Anyone experience this sleep/dream problem?

[[Ma...]]

I usually get little to no sleep but still am grateful for the little bit I do get. Lately I have been falling asleep then having a weird dream or nightmare which seems to last awhile but when I wakeup I look at the clock and realize I was only asleep for a few minutes. This keeps repeating over and over again. So basically I'm not getting any sleep at all and just suffering from these horrible nightmares. Has anyone else experienced this?

[[Kr...]]

Yes very similar;  and the clock only changes a few minutes, but then sometimes it's longer and I don't know whether I've been trying to sleep, fighting these halucinatory dream-like states, dreaming or sleeping.  I was sure I was awake on one episode, but when I moved my head, I'd been dribbling on my pillow.    Luckily I'm having breaks from this some of the time now.  I thought I was getting 'night anxiety' and tried not to look at my phone.  Sometimes warm milk, or a paracetamol (tylenol?) helped.  It was a very annoying sx, but not so much terrifying as kind of sickening, so I could 'talk myself around' once I was sitting up, or fully conscious.

 

It usually happens to me when I wake in the middle of the night and try to go back to sleep.  Or when I wake early morning (most mornings) and try to get a bit more sleep.    (on the latter, I usually give up and get up, but sometimes I manage to get another hour in - over a period of 3 hours!!).

[[Ma...]]

Thanks for the reply. It is a horrible symptom and trying to fight through it doesn't work. I've been in bed for 12 hours and I couldn't tell you If I slept at all. It's scary.

[[Kr...]]

I actually think it was this symptom that had me sitting on a chair in the lounge doing affirmations out aloud from a wee book i had in my bookshelf 'Scientific healing affirmations' by Paramahansa Yogananda.    And I do remember feeling quite desperate then and quite hopeless. 

 

The scarey part, I guess, is having to admit that we're not sure what's happening;  are we awake or asleep?  Have we slept? 

 

The good news is that it doesn't happen when we're awake and walking around;  it only happens when we're trying to sleep, which leads me to believe that some type of sleep is occuring, even if momentarily or 'non-REM' and we just have to go with that. 

 

I would be exhausted and in need of sleep until I gave up at about 0900 am or so, and I'd get up.  Once I was up, I no longer felt exhausted (a little wired n tired) and wondered if I'd imagined the whole thing and dreamed that I couldn't sleep.

 

I didn't dream it of course, but, I think the cortisol, adrenaline, GABA, Glutamate and chemical imbalance going on, along with the semi-sleep makes our bodies confused.  The nerves, that we're so used to relying on, are sending us mixed signals.    The one thing we can rely on is the PILLOW, and the BED, and the PHONE.... if the warm milk n honey or sugar didn't work I'd sometimes give up and read F/B on the phone.  Another time I took a hot water bottle back to bed - I did manage some sleep, because I woke with a rash all over my stomach - the 'hottie' was too hot.  But I still didn't think I'd slept.    I really do think we have some-type of 'inbetween awake and asleep' period - it's not pleasant, but as I read on another thread about this - there is some rest going on, and we are still on the road to recovery..... try not to fret about it, and as with during the day, do whatever it takes to get through (with me it's looking for sensations, food, water, hottie, milk, extra blanket etc).

 

And it doesn't happen every night, but the longest I had it was about 4-5 nights, then a different pattern.  Now it comes back sometimes when i wake early in the morning, but not as badly.  You will get through this - others have experienced exactly the same and gone on to share the story - it was heartening for me to hear that it wasn't just me, and that it WAS survivable xxx 

[[Kr...]]

And..... my apologies, I'm in the wrong forum and I didn't do a taper.   (Although I was in tolerance withdrawal for some years).  Hopefully some others will chime in as to whether this happens on taper.  My experience has been through WD, post jump, but I'm guessing these passing symptoms are all our brains rebalancing.    We're all heading towards healing 

[[Ma...]]

Thanks for the info. I think if I make it through this then I will be a much stronger person. This site helps alot  :thumbsup:

[[be...]]

I have nightmares sometimes but can usually shake them off. But up until a couple of months ago I had what I called my daymare. If I slept in the afternoon I had the same dream over and over. In the dream everybody was awake and so was I but everyone couldn't hear me. I was trying to ask them to wake me up. To help me actually wake up but they didn't know I was there. It was petrifying. I stopped afternoon sleeping because even though I needed sleep I was too afraid to even lie down. Finally one afternoon I dozed off for four solid hours. The dream didn't come and I haven't had it since. It was when I was trying to get down from 13 mg. After that no issues at all so breaking that 13 mg barrier was the key for me. I wouldn't have wished it on anyone. B

[[Kr...]]

That's awesome for you to share, and a lovely update Barb.  I can certainly relate, so maybe it's just the brain healing itself (someone else said to me 'the brain KNOWS what it has to do).  I love how my body has been healing and actually made me 'sit out' of the process and watch - it's been hard to lose power and control, but it's also been amazing to see how our bodys can do so much healing on their own (despite the debilitating side affects that we as 'witnesses' have to endure!!!)

[[lo...]]

I'm tapering, but it was happening on my recent reinstatement and hold as I was kindled as shit. It wasn't bad during my first taper until I made those two massive reductions near 10/2016, and then yeah it was crazy vivid dreams that lasted minutes. It really, really sucked.

 

It's a rebound in REM sleep, as benzos suppress that. That's why a lot of people report not dreaming on benzos, just a nice deep sleep (when in reality its not that deep, it's less quality).

 

It will sort itself out in time. If you can handle it ok, try to hold on to the fact that it will obviously somehow, in some way, sort itself out eventually. It did suck, it's one of the main reasons I reinstated. I can't do no sleep, at all. I lasted two nights of it lol.

 

Good luck

[[Fi...]]

I usually get little to no sleep but still am grateful for the little bit I do get. Lately I have been falling asleep then having a weird dream or nightmare which seems to last awhile but when I wakeup I look at the clock and realize I was only asleep for a few minutes. This keeps repeating over and over again. So basically I'm not getting any sleep at all and just suffering from these horrible nightmares. Has anyone else experienced this?

 

I had all of that and more, pre-taper (tolerance) and during my taper. It has eased off greatly now and real sleep has been making an appearance once again.

 

I think at least some of it is gut-related, gut-brain signalling. That's what it feels like here. I've always had this intestine-head thing going on, made twenty times worse by tolerance and withdrawal.

[[li...]]

Yes, I get nightmares almost every night, and my body responds to them , I wake up with my heart racing and sweaty . It went away for a while then came back. Will be happy for this to go away! My therapist said that whenever you are having a dream you don't like, finish it the way you want. So make up your own happy ending. I find that this is mildly effective.