmare of my life back to back and I can sleep after that I was so scared

I’m about 2 weeks sober ! I was a bing drinker ! I feel great but I don’t sleep more than an hour or two at a time ! I read and ordered Calm Support and it actually for your mind and body after you stop drinking to restore mind and body health it has very good reviews! I attached the link !
https://calmsupport.com/

Wow
 

I can’t believe they treated you like that ! I experienced the crazy blood pressure for about 8 days ! It was scary ! Remembering that will keep me sober thou! 😊