Fear of sleep

One of the worst wd symptoms is the fear of sleep. It isnt a fear of lying down. It is actually a fear of going to sleep. When I see other people sleeping or a baby sleeping it makes me nervous. I don't feel this all the time and it does happen in various degrees. I have learned if I take other medications to try to help such as Vistaril it makes it worse. It is getting better thank God. However as I was driving down the road today the sun was coming in my car and normally this kind of makes me sleepy and it must have been doing that I'm just not that aware of it. All of a sudden though I have this anxiety about sleeping. You would think that we would be desperate to sleep. On one hand I am desperate to sleep but on the other I do not want to feel sleepy. It is just a very weird thing and I was wondering if anyone else experiences this. I do want to thank God today though for the six or seven hours of sleep I got last night. That was incredible and so needed.j

I remember fear of sleep. I had it during my absolute worst phase of sleep deprivation. Not getting any sleep was freaking me out, but the thought of surrendering to sleep was even more scary because sleep seem to me to be a bottomless dark pit that I would never climb out of. It just goes to show that withdrawal anxiety can attach itself to anything. Later on, my sleep anxiety was caused be fear of failure and frustration which is the most common cause of it I guess.

I guess I'm kind of in the same boat as far as fearing going to sleep sometimes. I love the sleep i get when i can actually get it. Its just i always have weird vivid dreams and sometimes even nightmares.

Yes My fear turned into the fear and frustration. I bombed at work back in my 10th month. Sleep went from just being too tense to fall asleep with my waking up at night tapering off to every 2 hours and no sleep after 4 am. With daily meditation and relaxation before sleep I am better. I got to just 3 am and 4 am mostly. Now it's just 4:45 every morning. 5 hours. Except at 7 when I have to get up, all the anxiety, muscle spasms, and brain jerking awake melts away and I am in perfect relaxed slumber like I haven't experienced since well before I took Klonapin. I've managed insomnia before maybe that's why. I had sleep apnea for like 8 years maybe more. So I've been exhausted and frustrated the better part of 12 years. I can't seem to break this cycle. Like you all I stopped resisting or panicking over it. I was using a meditation to get back to sleep. It worked for a while but now seems to make it take longer to get back to sleep. It all starts with a waking and knot in my gut.

I too suffer from the fear of sleep though it has improved a little bit these days. There was a time when I used to get very nervous and tense in the evenings. A sinking feeling used to grip me that now night time will come and I will be wide awake while every one in the world will be snoring away to glory .

 

As so many sensible benzo buddies have advised that acceptance is the key to improvement. I try to implement it but I have to confess that some days I do lose my nerves .I get angry with God. Why are you punishing me ? But then when I have a good night sleep my heart is again full of gratitude to God

Yeah I am going through this for first time in my life. Insomnia, which turned into sleep deprivation, triggered this new anxiety for me. When it first happened, I would feel 'ok' in the day but as the sun went down and nigh time got closer, I would find my anxiety getting much higher. I would put off sleep until as late as possible. I think as each time you actually get through those periods of sleeplessness, each time gets a little easier. You learn what works and what doesn't.

 

Sleep anxiety manifests itself in many ways. I am a little sensitive to sound in the day but the minute I put my head on the pillow and the ceiling creaks, my body jolts with fear! lol

Yes I think the key is acceptance. If I can keep the anxiety down I dont feel as bad in the morni ng.