Published on 12, July, 2020
My sleep pattern is all over the place. It always has been, since I was a child. I feel tired so I go to bed and I either can't fall asleep or I fall asleep but wake up within an hour and then the rest of the night is a write off! When I'm awake after the first hour I try to sleep but I look at the clock and it's only been ten minutes and the rest of the night goes like that.
I used to lay there and try to sleep, I read online about how doing things keeps you awake but not doing things makes no difference so I stay up now and listen to music. I'm as active at night now as I am during the daytime, I feel tired, but not overly tired.
I feel like I should be more tired than I am. The biggest downside is that I feel worse mentally than I used to but other than that I don't get any adverse effects. Except for constant yawning and digestive problems, like chronic belching.
Ok maybe I do get some adverse effects
I don't know what to do about this though. I've always had trouble with my sleep since being a child and it's worse now I'm an adult.
My constant anxiety doesn't exactly help either. I looked it up online and read about fatal insomnia and now I've got that running through my mind. Curse me for going to Dr Google!
I've tried everything with my room and bed, new pillows, new bed, blackout curtains and my sleep hasn't improved so I'm not sure what to do from here.
I'm open to any advice you may have and thank you in advance.
I have found a really small dose of beta-blockers, propanolol 2 x 10mg a day, is really helping with anxiety. After a long life time of constant anxiety it is life changing. I too have always struggled with sleep, and it helps that when I do wake, I am not anxious. I do breathing exercises when I wake, usually up to 100 then down to 0 then back up to 100 etc. I also have poems and prayers that I memorise and go over when I wake, to relax. Finally, I have some meditations and hypnosis which I play. Often I fall asleep during these, but if remain awake feel that the time has been well spent. Oh, I have a specific book to listen to on Audible as well, which has a nice voice.....and also listen to rain on a noise (asmr) app.... plus use some herbal supplements occasionally, Kalms and Melissa Dream....If all else fails, half a small dose of zopiclone.
I hope you nail this one buddy, it is tough not sleeping.
Stay well
I actually managed this last night! I went to a brightly lit cafe in the evening with friends. I think I did fall asleep a few times as I noticed my vision going weird and everything feeling very far away and my eyes starting to close and had to jerk myself back awake but hopefully no one noticed. I found that digging my nails into my hands to cause pain helped to keep me awake. By the time I got home and fell asleep in bed it was nearly 10pm which is very, very, very late for me. I put on my ear defenders and slept right through until 4:30am, and then fell asleep again for another hour! This is so rare for me. I hope it will make staying up late possible for the rest of the week as I don't want to have to give up evening activities for the winter already.
I have the opposite problem, I love sleeping. It is my only time I feel calm and free. Nobody can make demands of me, I can be as autistic as I want when I am asleep. My issue is I hate getting up, can easily do 12 hours.
I can't remember the last time I slept properly.
It's been a long long time! I have CFS which doesn't help though.
Defos don't drink any caffeine before you go to bed I used to do that and it's a recipe for disaster lol doesn't help digestive issues either
I hope your sleeping improves for you ^^
Hello, like so many people here, I too have trouble sleeping and have tried so many different ways to get to sleep and to stay asleep but with variable success. I do find that after a bad nights sleep, I do get a few good ones so count that as a blessing and so tend not to worry about not getting eight hours of sleep. I take ten minute power naps and these help.
I have a difficult time with sleeping.
More often than not I can't sleep. I'm awake for most of the night, I think, because my mental health struggles at night and I'm extremely anxious which stops my brain going to sleep mode.
I've only fallen asleep once on the sofa, the trick is get up and do something else e.g. tidy the kitchen or read poetry on a dining room chair. To get up I still have an alarm on my phone but I've stuck it out of reach from the bed although I'm tending to wake up 10 to 15 mins before the alarm.
Joe said:Not go to bed until 00:30,
Do you not just end up falling asleep in places other than bed? That's what happens any time I try to stay up late.
How do you know when you're allowed to get up in the morning if there's no clock? It'll soon be (and was until the clocks changed) pitch black at 7am so how do you know it's not 2am?
I'm in the middle of trying a 6 week sleep programme to fix my sleep. I'm fortunate in that work is paying for it as it's normally expensive or you have to be referred by a GP. Jury is out at the minute, some things are helping though.
In addition to above tips from Profiler and Amerantin, I am currently trying the following:
All sounds a bit restrictive I know, there is a part of me rejecting stuff because of that but I'm trying to ignore that and give it a go to see if it helps. It does sound like it may be worth a trip to the GP, particularly around the digestive issues. I used to have Night Terrors and about 20 years ago they figured out this was partially caused by acid reflux so keeping that under control is also important for me.
I have had sleeping problems for decades. I often wake up at 4am and cannot get back to sleep for a couple of hours. The consequences can be severe, I then fall asleep at around 4pm without even realising it. In one of my jobs where I got fired, sleeping on the job was mentioned as one of the reasons for my dismissal. I often sleep between 4pm and 7pm , I can't help it, when I wake at 7pm I'm confused and I think it's morning.
I can fall asleep sitting up in a bright, loud room in the evenings but once I've slept for an hour or two any tiny sound (e.g. the clicking noise the thermostat makes in a different room when it detects a temperature below is minimum setting) wakes me up. I rarely sleep much after midnight for that reason, especially as my earplugs have usually fallen out by then and I've probably removed my ear defenders in my sleep. Antihistamines before bed help a bit.
You always have excellent insight which is also reassuring.
Anxiety is part of the over-excited brain. In fact, anxiety is just the other side of the coin to excitement.
All of these experiences come from brain that's making hyper-connexions:
nightmares, sleep paralysis and false awakenings
I might pop them under "Monotropism" https://monotropism.org/ Due to how they function, paralysis is popular with ADHD and Dyslexia as well - it's like a warp speed mismatch of firings, the brain is not being synchronised.
The other connexion here is the gut-brain axis. And this has to do with GABA receptors shutting down a brain that's accelerating beyond our control. They are also responsible for digestion.
In my family, no one thought any of us needed medication because someone will have had digestive issues and were troubleshooting massive problems, going on to work in physics or neurology. It's properly normal for those of us with potential for wild imaginations and the Montropic / hyper-connected brain-types to have nightmares and sleep paralysis. It doesn't make it fun, but I found further engaging my imagination with someone more powerful than the nightmares, even talking through them helped.
But what helped, was around 25, I started adding a mushroom supplement with immune boosting herbs to my diet. As my hormones began a noticeable change, I added a herbal balancing formula to that and a multi. This helped greatly even though at the time I didn't know why. I had better clarity, I was running a few times a week, I was sleeping well, there was less anxiety.
A few years ago I found medical papers supporting Autistic anxiety as biological and linked to gut-health. (There are entire families of foods I cannot eat or digest and if I accidentally do, juicing a few lemons can also help). As it turns out, Nootropics can really boost GABA. They work well with hormone & vitamin balancing and then those one off nights every few months where I cannot shut my brain down and it's 4am (it's usually a melody aggressively looping), I will take a quarter or half anti-anxiety medication (Never take this with grapefruit). Which really targets this specific issue with GABA.
Anti-depressants can actually deplete GABA and are dangerous for those with low blood pressure. Just a side note*
Hi Zengarden, what is sleep spray?
Have a curfew by not be on social media e.g. after 6.30pm
Do a word search or colouring
Read something funny
No caffeine
Sleep spray
Sorry about your sleep problems.
I've been in a constant state of burnout since my mum died and that's affected my sleeping. I'm exhausted all the time but I don't sleep well, constantly wake up throughout the night and when I do sleep I don't feel refreshed after.
So it could be you're suffering from burnout but then it could be one of those autistic things as sleep disturbance is a common occurrence for people like us.
Sometimes though things can affect you without realising it. I always make sure of these now.
My room isn't too hot
My room isn't too noisy from say the computer or a piece of paper rustling
My pyjamas are a good material that won't upset me
Outside isn't too bright for me from street lights
No caffeine during the evening
I have a glass of water in case I need a drink
My phone is fully charged in case of emergencies
Any one of these things can affect me so you might like to make your own list and see if anything resonates with you. It might help to at least giving you a better nights sleep.
Autonomistic said:It's also possible that the constant anxiety is a result of autistic burnout. Burnout is usually associated with exhaustion but can also present as a constant hyper aroused state
This is what happened to me. Sleep was affected. I was so overly anxious that I wouldn't sleep well again for another night in a row, it fed into a loop. No amount of relaxation helped, in fact it drew more attention to there being a "problem".
Everything you say above is correct.
To the OP I seem to remember this website offer some useful info with regards to sleep and autism https://embrace-autism.com/autism-and-sleep-problems-series/
embrace-autism.com/.../
It's worth considering L-Theanine supplements to aid sleep. I've been taking them for a few months (since they were recommended on here) and I can honestly say my sleep is much better. L-Theanine is a natural component of green tea that is supposed to help with increase GABA levels, reduce anxiety and aid sleep.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25759004/
I feel anxious all the time but for no obvious reasons, there's no trigger I am just anxious. Do you get that?
There is some scientific evidence that autistic people have reduced GABA levels and that can be a biological cause for high anxiety.
Like you I've experienced extremely high anxiety on a daily basis, very often for no apparent reason. When it's bad I wake up in a panic and remain anxious all day every day, no matter what I'm doing.
The issues I had with sleep when anxious all the time was that I was overly aware of every sensation in my body. I could feel every pulse, hear my blood flowing, etc. This was exacerbated, rather than helped, by mindfulness techniques. These effects also seem to have improved since I started the L-Theanine.
The problem is that once the body has lived with high levels of anxiety for a long time that sort of becomes the new normal operating state. I call it my baseline anxiety. Trying to take on more, when I'm already in a highly anxious state to start with, becomes far too overwhelming very quickly.
It's also possible that the constant anxiety is a result of autistic burnout. Burnout is usually associated with exhaustion but can also present as a constant hyper aroused state.
https://emergentdivergence.com/2023/05/12/creating-autistic-suffering-what-is-atypical-burnout/
I hope you find something that helps, as it is horrible living with constant anxiety. You are right that doctors don't understand. All they do is offer antidepressants, which make the situation worse in my experience.
The body can cope with lack of sleep in the short term but longer term it can contribute to all kinds of adverse health outcomes. Therefore you are absolutely right to want to address this.
Yeah I know what you mean! I've avoided so much that I'm basically a recluse trying to slowly rebuild and get myself back out into the world in small, manageable steps.
Yeah, I'm all too familiar with the physical symptoms of anxiety. They used to really scare me and sometimes they can still catch me unaware but I'm slowly learning to continue on while experiencing them. And it is slowly getting easier.
I heard on a podcast that a lot of people who have anxiety want to get rid of it altogether but you can't, because anxiety is a normal human emotion. That resonated with me as I've wanted rid for many years.
Yeah, make a list of pros and cons, see if that helps offer any clarification.
No problem at all I'm I could help.
Yes it’s definitely an autism thing.
I’ve always had trouble sleeping and for the last three years I’ve had chronic burnout so I’m exhausted all the time. I raised this with the people who did my autism assessment and they confirmed it’s likely autism related.
Apparently autistic people don’t produce melatonin in the same way as neurotypicals and that as a last resort my GP could prescribe melatonin. But before they would even consider that I had to sort my sleep hygiene out.
So,