1. Community
  2. Symptoms
  3. Sleep Problems

Very frightening thoughts intruding on sleep.

Posted , 3 users are following.

graham91270
graham91270

I’m 63, and am currently recovering from a bout of Winter Flu virus that has now kept me off work into this third week. 

The physical symptoms of the flu are now, happily, receding, but I picked up an immensely worrying set of side symptoms along the way that are threatening to completely cripple me emotionally and mentally as well as completely wearing me out.

The flu - as well as being the worst I’ve ever had - left me very tired, with the result that I would often want to sleep at any point during the day. This was, I believed, quite normal, and just something that came along with the flu, but then I started to develop some very frightening disturbances to me sleep, that have now become even worse than anything I experienced with the actual flu.

The main problem is that I will decided to have a nap, and whilst all seems fine at first, any background mental images I have will suddenly distort into entirely random things, or any mental chatter that I might hear will suddenly become totally illogical with random words being dropped into my mind and causing me to suddenly wake again and struggle to try to control back of my mind. 

I’m now in my second week of this and have been back to the doctors, who have simply put it down to anxiety and stress from the flu virus. I have been given Zopiclone to help me sleep at night, and  was also given a low level (2mg) course of Diazepam, too, to try to calm me down throughout the day. However, although the Zopiclone has helped in every respect, the Diazepam didn’t seem to work at all, so I’m stopped taking it completely now. 

It shouldn’t be the case that sleep is something that I fear instead of looking forward to each night, and I am desperate for this to end, and to again have control of my mind. My fear now is that as I have lost control of my mind during sleeping hours I may now see the condition slip over into my waking hours, too, and render me completely insane.

Does anyone have any direct, recent or current experience of anything that sounds like this, and is there anything anyone can say to me that might help

0 likes, 6 replies

6 Replies

  • graham91270
    graham91270

    Posted

    Hello again, all

    I forgot so say that I have seen similar problems discussed elsewhere in this Forum, but just wanted to open my own dialogue today with my previous post. 

    Regards

    Graham

  • lily65668
    lily65668 graham91270

    Posted

    Graham, I wouldn't worry too much about it. This latest flu virus is a very nasty one. I got it about six weeks ago - the first time I'd had so much as a cold since 2003! The respiratory symptoms weren't too severe and only lasted a week or so, but I wasn't prepared for the strange mental state it plunged me into.

    I've had post-viral gloom before, after the handful of serious attacks of flu I've had in my life, and especially after getting shingles nearly 20 years ago. But this one was really something else. For a start, I felt so exhausted I could barely put one foot in front of the other for a couple of weeks. More alarming were the mental effects. I didn't have the sleep disturbance you're describing, but I got all sorts of strange sensations of depersonalisation, and started getting paranoid about my work colleagues.

    It's going off now. I don't feel exhausted any more, but I'm still demotivated and a bit cranky with people around me. I think you just have to cut yourself some slack and not worry about this. It's highly unlikely to be a permanent sleep disorder and much less a psychiatric condition, given that it's suddenly started at age 63. (I'm a former neuro nurse btw.) You haven't "lost control of your mind", it's just that the virus has left a few toxins in your body that will take a while to eliminate.

    And please be careful with the zopiclone. They're addictive at any age, but especially yours. (And just in case you're wondering, you're 10 years younger than me!) It would be best to take them for no more than three consecutive nights, then have a few nights off, even at the risk of not sleeping well on those nights. I'm guessing your doctor only gave you a very short course of diazepam, which is even more addictive.

    Try to stop worrying about this. Just accept that you're going to be this way for another few weeks, but that it will eventually go away.

    • graham91270
      graham91270 lily65668

      Posted

      Dear Lily

      I’m so sorry that you’ve had to recently suffer this horrible virus, too, but thank you so much for your reply, which has helped to calm my fears - especially with regard to any long term damage or potential mental health problems. 

      I work in a Community Mental Health Team, and though this is only in an admin role, I have learned a fair amount about dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease through simply being immersed in that environment for so long. 

      Because of of the above, I really did begin to fear that I had the beginnings of dementia or Alzheimer’s and even did a little memory test on myself yesterday to see if I had any signs of either, but I managed to convince myself that I didn’t. 

      There have been a number of occasions when I’ve relaxed sufficiently to enable m to sleep quite naturally, but I’ve found that when I’m particularly anxious the horrible thoughts flood in in ways I find impossible to control,. One thing that does encourage me, however, is that as soon as I take the Zopiclone, my mind seems to calm almost instantly, and there is then just a gradually drifting off to sleep against a backdrop of a calmed and settled mind. 

      I was very interested to read your comments on the paranoid thoughts you’ve been having to contend with, as this is something I, too, had to contend with during a spell of depression around 6 or 7 years ago. I can remember how I would be reading all manner of meanings into simple and everyday comments that people were making to me, and felt at one stage that one of my friends - a devout Christian - was receiving messages from God that He was furious with me for abandoning the faith and that my illness was the start of the judgement  for that. I did eventually speak to my friend about these ‘messages’ and he confirmed that nothing of the sort had happened (which was a big relief!) and I eventually through and returned to work, where I’ve enjoyed continuous employment ever since. 

      You can imagine how my mind was pushing me into similar directions with the depth of the illness in this last week, but I’m going to keep re-reading your reply for further encouragement, and keep it close by me for any further scares ahead...

      i do so hope I can get through this, and I’ll certainly keep you informed as we go along, so many thanks again for your very swift reply, and I looking forward to some further exchanges of updates on our mutual progress.

      Kind regards and thanks again

      Graham

       

    • apu91247
      apu91247 graham91270

      Posted

      Please do some research on google about what ever brain medication you take, like how to stop etc
    • graham91270
      graham91270 lily65668

      Posted

      Hello again Lily

      You’ll see that I’m now using a different name as I had to change my previous one due to something about using it on another site.

      I hope you’re feeling a little bit better today, and I hope your dental appointment wasn’t too bad at all. 

      To bring you up to date - and to report a bit of progress - the weird and random thoughts have continued throughout the week, but I tried something earlier today that seemed to really work.

      I was tired from all the sleep I’ve lost, but this time, rather than trying to get up and just carrying on wearily through the day, I decided to resign myself to just letting the thoughts have sway and do what they would with me. Strangely, in doing this, I then started to try to practice a meditation technique I learned years and years ago, and have practiced at various times since then.

      I’d had success at all with it on the previous 5 or 6 times I’ve tried it as I couldn’t manage to cut through the usual ‘mind chatter’ that everyone has to contend with at these times, but today was quite wonderfully different.

      Deciding to just ‘give in’ to whatever might happen somehow allowed me to find a brief ‘window’ of peace in which I manage to gradually ‘slip below’ the weird and random thoughts and find a safe and quiet rest in which I consciously rested with a quiet mind in a fully awake state for the first time in around the last two weeks.

      I don’t know the science behind it, but what seemed to be happening was that the weird and random thoughts may well have been still popping round in one part of my brain whilst I was temporarily ‘somewhere else’ and operating out another part of my brain altogether. You’ll probably know a lot more about that than me because of the your neuro nursing career 

      I do hope you didnt mind me sharing this with you. I still have a lot of problems to work through, but I thought it might be good to let you know that I found a bit of progress along the way. 

      Regards as ever

      Graham

    • lily65668
      lily65668 graham91270

      Posted

      Really glad to hear that you've made some progress Graham. And no, I didn't mind you sharing this. I really hope things continue to improve.

Back to top

Report or request deletion

Thanks for your help!

We want the community to be a useful resource for our users but it is important to remember that the community are not moderated or reviewed by doctors and so you should not rely on opinions or advice given by other users in respect of any healthcare matters. Always speak to your doctor before acting and in cases of emergency seek appropriate medical assistance immediately. Use of the community is subject to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy and steps will be taken to remove posts identified as being in breach of those terms.