I’ve been struggling with sleep issues for over a decade now. My Doctor has prescribed me all sorts of medication, all of which has had many adverse side effects. What I do know that works, is Xanax. My wife was prescribed it for some stress issues and occasionally will give me one so I can finally sleep. Obviously asking my Doctor, “can I have Xanax” Will not go well. I’ve eluded to it in ways and the response has always been along the lines of “that’s habit forming, I’d rather you try this”. Of the many medications prescribed, none have worked. Resorting to the dark web is something I’d really rather not do. Fentanyl laced drugs took my sister and it’s a road I hope to not have to explore. Any suggestions?
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Wow. I just want to say thank you for such a thoughtful, informed, detailed response. You are an amazing person!
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Thanks so much for all this. I only intake caffeine, marijuana and alcohol. Going to start weening myself off coffee for sure and I’m always trying to minimize the other two. Going to spend some months this summer relearning how to live.
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Alcohol used to wreck my sleep. I’d come home, dog-tired at 7 PM, have a few (and a few more) drinks, look up and 6 hours had passed.
I ended up burning out, and having to quit both booze and weed. It was the best thing that ever happened to me. Along with all the obvious health, psychological and financial benefits, I sleep amazingly well now.
Apologies for giving you a boring canned answer when you are sleep-deprived and looking for help. But I swear these things really helped me.
Number one: think about getting a sleep study done by an actual sleep doc (pulmonary doc or neurologist). This was life changing for me. Don’t go to a chiropractor or whoever the fuck and get a CPAP machine.
Also, and this is important: Have you looked into tips for “sleep hygiene”? None of them are a quick fix like Xanax, but they can be powerful when used together.
These include things like:
- going to bed and getting up at the same times every day. this means getting up at your normal time, even if it’s a weekend, even if you didn’t sleep well that night, just make yourself do it
- when sleeping…making sure the room is dark, cool, and quiet (ear plugs are a big help here). by cool, I mean 68-69F (about 20C).
- cutting way back on caffeine and/or eliminating it…and absolutely no caffeine after lunch (the older we get, the longer it takes to metabolize caffeine)
- not looking at any glowing screens (TV, phone, computer, tablet, etc) before bed time… for at least 15-30 minutes
- avoid eating / drinking a couple of hours before bed time
- using your bedroom only for sleeping and for sex
And when you have trouble sleeping, it’s a very good idea to get out of bed, go to a different room (one that is not too bright) and do something boring like read a text book for 15-20 minutes then go back to bed and try again.
When we stay in bed and aren’t sleeping, we’re training our brain that it’s OK to do that. You want to beat it into your subconscious brain that the bed / bedroom is for sleeping.
And I should have included exercise. The best sleep I ever get is when I get in a really good amount of exercise during the day. I won’t lie to you, I’m pretty lazy about it myself. You don’t want to do this close to bedtime, either. Go for a really long walk / jog / whatever in early afternoon if you can squeeze that in somehow.
Seriously. Nothing puts you to sleep better than 10 hours of hiking.
Obviously that’s unattainable most days, but I struggle with insomnia all my life, and one of the things I look forward to most from backpacking trips is the restful call of sleep when I “actually” feel like I “need” it.
Thanks for the advice. There’s definitely some stuff here I can try. I have a stressful computer job so cutting back on caffeine makes sense along with several other tips you mentioned!
I hope you find something that works. Not getting sleep is the worst!
100%. It’s all I look forward to these days. I know that fact in itself is a huge problem though.
Also the exercise thing. I find that when stress from the computer job is likely to keep me awake, a fast walk before bedtime is enough to help smooth that out
Definitely need to exercise more so I’ll give this a shot, thanks
A few things to add to this great list:
Magnesium supplement before bed. They’re not all the same. Don’t just take a pill. Get one of the proper powdered ones magnesium citrate or threonate. I really like this one.
Also, pod casts and audiobooks. I use headphones and turn the volume down just far enough so I really need to concentrate to hear the words.
Thanks!
Caveat: doctors will only let you have a sleep study if they suspect sleep apnea. Other sleep studies that capture off-the-wall sleep disorders don’t seem accessible, at least in my local health system which is a Catholic-run local monopoly. Perhaps HCA, or Kaiser, or others may have a different philosophy.
This is not universal. I have average US insurance in Colorado and my GP sent me for a sleep study after we tried just a few things for my insomnia.
I wasn’t aware of this. That is discouraging. I think there are like 30-something sleep disorders. Though apnea is extremely common. Some insurance plans will also push hard for an “at home” sleep study first, which is fine if you just need a CPAP machine. But it’s no bueno if you need someone to monitor you and hook you up to all those Star Trek devices like they did to me.
To add to the ‘canned answers’ here is one more:
As non medication, Magnesium has a muscle relaxation effect. With a big cup of water before going to sleep it could help falling asleep. (Tho make sure you are using the right kind of magnesium pill that actually gets absorbed into the body)Magnesium threonate cured my insomnia, it’s fucking wild how well it works. I’d tried everything until I discovered it, from melatonin, to antihistamine sleeping pills, all the way to downing 350ml of whiskey every night just to force sleep.
Magnesium works better than every single thing I’ve tried (but you HAVE to let yourself fall asleep when you feel it starting to work.)
Thank you! Today I learned. (I’m usually kind of skeptical about supplements but what I’ve been able to find supports what you’re saying here).
Don’t know if you tried this. The only thing that stops me from sleeping is my own brain
I have really terrible insomnia too. Then I tried my friends Pregabalin, and oh boy. Never had such a restful sleep.
It is a bit habit forming, but if you keep it to just before bedtime it’s a wonderful sleep aid, and much less risky than Xanax.
It’s not without its risks of course, and some people are better with it than others, but might be worth asking your doctor about. They prescribe it for almost anything where I’m from.
Pregabalin actually has the opposite effect on me, it wakes me up so I take it in the morning. It also gives me some pretty bad withdrawals if I miss a dose by more than 24hrs. I’m only on 400mg and it’s one of the few drugs I’ve been on that actually help with my depression, so not bashing it, just sharing my experience. :)
eta: it’s been a long time since I’ve tried taking it at night, I’m going to try it again and report back. Maybe I’ve been missing out on a cure to my whack ass sleep this whole time
update: nah it actually didn’t make much of a difference for better or worse. I’m glad it helps for some people though!
That’s fair, I have also heard that effect happens to some people. I should also mention when I used it for sleep I tried to use it very sparingly, and never try to exceed much higher than 150mg for sleep. Otherwise higher doses get too groovy for me haha
doc doesn’t want to perscribe you xanax because xanax will stop working and this fucks up many other things in the process
Ahh ok. That makes sense, while it works great, long term it doesn’t seem to be a solution.
It’s a really bad solution honestly. Benzo withdrawal can kill you and it’s extremely habit forming. Especially if you’re using it to treat insomnia, finding a way to stop taking it is gonna be tough.
No solution provided, just giving some caution and saying that using Xanax to sleep is roughly equivalent to getting drunk to sleep. Both affect your GABA receptors and both are habit forming and dangerous to withdrawal from.
I don’t have an answer and it may not apply to you but Benzos like Xanax are dangerous man.
Like it was nearly the end of me, yet I still get nostalgic for them. Be careful is alls I’m saying.
I hear you. I have addictive tendencies so it probably would backfire.
Honestly if this helps I was wasted on Xans one night and ended up falling in a canal alone and was terrified.
I threw away my stash, not knowing you should taper and can die just stopping.
What proceeded was a week of me lay in bed unable to eat but starving, twitching like a crack head at any movement, insomnia, shaking, sweats like nothing else, panic attacks and just generally wanting to die.
As I said before they feel that good that I would probably have been back on them if I didn’t stop going on the DarkWeb and falling out the loop with marketplaces.
I know it must be hard with your sleep issues, even more so as doctors are not keen on prescribing sleeping tablets due to the addictive nature of them, but I do hope you find a solution that works.
Finally I hope you don’t think I am lecturing you, just really wanted to stress how hard benzos are.
That said if a doctor prescribed them to you then they would manage any tapering off when it was time to come off them.
Good luck.
Are you seeing a family doctor, or a sleep specialist? You want the latter, and a sleep study.
The classes of drugs that might help are imperfect at best, I’d be partial to a benzo before e.g., Ambien or related, given the inherent risks of sleepwalking and worse with those drugs.
I’m going to do a sleep study this summer. I have some months off so my plan is to focus on health and wellness.
Good choice, and as hard as it is, trust the boring “drop caffiene” and bedtime advice. After a few weeks your body will acclimate to the timing, too. Honestly though, the best thing for me is a long weekend backpacking trip. After a day or so of strenuous hiking, and a terrible first night sleep, it’s like your body sees the sun set and is like “I’m done”. Can really reset your clock.
Thanks! Definitely going to ween myself off coffee this summer. Finishing up an edit gig now and it’s all that keeps me cranking
Do not hop on the xan, your doctor knows what they are talking about.
Go camping together. Nothing fancy, just a weekend at a park with a small tent and backpacks.
Let your team know you’ll be unreachable. Once there, phones off. No working. Just walk and talk, rest and eat, explore your surroundings, focus on what and who is in front of you.
You may not sleep well on night 1, but you will on night 2, especially if you covered some ground that day. The morning after night 3, however, will be the most well-rested you’ve felt in a some time. The effect carries to subsequent nights, then eventually wears off, but can give you the chance to restructure your days for better sleep in the long term. Use as needed.
I’ve been meaning to go to Yosemite and see the redwoods, maybe it’s time for a road trip!
What, specifically, have they tried? Did you try trazodone? I don’t think Xanax is the solution you think it may be even though it worked for you.
Is the issue falling asleep or staying asleep? Do you have an idea of what prevents you from falling asleep? What do you think about when you’re in bed falling asleep? What is your natural sleep cycle timeline? In other words, when do you naturally get sleepy and if given no restrictions, when would you wake up? How is your sleep hygiene (really, not just what you tell people)?
Do not, I repeat, do not go in there asking for Xanax or you will be labeled a drug seeker permanently. A doctor is not going to give you Xanax for this, full stop. They’re going to ask all of the above questions and try other avenues first. If they suspect an anxiety disorder they will move up that avenue and you may need a benzo but you have to be under care for a while and basically prove you’re trustworthy.
I have massive sleep problems too but you don’t have enough information in your post to give any other advice other than the standard sleep hygiene stuff you’ve already been told.
Trazadone was pretty intolerable with all the dry mouth side effects, plus it didn’t really help sleep a ton. I have a lot of problems with stress and anxiety. From a stressful job, to an insane family and some horrific life shit that happened over the past years. It’s tough to get my mind to stop racing sometimes. I’ve depended too much on substances in the past to manage it, and I know that probably means something habit forming may backfire. Honestly I’m always tired, but at times I’ll just lay there, tossing back and forth. Without restrictions, I can normally sleep from about 10PM-6AM, that seems to be the pattern for this point in my life. I’ve recently tried to start going for a hike at sunrise and that did help. Going to get back to doing that soon.
I know it feels tangential to getting a good night’s sleep when you haven’t had one in a long time, but if you have access to therapy consider making an appointment. Any one of those would be worth time with a therapist, and mental wellness definitely affects your sleep quality. This isn’t to say it’s all in your head or your fault you can’t sleep or anything like that, just that your mental health is as important a contributor to your wellness as your physical health.
I’ll definitely consider it again. I’m not a people person and find it extremely hard to trust people. But I also don’t talk much and things just end up festering.
All therapists aren’t the same, if you don’t click with someone after a session or two that’s completely a valid reason to dump them and try a different one. I know it can be disheartening if you have to go through a few, especially when getting to the point that you’re in therapy to begin with is already so much work. But from personal experience I would say it’s definitely worth it.
Be sure to bring up that you have a hard time opening up and trusting people, it’s definitely relevant to why you’re there and it’s a pretty common problem to have when seeing a therapist. Any good therapist will be able to help you find strategies for ways to work around it, like writing things out ahead of time if that’s easier for you.
It sounds like you’ve had a hell of a rough time with it, I hope you get some good rest and healing soon.
Thanks for the advice, have a good weekend
This. Anxiety has a lot of solutions now but a medical doctor (as opposed to a psychiatrist) probably isn’t the place to get them. A simple combo of things can work minor miracles. Good luck!
Thanks
So I have some experience with this and have a few things I want to tell you:
Consider a dedicated sleep study. If you have sleep apnea, medication will not fix your problem and some medications may actually make it worse.
Xanax (an anxiety medication) and Ambien (a sleep medication) are very similar drugs with respect to their mechanism of action. Xanax binds to a specific group of receptors to cause anxiolytic effects and happens to also make you sleepy. Ambien binds to a subset of those same receptors to make you sleepy, but don’t have the strong anxiety reducing effect. If Xanax works for you, Ambien should theoretically have a similar effect. In practice, it doesn’t tend to work as well because anxiety can keep you awake. If that has been your experience with Ambien, think about taking some steps to address anxiety even if you don’t think it’s that bad. Yoga, counseling, meditation, whatever. There are also guided breathing audio sessions designed to put you to sleep in apps like Fitbit and calm that may be helpful.
You can also supplement a prescription sleep aid with something non prescription, which is what I do. I take Ambien, and to keep my dose low I supplement with melatonin, tryptophan, and valerian root when I need an extra kick into sleepiness. I’ve heard CBD is also quite effective for this. Magnesium reportedly also helps with restful sleep, but get a sleep formulation because magnesium in the wrong form causes diarrhea.
Don’t underestimate sleep hygiene. For a long time I had the attitude of “I have real sleep problems, basic stuff like cutting back caffeine is not going to help.” The thing is, when taken together, that kind of stuff actually can help tremendously. I scheduled a month where I went hardcore on sleep hygiene. Strict caffeine limits, no late caffeine or exercise, don’t do anything on your bed but sleep and sex, wake up at the same early time every day even when you don’t have to, limit screens before, bed… I mean ALL of it. I found that it actually really helped. In combination with medication it might be a life saver. Might be worth doing your own experiment with it.
Good luck!
Thanks for the advice! I have a few months off this summer so going to dedicate that time to relearning how to live, hah
Yeah it’s hard to help because you didn’t go into the nature of your sleep issues, but I had wicked bad insomnia for about 2 decades and sleep great now. CBD/weed helped immensely as well as getting a white noise machine.
Edit: also look up binaural beats and try delta waves. You’ll need a good set of over the ear headphones and you need to just lie in bed in the dark playing it. You can also try yoga nidra, which if you haven’t heard of it is not actually yoga. It’s a form of meditation that you do lying in bed that can help with falling asleep.
Here is my best suggestion and it is serious. NO CAFFEINE after lunch. Period. No naps. Go to bed early every night at the same time. Wake up early to start your day. Drink lots of water every day.
Als, your bed is for sleeping (and sexy times). No phones, no tv, no distraction.
Sometimes when I’m sleepless for few nights, what I do is workout, try my finish my work for the next day and get myself really tired. Also try to calm your mind before going to sleep, too many thoughts can keep your brain active. Also try changes mattress, blankets and pillows ( the shape matters as well as the material ).
Thanks for the advice. I definitely need to learn how to calm my mind. Going to take a meditation class or something along those lines.
Music also helps me. Try Lo-fi music. Use any music player app with a timer. A good pillow was a game changer as well.
I get anxiety and have sleep problems too. My good friend gave me some of the cbd thc gummies. I take like 5mg and sleep great. Eventually you build up a tolerance, so for me, every 4 months I take a week off and sleep like shit to reset the tolerance and I’m good to go again. I don’t know if it’s a legal option for you, but it’s a game changer.
SoCal here. We have all the weed, thanks for the tips
