Ongoing insomnia, convinced it's fatal

Posted , 20 users are following.

I’m begging for some help. I don’t sleep. Not properly. I thought this would have resolved itself by now but it is still going on. My brain prevents me from sleeping and this is completely beyond my control. This started from stress – every time I would sense myself drifting off, I would have a surge of adrenaline – almost like the feeling of drifting off provoked me to remember something important. This continued and continued for weeks. Eventually I would fall asleep, but only for an hour or so of dream sleep and then wake up. Now I have no control over this mechanism. I do not fall into proper sleep at all. Every single time my brain starts to slow, to move into stage 2 of sleep, I am awoken. A part of my brain has trained itself to react to the sensation of falling asleep by waking me back up. I don’t know if this is some problem with my thalamus or whether the problem is in a different part of the brain. The sensation of falling asleep acts as a stimulus for the conditioned fight or flight response. Nothing I do can resolve this and I fear it is just going to continue indefinitely until I die from sleep deprivation. I have tried all sorts of different methods, but nothing works, I can go into a very light stage of sleep in which I can still sense all of my surroundings. But I cannot EVER progress past this, something inside is waking me back up. Pills as strong as mitrazapine and zopiclone will make me feel woozy and strange, so much so that I keep zoning out and going cross-eyed. But these pills still fail to put me into a deep sleep. Nothing can override this mechanism, I will just lie in bed all night, my eyes rolling under my eyelids and my mouth hung open, but something in my brain is preventing me from loosing consciousness. I am just awake all night. I have not properly slept for 2 months, even though I can feel my brain constantly trying to shut down and my eyes closing themselves, I will ALWAYS be prevented from sleeping. I am physically and mentally exhausted and have developed muscular spasms in my arms, legs and head. I don’t know how this problem can be resolved and it makes my cry to say it but I don’t think it can be. Something like ECT may work but I don’t think it will get rid of this learnt mechanism which is clearly deeply deeply etched into my synapses.  People think that I am in control of this but I am not. I don’t sleep. Ever. Something has gone wrong with my brain and so I will be prevented from sleeping indefinitely. Please, if anybody thinks they know how this might be resolved then advice would be greatly appreciated. My family and Doctors just think I'm depressed and that I'm sleeping more than I realise. I do not want to die from this or loose my memories and cognitive function. Apologies for such an extreme sounding post.

3 likes, 26 replies

26 Replies

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  • Posted

    Hi helena, I know this was a year ago and I’m really hoping you can respond to this message . You described what’s happening to me perfectly and it’s ruining my life . Did you manage to overcome this problem ? 
    • Posted

      hello amanda i was wondering if you have had similar and how you are getting on now?

  • Posted

    hey helena, i feel like im going through exactly what you said in your post was wondering how you have been getting on?? as im really struggling with it myslef.

  • Posted

    Hey Helena. your story and symptoms are almost identical to what I'm going through right now. it's a if I've trained one half of my brain to override the half that wants to sleep.I can feel myself falling asleep and my body gets a rush of adrenaline as if to tell me it's not ok to sleep. this has been going on for weeks and was wondering what you did to overcome this or if anyone else has experienced this and how they solved the issue.?

    • Posted

      Hi are u also having vivid dreams every night?

  • Posted

    hello there.. im going through the same issue as you and im wondering if youre feeing wbtter now and what helped? please answer im going through thw worst period in my life

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