The Sleep Demon

Hi @Decadian,

Like you, I know the 'rules' of sleep hygiene but find them very hard to successfully put into practice. I've been naturally inclined to being a night owl since childhood, as was my mother (and still is at age 80). I have a diagnosis of bipolar, which is very well known to have sleep disturbance as a common feature. I believe my mother may have had the same condition throughout her life without a diagnosis, as she shows other major symptoms as well. My father displayed strong 'jekyll and hyde' characteristics, which may also be an indicator of undiagnosed bipolar. Mental illness including bipolar has been diagnosed in several of my cousins. In short, it seems to run in our family. I'm a believer in genetic factors being very significant in long-term mental illnesses such as mine, as well as learned behavioural aspects. I don't think everything can be explained as 'just bad habits', which one of my psychologists suggested.

Over the past year or so I've been struggling to get my sleep patterns in more regular order. Prior to that, I had spent several years very often in a 'dusk until dawn' living pattern. At the worst stage of my bipolar depression my body clock slipped completely out of synch with anything and I never knew when I would be awake or asleep, losing track of time, day and date. At one point I was sleeping up to 20 hours per day during several particularly bad months after I'd broken down out of yet another of the many jobs I've had in my life.

That's pretty extreme sleep disturbance and has very negative effects on basic functionality in life. I have gradually managed to (mostly) get myself into bed earlier and earlier as the past year has progressed, so that I'm usually in bed by midnight-ish, a vast improvement on where I have been. However the problem that has arisen since then is that I find I sleep in mostly 3 hour bursts with long wakeful periods between the next session of sleep. This is where I am now. I find it simply impossible to go more than one day without naps if I've only had three hours sleep the night before. This is partly due to having chronic physical illness (crohns disease), which has already sapped my energy levels over time. Another part of it is that the medications I take for bipolar just have me falling asleep in chairs when very low on energy, as I am for big chunks of almost every day.

So that's the story about sleep from my end over about the past eight years. I think it's better to occupy ourselves in positive ways when not sleeping than simply lying angst-ridden in a bed trying to force ourselves to stay there when we can't sleep. Having said that, I do get 'naughty' with things too and don't help myself with the sleep routine in various ways. But I find it hard to be the mental health 'saint' some practitioners seem to expect us to be. Just because we are told and know what are the 'best practices' for our condition, doesn't mean we are able to put those things into effect. It's hard enough for 'normal' people to behave like mental health saints, let alone those of us with diagnosed mental illnesses that tend to toss us around beyond our control at times.

Thanks if anyone has read this far down on this endless post. To me it's a very interesting discussion @Decadian has raised.

@Decadian and @Mazarita thanks for kicking off this discussion. As is obvious from my times on Night Shift I have pretty extreme sleep problems for the last couple of months and have had such periodically for many years. Last year I had a few months of sleeping well and I was a different person but unfortunately things didn't stay that way.

I do know about sleep hygeine and practice most aspects of it. i.e. going to bed around 10.30 pm most nights, no electronics in the bedroom unless I occasionally need an alarm and put it on my phone, winding down for a while with a routine before bed, trying not to nap during the day. My weakness is getting on the desktop computer in the lounge when I've already tried to go back to sleep for a while. I've noticed that recently they've added to sleep hygeine that it's not good to lie in bed not sleeping for more than 30 minutes, but better to get up and do something quiet, maybe have a warm milky drink, then try again to sleep in a while. I find coming to the forums at those times stops my thoughts from accelerating too much. I've been having an average of 4 to 5 short (1-2) hour naps overnight and often less and am well aware that if it goes on for too long it could trigger hypomania for me.

So I have short periods of doing mindfull breathing with my feet up during the day to refresh myself, resisting falling asleep if possible. For some reason I've been finding it hard to get into reading (have spent hours a day doing this most days for the last several years), mindfulness colouring or other activities I previously enjoyed lately. But I do find these forums really fulfilling and it means a lot to me that I am feeling so much less alone and able to give support as well as receive it.

My Dr has also just changed the dose of one of my meds in the hope that it will help so I'll see how that goes. No change yet.

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@Kurra wrote:
I have a lifetime history of requiring very little sleep. This was the case even as a newborn.
I have always managed to function well despite an average of 3hrs per night without any naps during the day.
In February this year I was started on an ssri principally for its effectiveness on anxiety. For the first time in my life I am now sleeping 7hrs or so each night without waking up.
The amount of energy I have each day is nothing short of a miracle as is my capacity to cope.
I'm very happy with this change because I also appear to have attained a degree of stability I would never have dreamed would be possible.

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I've had sleep issues for a while now. And I really struggle with getting enough sleep and waking up throughout the night. As a very young child or even baby, I was most definitely a night owl. I would often wake up just before midnight and I really didn't like getting out of bed in the morning- I would often be late to school in kindergarten and have my midday nap in the afternoon.

I'm interested to know what medication you are on @Kurra , I'm not sure if we can talk about specific medication here, but I think if I could get a decent about of sleep, I think my depression would improve.

Another thing that I find useful was getting the morning sun because it helps reset the body clock, and another way is to try to wake up earlier each morning to correct your sleep cycle. I'm also not good on the sleep hygiene and I need to have my laptop in bed with me. Last night I was able to fall aspleep quite earlier, and to me thats another postive sign that I am improving slowly

Yeah It was me that thinks of it as the "Sleep Demon" now. I personally had struggles for years and then dealt with my son's difficulties. We went to the RCH sleep clinic but they really said beyond basic sllep hygeine rules we have to reset our internal clocks .. which I knew and had been trying day in and day out for years as a parent.

The Night Shift thread was a real saving grace for me .. as it stopped my obsession with it (Sleep Demon) and I could relax and do something social .. chat with Maz or Peppi and now lots more great people. I think it was a necessary thing for me to go through a period where I just enjoyed being up again instead of controlling myself or being hard on myself according to rigid time schedules. Back to bloody orphanage living.

Yep ... great thread topic @Decadian

I hear you @Former-Member!

Thanks Everyone for your replies

I have had a headache - something like a migraine - all day after a bad night last night - I think I wrote the first post in this thread early this morning

Yes - we all know about Sleep Hygiene - but how boring that is - I refuse to toss around in bed too - and think the Sleep Police on various TV shows are like the larger-than-our-tummies-used to be police are out there too.

Hey - Thought Police - we already know if we have a bizarre sleeping pattern - or our shape isn't as "shapely" as it was or we would like. No one needs to tell us

My headache has lasted all day and I am off to bed - but I wanted to let everyone know how much I appreciated everyone's comments - and I will back to this in the morning.

Unless the Sleep :Police give me a hard time - ah dear - those rules are so boring!!

I'm going to bed right now -

Decadian

Hi everyone.

I am lucky with sleep. Apart from the occasional bout of insomnia that will last a week or so, I am usually asleep 2 minutes after my head hits the pillow.

I have an imaginary box in my bedroom. I put all of the day's issues and tomorrow's concerns into this imaginary box, and I close the lid. All the issues and concerns are therefore kept safe, and I can rest assured that they will be there for me in the morning...

An untroubled mind tends to find its way to sleep much more easily than a troubled one...

When I was in my teens, 20s and 30s, I was very much a night owl. I did most of my best work and writing in the wee small hours of the day. Getting me out of bed before 9 or 10 am was... problematic to say the least...

Now, I get to sleep at 10:30 - 11 pm most nights, and my waste management system wakes me at 6 am most mornings... hahaha...

@Kurra was a big influence on me being very careful to manage my sleep, as lack of sleep tends to send me hypomanic... her advice helped me finally let the night owl fly away...

One thing I would like to introduce is the matter of blue light...

Light at the blue end of the spectrum of visible light is very important for keeping our body clock, our circadian rhythm, in synch with nature. It helps to regulate the biochemical soup in our brains, and all that jazz...

Artificial light does much to throw our bodies out of whack. And now we come to it...

There's blue light shining from the screens of our laptops, tablets, phones, computer monitors and televisions whenever they are switched on. It is my considered belief that too much staring at screens could be doing us more harm than we think...

I welcome your thoughts on this interesting conundrum...

Usually I get enough sleep - but yesterday was strange and I didn't sleep well last night either - though I know I got some sleep

I have heard about the blue light issue - there was something on Insight a couple of weeks ago and I so understand the argument about sleep. I have a trick that cuts out the blue light from the TV - I run a movie with good music and have the other lounge chair between me and the screen - and I often fall asleep listening - I grew up with a fantastic thing called a radio in my bedroom - and listening - great idea

So I know I got some sleep last night - or early this morning - but I felt tired and miserable until I drank a strong cup of black coffee - not a habit of mine - but I don't want to fall asleep today - not until night-time anyway

Still - I think worse than being up late and doing things that interest us is lying in bed thrashing back and forth and getting all twisted up in the doona and losing pillows to the floor and getting up and being a part time night owl anyway. It's only my opinion but insomnia is only something that happens if people are worried about it.

I hate having a bad night - doesn't everyone - I would hate to be the only person

However - when we get to the bottom line on sleep hygiene - in October 1971 everyone put their clocks forward at 3.00am and we were all disturbed regarding sleep patterns on Monday morning - not Sunday but Monday - because people go to work mostly on Mondays.

People made all sorts of complaints when we started Daylight Saving - and - still - after all these years it takes me a week to adjust. When this came to stay back in the early 70s - did anyone consult the Sleep Police.

I am having a not-so-good day - please pardon my griping

Decadian