Insomnia not getting better

[[Th...]]

I’m a bit nervous right now. Out of desperation for sleep I took .5mg Xanax, 15mg temezepam, and a belsomra. I am still awake. It had absolutely no effect on me. Now what?

 

The same thing happened to me.  You reached Tolerance or where the drug at the current dose, or maybe any dose, will no longer give you the intended results you are seeking!

At first, 1mg of Xanax could knock me out for 8 hours, then 7, then 6...5...4....3.....2....1.  So I upped the dose to 2mg with the same results...maybe an hour or 2 of sleep.  Then I switched to Klonopin and 1mg did nothing and neither did 2mg so I started taking 3mg and 4mg per night while still getting maybe an hour of sleep.  I then added in 30mg of Temazepam and still only got an hour or maybe 2 of sleep.  I then threw Mirtazepine into the mix and the results were the same.  Then I found this forum and realized that all Rx drugs eventually stop working and that they are a dead end road.  So I jumped CT (not recommended) under the advice of my PCP and the rest as they say, is history.

 

I then tried Gabapentin, Seroquel, Busperion, Belsomra, Doxepine, along with all ofthe OTC and Herbal remedies...nothing worked for me for more than a night or 2 so I ditched them all and decided to "tough" it out. It was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life but I am so thankful I listened to the buddies on this forum that said I would heal and get my sleep back. 

[[...]]

What’s scarey about this is that I was never in tolerance. I took them for a short term anxiety situation and when that situation resolved itself I was ready to quit. Doc said just quit you’ll have a couple weeks of uncomfortable symptoms and then move on. 5 months later I still can’t sleep and there is nothing that can be done about it. I was hoping that this would have resolved by now. I cannot believe that this amount did not knock me out. It was like I took a placebo. I don’t know how my all of you made it so long without sleep but I’m really struggling.

[[Th...]]

Maybe you mean you were never in tolerance WD?  Reaching tolerance doesn't mean you will have inter-dose WD symptoms...but those seem fairly common?

You reached Tolerance and confirmed that you did by taking 2 different Benzos with no effect.

 

The doctor that told you that you'd have a couple of weeks of uncomfortable symptoms was wrong and obviously doesn't understand protracted withdrawal symptoms...or symptoms that can last for months or years.

 

Maybe nothing can be done at this point with Rx drugs, but time will heal you.

 

The biggest mistake I made was trying to put a timeline for when my sleep and symptoms would improve.  No one knows when that will be.  Your WD is what it is and it will end when it ends.  Not comforting, but the truth. Creating your own timeline only leads to frustration, anger and feeling that WD is permanent.  It's NOT!

 

The reason that amount did not  knock you out is you already down-regulated your GABA receptors as much as they can be down-regulated.  You can't damage them anymore so what you took had zero effect.  It's like expecting the ashes from a wood fire to burn hot and for a long time just because you threw a match into the pile of ashes.  It is never going to happen.

 

Just get through each day and do the best you can do.  Unfortunately the only way out of this mess is through the healing and recovery process, which also includes symptoms and insomnia.

 

But the good news is that WD is temporary.  It doesn't last forever.  It feels permanent and hopeless, but it's not.  You'll make it past the finish line one day.

 

 

[[Ka...]]

I am so sorry you are in the throes of this Xray - it really sucks.  You may be experiencing what I did which is some sleep-related anxiety and phobia about it.  Add anxiety to tolerance and it takes a while to right the ship.  If you can surrender to the time it is going to take to resolve this, it will help get you there sooner.

[[Do...]]

I took trazadone when I quit at first it didn't work? But eventually it allowed me to mostly sleep through the night.  It gave me bad nausea and pain in my abdomen.  I quit taking it and now sleep okay hope you get better.  I still get¹insomnia though

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Got 4 hours last night. It seemed to be fairly deep sleep but it feels like it’s to little to late. I know that my body is getting the bare minimum it need to survive but I sure would like more. I want to be able to participate in life instead of having this cloudy sleep deprived brain. If I look at the positive even a month ago I was begging for 4 hours. So there is some improvement. Hopefully these improvements will keep coming.

[[Ka...]]

Got 4 hours last night. It seemed to be fairly deep sleep but it feels like it’s to little to late. I know that my body is getting the bare minimum it need to survive but I sure would like more. I want to be able to participate in life instead of having this cloudy sleep deprived brain. If I look at the positive even a month ago I was begging for 4 hours. So there is some improvement. Hopefully these improvements will keep coming.

 

Sounds like progress to me.   

[[CA...]]

Improvements xray, I got about 4 hrs deep sleep as well so improvements all around!

[[Th...]]

Got 4 hours last night. It seemed to be fairly deep sleep but it feels like it’s to little to late. I know that my body is getting the bare minimum it need to survive but I sure would like more. I want to be able to participate in life instead of having this cloudy sleep deprived brain. If I look at the positive even a month ago I was begging for 4 hours. So there is some improvement. Hopefully these improvements will keep coming.

 

4 hours is great.  You might night feel refreshed, but that is improvement.  It's never too little too late.  You can't make up sleep loss, but any sleep you get helps you mentally and physically.  Everyone wants more sleep when they are majorly sleep deprived.  Instead of wanting more, be GRATEFUL and THANKFUL for the 4 hours. Many many times when I got 1 or 2 hours I was begging for 4 hours.  Improvements WILL keep coming but they will most likely include more nights of poor sleep.  It's very UP and Down until it evens out.  You can participate in life, don't create artificial limitations based on lack of sleep.  I did that for far too long and missed out on things I can never get back.  Brain Fog is common, so just live your life the best you can even with the brain fog.  Give insomnia the middle finger and go out to eat or see a movie, etc.  You are in control, not the insomnia! 

[[He...]]

Hi X,

I thought I'd chime in here. A year ago, when I started my taper, I hit tolerance with a 2mg bar of Xanax. As theway2 said, it took me a little while to become completely tolerant. It would put me out for 8 hours, then 6, then 4, then 2 and then it just didn't work at all. NOR would Ambien. The last time I ever took Xanax, before my taper. I took a 2mg bar and stayed wide awake. 3 hours later, I took a 10mg Ambien and still didn't sleep. Talk about tolerance!

 

I had no choice but to taper off as CT would send me in a tailspin. It took me 6 months to get off and I have been off for almost 6 months, and I am still having on and off sleep. Anywhere from zero hours to 8. Last night was 2, the night before 4 and the night before 7. My first 3 months of tapering, I NEVER slept more than 3 hours with 1 hour being my average and having several zero-hour nights.

 

Hang in there! I'm healing with you. Congrats on your 4-hour night. That seems to be the hot spot for me to feel good. I did alright today but my days are better when I sleep 4+ hours.

 

Take Care

 

HM

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Thanks HM,

I hope you're right. I wish I would have done some research before i CT’d. I hadn’t hit tolerance yet and It was still doing what it was supposed to do.  I just didn’t need it anymore so I quit. Since I hadn’t hit tolerance I was very surprised when I tried to use it for sleep and it had absolutely no effect. I guess the cold turkey really did a number on my brain. Now I’m stuck in this insomnia nightmare where I cannot initiate sleep. I took 15mg of mirtizapin last night and slept 6 hours but it was garbage sleep and I feel like I didn’t sleep at all. I’m so sorry to hear you only got 2 hours last night. I hope and pray we all heal soon. We all deserve better than this.

[[He...]]

Hi X,

Yes, those benzo's do a number to your brain. I agree. When Xanax worked for me, it was heaven except that I wasn't as alert and awake as I am now. It kept the anxiety at bay but kept me feeling kind of subpar. I am still trying to get my mojo back. I am 53 and I wish I could retire. I am so tired and have such brain damage from a difficult life that it's hard to work. I have to keep plugging along though. I slept 5- or 6-hours last night and I feel OK. I definitely miss the days of sleeping 9 and 10 hours and waking up refreshed. I hope we all get to have that again someday. I am glad you got 6 hours of sleep, but I am sorry it was 'garbage'. I know what you mean. I got up to go pee at least 4 times last night. I hate when I am in the deepest sleep and my brain wakes me up to go pee. I never know if I'll make it back to sleep or not.

 

Have a great day and I hope we both (all of us) get sleep tonight.

 

HM

[[Th...]]

On the bright side, 6 hours of "garbage" sleep is better than zero hours or no sleep.  It's all perspective.  You can choose to be positive and be thankful and grateful for any and all sleep whether it feels restorative or not.  Or you can lament about how horrible your life is and make things even worse when sleep his hard to come by.  Just saying...I've been right where you are now and took the negative road for about the first 6 months after my CT and that only made things worse than they needed to be.  After I got on the "positive" road, it didn't make my insomnia disappear, but it sure helped deal with it the next day!

[[...]]

I need some encouragement. This insomnia has me scared to death. My heart pounds, my anxiety is thru the roof and my brain is just tired and foggy. When something as basic as sleep no longer works it tends to freak you out. I’m 5 months from a c/t and I was really hopeful to turn a corner soon. It starts to make me think that I’m stuck like this.

[[Th...]]

You are NOT stuck.

This is TEMPORARY!

You WILL NOT be like this for life let alone for another year IMO...

Sleep slowly returns...so even if this takes longer than you'd like to turn a corner, it will eventually happen! Sleep returns in fits and starts.  It's not one hour or less every night for months and months and then one night you go back to sleeping "normal."

At 5 months off I thought I was unique and that I had some sort of WD no one else had and I was going to be one of the very few that would never heal.

I was right where you are now.  I even seriously thought I had sporadic fatal insomnia.  I didn't and you don't either.

It's ALL Benzo WD.

Do your best to NOT believe the Benzo LIES that tell you that you will NEVER heal or get sleep back!

Every passing day brings you one day closer to sleeping again whether it feels like it or not.

No one knows for sure when you'll turn a corner, but If I had to bet, I'd say you'll turn a corner sometime soon and certainly before the end of 2022 

Hang in there.  Better nights that will lead to better days are ahead of you for sure!

 

[[...]]

Thanks for the pep talk TW.

In your experience on this forum have you seen anyone recover while taking seroquel or remeron for their insomnia? I just don’t think I’m as strong as you. 3 weeks ago I had 3 zero nights in a row and I didn’t think I was going to make it through the 4th day. I had some joy last week with 25mg of seroquel giving me 7 hours of of pretty refreshing sleep. I’m just afraid if I keep taking it that my recovery will be prolonged. I’m between a rock and a hard place. I can’t keep taking these zero nights but I also don’t want trade one drug for another. This insomnia sucks!! I’ve fought this for 5 months and I feel like I haven’t made headway. I can’t work because my job requires me to drive from job site to job site and I’ve found that I’m now microsleeping behind the wheel and that is not safe. I have to be back to work by June 1st or I’ll lose it. I feel like I have to choose between my job and my health.

[[Th...]]

Yes,  many on this forum took seroquel and/or Mirtazepine for sleep to get through WD.  A few had some issues getting off of the Mirtazapine and/or Seroquel, but nothing like Benzo WD.

 

This isn't a contest, but I had 3 nights in a row with no perceived sleep at least 10 times and 2 times it was 4 nights in a row with no perceived sleep.  Like you, I thought I was going to die or go insane or something else bad was going to happen to me...but it never did and I was amazed at how well I could function after being awake like 90+ hours in a row.  Yes it was scary, because our entire lives we are conditioned to believe that we must get 8 hours every night or else.  That's not true, especially during Benzo-induced insomnia.  If your brain could sleep, it would and it is getting "micro sleep" or periods where your brain shuts down like actual sleep that you are most likely unaware of.

 

I took Seroquel and Mirtazepine (Remeron) and the only one I could get sleep from was the Seroquel...but I felt very hung over the next day with a a lot of brain fog and DR.  So I only took it sporadically.

 

I am not advocating for drugs, but I doubt Seroquel will prolong your WD?  It should be OK to take a few times per week?

 

Trading one drug for another is normally not good, especially if it's one Benzo for another Benzo or Z-drug, but in your case, taking 25mg of Seroquel after a few zero nights might be OK.  Talk with your doctor and then do what is best for you.

 

It's pretty common to think you've made no progress and that you are actually getting worse.  Most of the time things get worse before they get better?

 

I thought I'd have to quit my job too.  It is tough to be in that situation, but June 1 is still 6 weeks away.  You could improve a lot by then?  I remember in January of 2017 we booked a cruise and my family told me..."why do you even want to go?  It won't be any fun and you'll ruin it for everyone else"  I did a lot of healing between January and June and actually enjoyed the cruise.  My sleep wasn't perfect but I was getting 4-5 hours every night and was able to nap as well...sometimes for over an hour!  I say that to give you hope. 

 

[[...]]

So last night I fell asleep on my own and slept for about 2 hours. I woke up and was still groggy enough to go back to sleep but I had this weird feeling that I was having to manually make myself breath. I felt like if I fell asleep I would stop breathing. It was one of the scariest feelings I’ve ever had. Has anybody else had anything like this? This went away after about an hour and I was able to fall back asleep.

[[Th...]]

Yes, I had that too, on and off, for a few weeks where I thought I would "forget" to breath and end up suffocating myself.  I think it's more of a type of panic than anything else? And the more you focus on this or think about it, the worse "or more real" it becomes.  It's all part of the Benzo mind games your brain plays on you during WD.

 

But on the bright side, you fell asleep on your own for a few hours...that's real progress!

[[He...]]

Hi X,

When I first started my taper a year ago, I had several times when I would by lying down trying to sleep (although I couldn't) and I would stop breathing and have to force myself to take a huge breath. Like you, I felt like I had to make myself breathe and that it wasn't automatic. Very scary, indeed. I had many other scary symptoms that have since lessened dramatically. Benzos are a bugger to get over from a dependency standpoint. I was absolutely terrified for the first 3 to 4 months. It was horrible. I am so glad I found this site where I could talk to others who have been through my journey, especially regarding insomnia.

 

Wishing you all the best, every day, as you recover,

 

HM

[[...]]

Got about six hours of sleep last. I’m happy about that but it’s still rubbish sleep. I had to take 7.5mg of mirtazipine to fall asleep and then another 7.5 in the middle of the night to go back to sleep. I hope I’m not ultimately hurting my recovery by doing this. I can see that I’m making progress though because there was a time that no amount of mirtazipine would help me sleep. Now if my sleep would just start getting a little deeper I would be happy.

[[He...]]

Hi X,

Sorry that your sleep was rubbish but glad you got 6 hours. I don't know how much I slept. I am going through weird phase of sleeping and waking all night to where I just don't know. I think I also got about 6 hours but not sure.

 

I hope you have a great day

 

HM

[[Th...]]

Got about six hours of sleep last. I’m happy about that but it’s still rubbish sleep. I had to take 7.5mg of mirtazipine to fall asleep and then another 7.5 in the middle of the night to go back to sleep. I hope I’m not ultimately hurting my recovery by doing this. I can see that I’m making progress though because there was a time that no amount of mirtazipine would help me sleep. Now if my sleep would just start getting a little deeper I would be happy.

 

6 hours of any type of sleep at this point is fantastic IMO.  Do you have something that can track your sleep?  I have a Fitbit and it tells me how much REM, light and Deep sleep I get each night.  I average around an hour of deep sleep each night according to the Fitbit!

[[...]]

Back to square one. Last night was another zero. I so wish that this would end. It makes you want to just give up. I’ve been fighting this insomnia for 106 days and I’m so tired (literally and figuratively) of fighting. But the only other option is even less appealing. Hope for some joy tonight.🙏🤞

[[Th...]]

Zero nights are the worst.  I had a 2 hour night Monday night.  The first off night in over 4 months so I sort of know what you are going through.  I had a "dark" "toxic" feeling for part of the day yesterday that brought back all of the memories of the "bad old days" of insomnia during Benzo WD.

 

Low dose Remeron (Mirtazapine) doesn't act like an AD; it acts more like an antihistamine so it shouldn't do much or anything to mess with your healing and recovery.  Also, others have had sleep success with lower dose Seroquel; maybe 50mg or less?  I had the best success with Seroquel, but it gave me brain fog and enhanced my DP/DR but that was a trade off I was willing to make for awhile in order to break the string of zero nights.

 

Thankfully CBD oil works for me now, but I waited too long to take it so I only ended up with the 2 hours.

 

I know it feels hopeless and all that you can think of is how to get out of this mess and have it end, but it will end, but on it's own timeline. 

 

Praying for some relief for you soon!