Alternative's Sleep Pattern = Confusing

Post Reply New Topic

Hi.

Listen...I mean look.

Kidding.

Anyway, I'm very confused with my sleep pattern.

Is it part of my depression?

I don't know.

Because 1 week or so I get too much sleep of up to 15 hours, and the next...ish I get 2 hours. How's that?

I just can't switch off when I can't get no sleep. I try unwinding to music, but no luck. I just don't really have any suggestions.

I've tried recognising a pattern but nothing doing.

Right now, I'm in the no sleep cycle and I've asked my mum if I should take a regular dosage of the Melatonin I was given for the use of using it "every now and again", but she said "no, it's not the answer."

So I was thinking, is it to do with the depression?

I don't stay up late, I go to bed at a reasonable time of 9pm - 10:30pm, and I've even gone to bed early to sleep, but alas, no luck.

If anybody can give me any advice to attempt to work out the sleep pattern and narrow down the "no sleep part" then I would be grateful.

I have recently had this problem too, i work 3rd shift so im sleeping when the sun comes up, and i work overtime and that screwes me up big time. So sometimes ill sleep well... others i can go a day or 2 without.

Often, i have stuff on my mind, and when this happens i cant sleep, i dont know how to stop it.

Big thing, u gotta regulate your sleep, kinda like the FED reguilates the economy, you dont wanna sleep a ton (14 hrs??) because it will screw ya up. 6-8 hrs works for me, and after i work overtime (today i dont) i got 6.5 hrs, i did that on perpose, cause ill be going to bed a little earler tonight so this will enshure im a little more tired the next day.

My other problem is i take painkillers, very powerful ones, sometimes for my back or pulles muscles (i work moving frieght) but other times I abuse them (addiction i have realized is the cause of this, and i know its a problem, and im working to solve it, it costs me $350 a mounth for this stuff and i obtain it, lets just say im not suppose to have what i have) but if u do something similar, and stop taking it (IE RUN OUT ) that will effect ya.

WHat exactly happens when you are lying awake? What is different other then the obvious, MOOD, craving, energy level, whats on your mind?

I think u just need to regulate your sleep better personally.

I have had similar problems with you in the past. I was quite chubby a couple of years ago, so I had too much energy. Whilst trying to sleep, DON'T THINK: 'What will happen if I wake up?'

Regular exercise helps a bit as it really tires you out.

Don't have Bi Polar do you?
That sort of sleep pattern can be a feature.

Are you using caffeine? This includes coffee, tea, colas, energy drinks, and most other carbonated beverages. If you drink a lot of pop, especially diet pop, check the labels.

I spent a long time claiming that my tolerance for caffeine was so high that my regular intake couldn't be affecting my sleep, which was down to two hours a night, with the occasional crash day of 15-20 hours sleep about every other week. When I quit drinking two liters of Mountain Dew, plus a six-pack of Coke, plus a pot of coffee, plus assorted espresso drinks and such every day, my sleep regularized a lot.

Yea I dont really have a pattern either. I just fall asleep when Im tired, which could be at any time. The amount of time that I stay asleep varies too, but I always sleep like a rock.

My advice, and I'm not the final authority on this:

Try to regulate your sleep with small amounts of benedryl and caffine.

If you eat sugar, eat the same amount at the same time every day. Protien for breakfast, carbs for dinner.

Sleep in the dark, stay awake in the light. Get some sun every day as early in the day as possible. Use your aspie strengths to establish a regular routine for yourself.

Pay close attention to messages from your body and make small adjustments to your routine. Get some fish oil or cold pressed olive oil into your diet. Fried fish doesn't count; frying destroys the nutritional value of the Essential Fatty Acids.

Don't smoke. Get some exercise. Take a good multi-vitimin, iron-free if you're male.

Thanks for the advice people.

I do, do regular exercise, though like riding my bike, walking my dogs, but I don't wish to go out for anything else.

I feel socially isolated, and just want to shut down.

I don't know if this is any help to you, but when I was depressed I slept very little. My sleep patterns got completely out of whack but got back to normal when I started taking anti-depressants.
I have read that over-sleeping (more than 8 hours a night) can be a symptom of depression as well as insomnia, although I never experienced that myself. I'm no expert, but yes, depression can affect your sleep pattern.

Light and temperature are two things that I know can alter one's circadian rhythm, or the time one is awake and when one is asleep.

I find television puts me to sleep. must be something to do with staring at a flickering light, either that or the shows are so boring they put you to sleep.

Oh yeah, I forgot about late night television as an insomnia cure.

Audio books and AM talk radio are the answers for me. Music, especially popular music, doesn't do the trick, as you want to listen to it too much. There are also too many memories tied into music you like to listen to. Human voices, however, are so much easier to fall asleep to, and if you leave the AM radio on all night, you'll never have memories tied to anything, as the enws is often, well... new.

The other trick, I've found, are GE Reveal™ light bulbs. They actually replicate pure white light, giving you a natural light spectrum. This isn't as effective as the lamps built to simulate natural sunlight used to reset your biological clock, but it's much easier on the eyes when you need to sleep, especially as a night light or small bedside lamp (which I leave on from time to time while I listen to the radio).

I also follow a specific ritual of exercise every other day later in the evening (typically I worked out from 7pm to 10pm at college). This doesn't have so much to do with sleep, but rather, putting your mind at ease by multitasking. By watching your favorite prime-time tv (in my case, "24", "House", "Mythbusters", and "Battlestar Galactica"), weight-training, and working out some of your frustrations with physical exertion, you feel more relaxed, like you've managed to be productive regardless of how much things have piled up out of control.

Also, in my case, the exercise often led to quite a few answers to problems I ran into (academic and non-academic). I'd be on the treadmill, about to collapse, and suddenly a few solutions I could take to reach an answer to accounting would pop in my head.

Did I also mention that there is a new fad in neurological research based on IQ trends related to cardiovascular exercise? Apparently brain cells can be replaced instead of permanently lost, and regular physical fitness over an extended period of time seems to help enhance IQ, communication between the two hemispheres of the brain, as well as neurotransmitter density.

Some general tips that may not solve your problem, but can help:

1) Physical exersize, just an hour a day is good. Don't exersize a few hours before bedtime, otherwise your body goes in 'energy' mode rather than 'rest' mode.

2) Sunlight! It's very important for our biological rythms. Do more stuff outsife if your indoors most of the day, or at least sit in a sunlit room. Wake up early to spongue up on that stuff! It's good for your mood, health and biorythm. Just watch out for sunburn.

3) Regular living patterns. Try to eat, go to bed and wake up at the same time every day. It's much easier to go to sleep and have good quality sleep when your body knows it's supposed to sleep at that time.

4) Don't oversleep! Even when you had little sleep the previous days, that's two bads. And two wrongs don't make one right, they make a doube wrong.

5) Caffeine is your enemy! The best wouldn't be to eliminate it from your intake, but otherwise, try to minimalise it. Especialy don't take any 6 hours before bedtime.

6) The last hour before you go to bed is for relaxing and getting ready. Take a bath, turn off the tv and computer and get out that book.

7) Bed is for sex or sleeping only! (If you have so much sex in your bed your body thinks of bed as sex first, sleeping later, you maybe should have sex on the couch instead )