Please help - cannot stand being tired even for one day

Hi All.  Just as the topic says, I struggle MIGHTILY with being tired for even one day.  Right now I'm taking 4.5mg Valium at 12am, sleep until 3 or 4am, take 2mg Lunesta which puts me down until 6 or 7am, then take 10mg Ambien which puts me down for another 45-60 minutes when I wake, rested. 

 

I know this combination is incredibly bad for me, but I also know that when I wake unrefreshed I get anxious and psychotic.  There are some days when 10 minutes after I wake up and feel that horrible unrefreshed feeling I start screaming.  I was rushed to the ER last week and then put in a psych ward for a few days where they pumped me full of Ativan and 200mg Seroquel.  I wasn't suicidal so they let me out after a couple days.

 

I feel really, really stuck.  I know these drugs are going to turn on me soon, but the thought of going months on little to no sleep as my GABA receptors fix themselves fills me with adread.  Any wisdom out there on my dilemma?  I've tried low dose Mirtazapine and other strong anti-histamines but they no longer work for me.

 

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You been on this benzo/z-drug cocktail for such a short period of time, I urge you to try to get off these before you form a dependence and have to taper, a scenario that will in no way alleviate your insomnia.

 

These drugs actually make insomnia worse by downregulating the neurotransmitters that allow you to sleep, and once they are switched off, getting to sleep will be nearly impossible until the CNS can repair them. This repair happens in the absence of this class of drug.

 

I just went through two years of this nightmare, beginning at the age of 65. Only recently did natural sleep return, although I believed it never would.

 

Please read some of the posts here on the Insomnia board, where there are long discussions on the topic. You still have a chance to get off these terrible drugs before you find yourself on a runaway train. 

Leslie - thanks for the reply.  I have been on this cocktail for about a week because each pill on it's own does not help me sleep the amount I need to.  Ambien gets me 90 minutes at best, valium 3-4 hours, and Lunesta gets me 2-3 hours.

 

If I don't take them I don't sleep AT ALL.  Which is what sent me to the ER because I had a breakdown.

 

I feel stuck.  Damned if I do, damned if I don't.

 

Is there a reason you suddenly started taking these drugs? Did you sleep before starting all this.

 

I agree with Leslie, get off as fast as you can. Figure out why you cannot sleep--the underlying reason--and address that first. Use natural remedies or otc sleep aids if you need to. And you don't need that much sleep. It looks like you are trying for 8 hours. You would be fine I am sure with less. I know as long as I get five life will be fine.

Why did this insomnia start? You need to get to the bottom of why you're not sleeping. Is it stress? Work? Relationship? Noise? Light?

Leslie - thanks for the reply.  I have been on this cocktail for about a week because each pill on it's own does not help me sleep the amount I need to.  Ambien gets me 90 minutes at best, valium 3-4 hours, and Lunesta gets me 2-3 hours.

 

If I don't take them I don't sleep AT ALL.  Which is what sent me to the ER because I had a breakdown.

 

I feel stuck.  Damned if I do, damned if I don't.

 

Yes, I understand this oh, so well, from horrific personal experience.

 

You may want to read through this long thread started by member ThEwAy2:

 

  For those of you that just don't get WD Insomnia?

 

He has helped many of our members tackle insomnia, possibly the cruelest side effect of benzo/z-drug use. If you keep up, you may find your sleep drop to 0-2 hours a night, which happened to me.

 

I promise you it’s possible to overcome this, and I say this as a born-but-cured insomniac.

Ok, thanks for the replies.  A little about my situation: I started having insomnia back in 2006 due to work stress.  I had poor sleep for 9 days before I went to my doc and he gave me Restoril (Temazepam).  I slept good until my script ran out, he refilled it, and then I was dependent.  I bounced around using xanax or Ambien to sleep for the next few years.  In 2011 my endocrinologist suggested Remeron (mirtazapine) which was a godsend for a couple years.  It then stopped working.  Then I was right back to using Ambien most nights, and on some nights I still wouldn't feel rested.

 

In an attempt to get off Ambien I went on 10mg Valium for a couple months in April 2016.  I slept great!  I did too fast of of taper from it and got slammed.  Stabilized at 7mg and went down 1mg a week using lots of cardio exercise, Remeron, and low-dose Seroquel.  When I stopped the Valium in July 2016 I kept on with Seroquel and Remeron, but only half my nights were refreshing nights.  In 2017 I tapered off Seroquel and Remeron, but went back on Ambien to deal with insomnia.  In summer 2017 I was down to 3.75mg per night of Ambien and I was getting decent sleep.  When the autumn came around I tried to get off Ambien but failed because I couldn't deal with shitty nights of 3-6 hours of sleep.  So I went back on it.  In 2018 I again tried to get off Ambien.  I made it 58 days before I begged my psychiatrist to put me back on it and Mirtazapine.  Trouble is, it didn't work as well as before.  I was having to use 20-25mg of it to feel refreshed.  I had a breakdown after one of those nights, so they rushed me to the ER where they gave me 5mg Valium.  I slept good that night.  I had a script written for Valium, Lunesta, and Ambien.  Which is what I've been taking for about 10 days now.

 

Just writing all that makes me realize how screwed I am.  I came so close to getting off EVERYTHING at the beginning of this year but the shitty sleep wore me down.  I just don't understand how some of you BB members can go months/years with bad sleep (or worse, NO sleep).  I need about 7.5 hours to feel refreshed and going through a day unrefreshed in HELL for me.  I've had so many of those days that I have lost all willpower to get through them anymore.  I'm so depressed and discouraged about my situation.  I just want to sleep like a normal person!!

I got myself into a similar screwed up tangled mess and simply stopped taking all the crap that I was shoveling into myself in the hopes of getting a couple of hours of sleep. I remember every night I would fixate over what drug plan I was going to use until I finally realized that there was simply no good endings if I kept going the way I was going. The insomnia that followed was pretty brutal, but I was heading in that direction with the pills that I was taking anyway. While on the Ambien and other stuff that I tried, I started to get severe anxiety with a lot of it focused on being able to sleep. I discovered that I was having inter-dose withdrawal symptoms that were behind the anxiety so once that went away, not being able to sleep no longer felt like the end of the world to me.

 

I can only say that you have to stop going down the path that you are taking. If you don't, things will only get worse and worse. The pills are what are making you so fearful right now, but now that you have a better understanding of the trap that you fell into it is time to get out and save you life. This sounds dramatic, but I mean it literally. Believe my when I say that getting off is a less frightening than continuing the way you are because soon you will have to start increasing your dose to chase that sleep and the hole will just keep getting deeper and deeper.

 

On the lighter side, I am pretty much back to normal now and you can get there too.

AlohaFromHawaii - thanks for the reply.  What is your suggestion?  I've been taking the Valium for two weeks and I'm already getting burning ears/face as the night goes on (before I dose).  Should I taper the valium and cold turkey the Lunesta & Ambien?

 

I notice in your sig you say you had bad insomnia for a year after you stopped.  That seems like an impossible task for me, to go a whole year with bad sleep!!  I'm so screwed.  I get psychotic even after a single bad night's sleep.  It's like my ability to handle the tired days has just been worn down from so many years of doing it already.  Enough!

 

Any advice from anyone is welcome. 

AlohaFromHawaii - thanks for the reply.  What is your suggestion?  I've been taking the Valium for two weeks and I'm already getting burning ears/face as the night goes on (before I dose).  Should I taper the valium and cold turkey the Lunesta & Ambien?

 

I notice in your sig you say you had bad insomnia for a year after you stopped.  That seems like an impossible task for me, to go a whole year with bad sleep!!  I'm so screwed.  I get psychotic even after a single bad night's sleep.  It's like my ability to handle the tired days has just been worn down from so many years of doing it already.  Enough!

 

Any advice from anyone is welcome.

 

I really really feel for you but really all the obsessing and worry about not being able to sleep will only make sleep more elusive.. you really need to let go and roll with the punches.. you could be in for a rocky ride but ya just gotta go with it.. the more you fight it and decide you can't stand it the worse it will likely be.. there are some good books that address sleep anxiety that might help "The sleep book" by Guy Meadows, also the "the effortless sleep method".. the strategies might not work entirely well soo early in your process but the info is sound and will help at some point.. some other tips are 1. when in bed make rest your goal (not sleep) as this takes the pressure off, 2. manage your anxiety and stress the best way you can, 3. don't let lack of sleep get in the way of life - proceed the best you can despite feeling tired, and 3. be accepting, patient and have faith that over time things will improve..

 

check out my success story which I will also update at some point soon hope this helps

 

http://www.benzobuddies.org/forum/index.php?topic=187921.msg2466030#msg2466030

AlohaFromHawaii - thanks for the reply.  What is your suggestion?  I've been taking the Valium for two weeks and I'm already getting burning ears/face as the night goes on (before I dose).  Should I taper the valium and cold turkey the Lunesta & Ambien?

 

I notice in your sig you say you had bad insomnia for a year after you stopped.  That seems like an impossible task for me, to go a whole year with bad sleep!!  I'm so screwed.  I get psychotic even after a single bad night's sleep.  It's like my ability to handle the tired days has just been worn down from so many years of doing it already.  Enough!

 

Any advice from anyone is welcome.

 

SleeplessInPNW,

I personally don't have any experience with tapering since I more or less did a cold turkey off of my primary drug, Ambien. I do know that Ambiem and Lunesta have very short half-lifes in the blood stream while Valium has a fairly long half-life. Short half-lifes make for a lot of instability and potentially unpleasant inter-dose withdrawals so I would consider getting off the sleeping pills first then tapering off of the Valium last as a sort of shock absorber. I would first consider phasing out one of the sleeping pills in favor of the other so that you are ony then trying to get off of one (might be a bit neater). I think that Lunesta would be harder to taper from since it can't be cut so maybe switch to just Ambien. I personally would get off the Ambien fairly fast since you will still have the Valium to take the edge off.

 

Do to the nature of these pills and the fact that you have been taking a fairly high dose of Ambien along with the other drug experiences, it is unlikely that you will have an easy time, but you have to start doing this as soon as possible regardlesss because it can only get worse on its own.

 

Nobody likes not getting sleep and it is easy to obess over it since we have been taught that we must have a full 8 hours for good health. You are going to find out that you can get by much better than you thought with very little sleep for extended periods of time. It is not pleasant, but it is very doable when you don't really have much of a choice. Just get rid of your pills once off of them so you don't feel tempted to backslide when things get hard. Initially you will likely have some form of accute withdrawal that may include symptoms others than insomnia, but this will pass in time and then it will only be the insomnia. You will learn how to cope with it and you will get through it like everyone else (feeling shitty during the day or not). The healing will be sporatic with setbacks and progress throughout most of the process and once sleep does start slipping in on more and more good nights, you will learn that the bad nights really don't have to ruin the next day.

 

I'm just about 3 years out and still have bad nights from time to time, but they are better than the early good nights were. I have long since learned not to stress over not getting a full night's sleep and I hope to carry this lesson throughout the rest of my life Athough it has been almost 3 years, I have been living a more or less normal life without sleeping pills for much of that time now. I will be happy to offer what ever advice to you that I can.

 

So, I only took 4.5mg Valium last night and slept lightly from 2am to 7am.  I've been up for 3.5 hours and the drug cravings to get me more sleep are INSANE.  I've never considered myself a drug addict, but the cravings are definitely there.  I talked to a rehab place called White Sands in Florida which said they do a Valium taper and try different antihistamines to attain sleep, such as Trazadone or Mirtazapine.  The problem is that I'm already used to those meds so they don't work for me, only the benzos do.

 

I'm out of Lunesta right now (my pharmacy will have it at 3pm today), but I'm sooooo tempted to take a 10mg Ambien and get another 90 minutes of precious sleep.  Oh my god what have I done to my brain. 

Restoril is the devil. That's what keeps most everything else from working. It's the only pill I tried that knocked me out fast but stopped working after like 2 weeks. To get off all of that, you will be unrefreshed. I can tell you that. There no other way around it. You are like me. I wanted to sleep every night and got desperate. I was taking everything until I just gave up. I've been going through this for 7 months because when I got on Ativan due to a panic attack, I thought I just got really bad insomnia.  Right now, I'm tapering klonopine and am down to about .1mg. I'm taking 5mg remeron (cutting my 7.5)every couple nights and holding my taper for a day or so to sleep then move on again. I feel horrid as I type this. My head hurts. Feels like I'm in a death grip, but I know it's all part of healing.

Restoril is the devil. That's what keeps most everything else from working. It's the only pill I tried that knocked me out fast but stopped working after like 2 weeks. To get off all of that, you will be unrefreshed. I can tell you that. There no other way around it. You are like me. I wanted to sleep every night and got desperate. I was taking everything until I just gave up. I've been going through this for 7 months because when I got on Ativan due to a panic attack, I thought I just got really bad insomnia.  Right now, I'm tapering klonopine and am down to about .1mg. I'm taking 5mg remeron (cutting my 7.5)every couple nights and holding my taper for a day or so to sleep then move on again. I feel horrid as I type this. My head hurts. Feels like I'm in a death grip, but I know it's all part of healing.

 

AMEN,It truly is the devil.

So, I only took 4.5mg Valium last night and slept lightly from 2am to 7am.  I've been up for 3.5 hours and the drug cravings to get me more sleep are INSANE.  I've never considered myself a drug addict, but the cravings are definitely there.  I talked to a rehab place called White Sands in Florida which said they do a Valium taper and try different antihistamines to attain sleep, such as Trazadone or Mirtazapine.  The problem is that I'm already used to those meds so they don't work for me, only the benzos do.

 

I'm out of Lunesta right now (my pharmacy will have it at 3pm today), but I'm sooooo tempted to take a 10mg Ambien and get another 90 minutes of precious sleep.  Oh my god what have I done to my brain.

 

I don't know your gender, but the new prescribing guidelines for Ambien is 5mg max for females and 10mg for males. And it is intended for short-term use only (no more than 3 weeks). Anything more than that and all bets are off (as you have already found out). Lunesta is pretty much the same, but I don't know the max size of the dose. I do know that if you cut one in half and pop it into your mouth your taste buds are going to hate you.

 

Your going to have to start getting used to nights spent with very broken and light sleeps (when sleep comes) so I would suggest not refilling your Lunesta and only taking a single progressively smaller dosage of Ambien until you are off the sleeping pills (while gradually tapering from the Valium). Ambien is only designed to get you to sleep, but not keep you asleep for long so it will only buy you a little sleep during this process, but it is something that you have to go through.

 

I'm really not trying to scare you, but I am also not sugar-coating things. You need to understand how serious this is and be aware that there really are no short-cuts or magic bullets that will smooth out the road. Also, do not consider going to a treatment facility! I have been around on this site for awhile and heard about far too many people trying that route only to find that they got worse instead of better. Treatment centers just don't understand benzo and sleeping pill withdrawals.

I'm a male, so 10mg Ambien is my dose.  It only puts me down for 90 minutes, sometimes less.

 

I am so scared.  I've been to the ER twice in the last two weeks because I become psychotic without adequate sleep.  They involuntarily committed me to a psych ward where they fed me 2mg Ativan and 200mg Seroquel to get me to sleep.  This of course is not sustainable.  I can't be going to ER after every night of not taking enough sleep meds to get me decent sleep.

 

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to get used to night after night of bad sleep, because it really isn't a question of willpower to push through, it's a question of my brain FREAKING out.  I wake up screaming sometimes.  My parents, who are 65 (I'm 45) are at their wits end.  We've been to multiple doctors, psychiatrists, etc, and everyone says that I'm one of the most severe cases they've ever seen.  They also give conflicting advice.  I do not know who to trust.

 

I have not taken the Ambien today, and I've been up for 6 hours.  So that is a small victory I suppose.  But let me tell you, the desire to sleep is insane.  It's like restless legs.  I can't stop thinking about it, not even for a second.

 

I'm completely at a loss on what to do.

I'm a male, so 10mg Ambien is my dose.  It only puts me down for 90 minutes, sometimes less.

 

I am so scared.  I've been to the ER twice in the last two weeks because I become psychotic without adequate sleep.  They involuntarily committed me to a psych ward where they fed me 2mg Ativan and 200mg Seroquel to get me to sleep.  This of course is not sustainable.  I can't be going to ER after every night of not taking enough sleep meds to get me decent sleep.

 

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to get used to night after night of bad sleep, because it really isn't a question of willpower to push through, it's a question of my brain FREAKING out.  I wake up screaming sometimes.  My parents, who are 65 (I'm 45) are at their wits end.  We've been to multiple doctors, psychiatrists, etc, and everyone says that I'm one of the most severe cases they've ever seen. 

 

I'm completely at a loss on what to do.

 

Yes. Don't go to a treatment center. I went and they almost killed me. Here's what I would do. Start liquid tapering your Valium and stop taking all those sleep meds (you might have to taper them) but I would take the mirtazapine on occasion to try and get some sleep even if it's every other night. I think it's one of the strongest ones that don't work on your gaba receptors? Just don't take a lot of it. You don't want to end up in a mess with that too. That's just my opinion. That's what I'm trying now. I feel like crap every day but I've started getting 9-12 hrs sleep every other night or so. You might want to ask the doc if mirtazapine is one that you can take ever so often or not, but I'm doing it so my body don't get used to it.

Stacey - I take between 7.5mg or 15mg of Mirtazapine every night, and I have been doing so for months.  It does nothing at all for me.  It's only the benzos or Z-drugs that put me to sleep. 

 

I'm extremely scared.  I don't want to end up in a straight-jacket being pumped full of anti-psychotics that have all sorts of side effects (like restless legs, OMG that is hell on earth).

 

 

I got myself into a similar screwed up tangled mess and simply stopped taking all the crap that I was shoveling into myself in the hopes of getting a couple of hours of sleep. I remember every night I would fixate over what drug plan I was going to use until I finally realized that there was simply no good endings if I kept going the way I was going. The insomnia that followed was pretty brutal, but I was heading in that direction with the pills that I was taking anyway. While on the Ambien and other stuff that I tried, I started to get severe anxiety with a lot of it focused on being able to sleep. I discovered that I was having inter-dose withdrawal symptoms that were behind the anxiety so once that went away, not being able to sleep no longer felt like the end of the world to me.

 

I can only say that you have to stop going down the path that you are taking. If you don't, things will only get worse and worse. The pills are what are making you so fearful right now, but now that you have a better understanding of the trap that you fell into it is time to get out and save you life. This sounds dramatic, but I mean it literally. Believe my when I say that getting off is a less frightening than continuing the way you are because soon you will have to start increasing your dose to chase that sleep and the hole will just keep getting deeper and deeper.

 

On the lighter side, I am pretty much back to normal now and you can get there too.

 

Did I ever ask you how long it took you to get your sleep back? I sleep every other night but feel awful almost every day.

Stacey - according to Aloha's sig it took around a year for her sleep to return to ok levels.  A year!!!!  I can barely lift my head off the pillow today and it's only been 6 hours on the first day!

 

 

Unfortunately, there is no magic pill that will see you through a solid night’s rest — at least, for any sustainable amount of time without the risk of adverse effects in the long run. As horrifying as it is, you’re going to have to come to terms with the situation. It’s entirely possible that you’re at a point with these medications that they’re doing more harm to your sleep cycle than good. A lot of what you’re feeling emotionally is probably being exacerbated by the drugs as well. Many sleep medications carry the risk of anxiety as a potential side effect. This, coupled with sleep deprivation and withdrawal, is a very toxic mix that many of us here find ourselves lost in. I wish I could tell you this journey will be easy. I wish I could tell you the suffering only lasts x amount of days. Everyone on here recovers their sleep at a different rate. It’s going to sound and feel impossible, but you have to find some way to accept what you’re going through. If you seek emergency professional aid, know that they will most likely push more drugs with or without the combination of sleep therapy. From what you’ve shared, it sounds like you may have already landed yourself somewhere in that cycle?

 

You’ve been given great advice from Aloha, Stacey, and 1966. Obsessing won’t produce anything but more anxiety, especially on those nights when you lay there and don’t fall asleep right away (which is going to be a very natural and common thing during withdrawal.)  For right now, I would suggest you try a slow approach to reducing the meds, as others have said, and work really, really hard to confront your emotional and mental reactions to the process.

 

I did not personally stick with it as my withdrawal and a loss of insurance prevented continued treatment, but I found that CBT helped me overcome several of my mental hurdles surrounding sleep. Another thing you might try is reading some of the success stories on here. You will find that many suffered through terrible insomnia, but I don’t think I read of anyone having to resort back to any type of sleep medication once they were recovered. Many say they sleep better than ever before.

 

Try different approaches to your sleep at night. Try the more manageable aspects of sleep hygiene, like a routine. Try resting with headphones on to relaxing music or ambient sounds. Lay on your couch or favorite chair at night if you need a change of scenery. Others and myself included have benefitted from altering their sleeping arrangements in this way, as sometimes the brain can come to associate the bedroom with insomnia and anxiety. Find ways to relax without the expectation of sleep, and you may eventually find yourself drifting off without meaning to.

UUUUGGHGHGHGHGH.  I'm not sure how I can do this!!!!!!!!!!!! 

 

To top it all off, when I was in the psych ward my wife informed me she wanted a divorce.  After 25 years!  She says my sleep problems make me unsuitable as a partner because I can't do my part in raising our 9 year old daughter (who is my world and I love more than anything).  She sent me an itemized list that was 47 items long listing all the ways I've let her down over the years. 

 

How much can one person take.  OMG.

 

UUUUGGHGHGHGHGH.  I'm not sure how I can do this!!!!!!!!!!!! 

 

To top it all off, when I was in the psych ward my wife informed me she wanted a divorce.  After 25 years!  She says my sleep problems make me unsuitable as a partner because I can't do my part in raising our 9 year old daughter (who is my world and I love more than anything).  She sent me an itemized list that was 47 items long listing all the ways I've let her down over the years. 

 

How much can one person take.  OMG.

 

I know that feeling. Me and my husband have been married for 22 years and it's been rough for him. He has it in his mind that since I'm showing improvement, he's not leaving. He knows it's the benzos. He just don't like me talking about it all the time. He don't think this will last a long time and I hope it don't because there is so much I want to do with him when this is over. Tell her you will do whatever it takes to get back to normal and this is all normal withdrawl and will pass eventually.

Stacey - I take between 7.5mg or 15mg of Mirtazapine every night, and I have been doing so for months.  It does nothing at all for me.  It's only the benzos or Z-drugs that put me to sleep. 

 

I'm extremely scared.  I don't want to end up in a straight-jacket being pumped full of anti-psychotics that have all sorts of side effects (like restless legs, OMG that is hell on earth).

 

The reason it don't is because your z drugs and benzos are dominating your sleep. At one time, just in January , I had just gotten off 30mg of restoril when I went into detox. I didn't sleep almost 12 days even with seroquel. I panicked when I got home and took it again. The mirtazapine wouldn't have worked for me either when I was taking all of that. It's just 3 months later and although I can't sleep without anything, the mirtazapine is actually working as I taper the benzo very slowly. If I miss too many nights of sleep (like maybe 2 nights) I hold the taper and take the mirtazapine. I usually sleep all night..I've slept 12 hrs before recently. I was doing like you back when insomnia first hit me. I went into full blown panic and kept waking my husband up. I couldn't help it. It just took over. I was freaking out bad! Now, I just lay there and if I don't sleep, I get really mad, but know I will the next night.

And trust me, I know this sucks to high heaven because I don't know how much more I can take either but I keep a sleep journal and what all I took. It's obvious it's the benzos messing with my sleep and I can tell I'm on the right track just by how much I used to take verses what I'm taking now. I slept 7 hours on this in January:

                        9:00 melatonin 5mg

                        10:00 restoril 30 mg

                          10:00 Amnitriptiline .25

                          12:30 1mg xanex

And slept 12 hours on this two nights ago:

                              .11 klonopine

                                5mg mirtazapine