jvice09

i cant even remember the last time i got a regular night sleep without medication or alcohol. the nights when i dont do either, i dont sleep, at all. i stay up for about a week before i cave in and have to drink or take my seroquel or trazodone. i walk around like a zombie when i stay up for that long and look terrible and lethargic. basically what im saying is that i dont want to do either anymore. my question is, if you can relate, is how long did it take you and how did you do it?

zjw

I'm not sure I ever got my sleep back to perfection and I'm almost 3 years sober. My quality of sleep got better within the first few weeks. The duration of my sleep however had its ups and downs. For the first few months I did rely on simple sleeping pills from the pharmacy. Once your system gets more stable and you get heathier things will balance out some.

If anything on the nights where i get less sleep I perform way better then I ever did hung over etc.. so sometimes the lack of sleep was not really that big of a deal.

I hope your doing good otherwise I have not seen you around here in a while.

jvice09

obviously if im here, i dont wanna drink anymore. i just dont wanna be on medication the rest of my life, and i dont wanna look so sad and depressed because i havent slept in a week. future posters spare me getting enough exercise, try melatonin or drink tea. i do all those things already.

zjw

yeah i feel your pain on the meds. I was fortunate to avoid that. and it was not an easy road. I have a brother on serequel for bipolar disorder he got off it for a year was doing absolutly fabulous everyone was estatic to have him back to what we all new as normal. then he had an episode the doctors quickly hucked him back on those meds and he's all Zombie again its very sad.

Pretty cool you sound like you got some fight in ya and you dont wanna be on those meds. I think my brother threw in the towell this last round I hope he snaps out of it and can find some alternatives.

Bit off topic i suppose anyhow hang in there man.

I could never find a magic bullet. My magic bullet was knocking myself out with booze *sigh*.

deeker

I'd rather take a non narcotic sleep aid then pour alcohol into my body.

You don't want to take anything to sleep but you are taking alcohol to sleep. Am I right?

Which do you think is worse for you a non narcotic sleep aid or alcohol?

I would go with the lesser of two evils. I found that when I stopped drinking for awhile the anxiety associated with
drinking lessens. Sometimes anxiety keeps us up at night.

Good Luck

least

It took me several weeks to get back to a normal sleep pattern. But now my sleep is better than it ever was.

jvice09

thanks for the posts. its fine, im just whining i guess. people take medication every day to make their lives better. a diabetic takes insulin every day. guess i just need to pop a pill to go to sleep every night, even though i dont want to.

OneIsTooMuch

Alcohol may help you fall asleep more easily, but it will destroy your sleep architecture.

Sounds like you should go to a sleep doctor. I did and found out I had severe Obstructive Sleep apnea. Now on APAP machine, and that, combined with sobriety have fixed my sleep problems.

Find a good sleep doc in your area and see if you need a sleep test.

The whole process took 10 months, and I will be on APAP the rest of my life, but I sleep great with no pills!

Good luck!

Kaneda8888

My sleep patterns initially improved and now it fluctuates for 'normal' reasons such as staying up late or having naps during the day which impacts your sleep patterns.

The important lesson I've learned is that I dont care about my sleep patterns in my sobriety unlike when I was drinking and I would be incredibly anxious about not getting proper sleep. If I dont get a proper night's rest on a particular night, I am not worried. Eventually my body will make me catch up.

grubby

Hang in there buddy, i am on day 41 and STILL struggling to go to sleep myself. like you, i cant seem to fall asleep on my own...... i can only seem to sleep with drugs and or alcohol.

Here's what i've been doing that has been producing (somewhat) consistent results, and it doesnt involve anything dangerous which is good news:

x3 or so hot cups of that generic "sleepytime tea" that you can get for like $2.00 from the grocery store, i start drinking the tea around 6 Pm so that it will be in my system around 9:30 pm which is my designated sleep-time

x1 pill of Doxylamine Succinate, a generic OTC sleep pill that you can also buy at the grocery store for very little money........ i bought a bottle of 92 pills for about $7, i wait until the Chamomile tea is in my system and then take 1 Doxy succinate tablet at around 9:00 o' clock

With the above formula i have been consistently achieving 5-6 hours of sleep a night over the last week and a half or so..... usually the Doxylamine succinate tablet is what provides the knock-out punch, i usually black out a good 45 minutes after ingesting the pill. I've heard that it's sister pill "diphenhydramine HCI" is cross-tolerant with alcohol and i believe it....... i tried it myself in the early days and it did absolutely nothing, also i heard that even when it DOES work it builds tolerance quickly.

Doxylamine succinate from my casual Google research does not seem to create tolerance, and it's more powerful then diphenhydramine, so it has become my go-to solution until my brain decides to go back to factory default settings and go to sleep when it's supposed to.

I hope this helps

matt4x4

Go to a doctor and try some herbal pills. Go to a chinese doctor, try some acupuncture. Eating right, and drinking lots of water help. Working out early and having a schedule help out tremendously. These are basic, simple, common sense things to try.

grubby

I forgot to mention this, make sure you exercise in the morning because exercise creates a "stimulating effect" for a few hours after your workout. I have been taking 3 mile long brisk walks every other day........ so stay active, it's good for you to get tired out if all else (drugs) fails.

karate

Work hard psysically and you will sleep

Or exercise , just not too late .

tomsteve

maybe for you, but some people suffer from sleep disorders that no amount of physical exhaustion will help them sleep.
then theres ones that aren't able to work hard due to physical injuries that don't allow them to work hard physically.

Sugah

In my first year of sobriety, I didn't sleep. I whined to anyone who would listen, and most folks told me I wouldn't die from lack of sleep. I wasn't so sure. I was a pill head as well as a drunk, so pills, even OTC, were out of the question.

I didn't sleep consistently well at night until I put myself on a schedule. I get up between 4:30-5 weekdays and by 7 on the weekends. My recovery (12 step) is so ingrained now, I rarely have a head full of thoughts to keep me awake at night. Cleaning up the wreckage of the past and keeping my side of the street clean on a daily basis goes a long way toward getting mind and body in sync. When I lay my head down, it's not long before I drift off, and it's been years since I've had regular nightmares.

Hang in there. Time takes time.

Peace & Love,
Sugah

Alysheba

I've had trouble with sleep since day 1 and it still hasn't gone away. I had trouble with sleeping a bit before I ever touched a drink (in my 40's) and now that I'm not drinking (would have been 8 mos with two small relapses) I'm having a terrible time. Almost every day I wake up between 1 and 4:30 AM and can't get back to sleep. Sometimes I fall asleep early and other times not, but I always wake up early.

I think it takes a long time for our bodies and minds to heal. I think for some of us it's harder than for others. Good luck. Prayers to those of us insomniacs or partial insomniacs.

Kris47

I am one of "those people." I was a chronic insomniac before I quit drinking and at Day 77 have managed approximately 5 days of 1-3 hours of sleep. I am still happy to be sober. I am not happy about the no sleep part but am not worried about it as much as if I were still with the drinking part. Our nervous systems will take a long time to settle down and afford some of us sleep. I am still on overload from all the years of drinking. I have been told that it could take me anywhere from 6 months to a year to sleep decent. Having said that, trazadone used to help me sleep and if you need it and it works I would avail myself of it. Do see a good doctor who understands alcoholism. Also try sleep restriction, no tv or computer several hours before your bedtime and a good book you could read is Keeping up with Snoozin. I am sending you good thoughts and understanding on how hard this can be. I pray for a good sleep sometime soon. I worry about HALT and don't want to find myself relapsing ever again. I am lucky that I work for myself and can work as I'm able.