Sleeplessness

I have never been much of a sleeper. I was always the kind of person who would stay up late and wake up early. Even as a child I didn't sleep a lot. I rarely took a nap, even now, in fact, I rarely take naps.

My first bouts of sleeplessness came in April of 2007. I lost my job and I think that was a big part of it, because in reality, I could stay up until 3 or 4 am and not have to wake up early so I wouldn't. My whole sleep cycle was out of sync. I was on unemployment, had gotten a nice severance package and didn't have to worry about finding a job that quickly, so I spent my days watching Lifetime and Oxygen, did a little consulting in HR and that was about it. For some reason, that is when I started to lose a lot of weight too. I trained myself to not really need the sleep. Seriously, how much energy can one use up sitting on their ass watching tv all day?

The problem is, once I tried to get myself back on a normal sleeping schedule, I couldn't fall asleep at a decent time. I would force myself to wake up early, but then I still couldn't fall asleep at night. There were some things going on in my life at that time too, which is generally called "stress", so a lot of nights I would just lay in my bed and think about that stuff too. No job, problems with my long distance boyfriend, wanting to move out of Cleveland, no money...the normal things that keep people up at night I guess. I was just getting plain frustrated after about 3 weeks of being out of work. I was trying to find a job locally, but also trying to find a job in New York, the place I always wanted to be, but I was running out of money going back and forth for interviews and was not finding anything at home. I just felt stuck, so I am positive that had a big impact on my sleep.

This was also the time where I got into the on-line psychic scene. More on that coming soon.

Sleep...one of the worst feelings is not being able to sleep. Laying in bed, waiting for the daylight so you at least have a reason to get out of bed. There were nights where I didn't sleep all night. This lasted about 4 months, then all of a sudden, I was able to sleep again.

My present "sleep issues" have been going on since March. I was in a new place, new state, new city. Everything was falling into place. I had a great job, was close to my boyfriend now, living on my own, waiting for that moment where I would be engaged to him and planning our lives in my head.

Something happened on March 17, 2008, which again, I will get into later, but since then, I haven't been able to sleep. Again, I have had nights where I didn't sleep all night. The problem now was, as opposed to before when I had this problem, is I had to go to work all day. So there have been days where I have been awake for 30-40 hours with no sleep whatsoever. This is the time I started taking the sleep medications.

I started out with the simple OTC unisom and that type of stuff. It did nothing for me, so then I got a suggestion from a friend to try melatonin, which is an herbal sleep aide. That worked better for me and even now, I switch on and off with my generic tylenol PM. I tried herbal teas, relaxation, meditation...I would take any advice anyone could give me....I still will, because I still have the issue, though with my pills, I can sleep now.

I did finally go to the doctor and was given Lunesta, which is a God send, unfortunately it is too expensive for me to take all the time. That was the best sleep I had gotten in a long time. I fell asleep quickly and woke up without that "hung over" feeling that I get often with the melatonin or generic tylenol PM.

I just think back to the nights I would be awake all night long and crying because I couldn't fall asleep. That can just be a terrible feeling. Silence...darkness...wide-eyes...the only sound being the hum of the fan on my laptop. Willing the night to be over and praying for the first light of morning.