Sleepless nights

[CoastalRealtor]

Hi! I am looking for tips that will help me shut my brain down in the middle of the night when I wake up. I am new to this group so forgive me if there are posts related to this already. Looking for meds that might help (melatonin and even NyQuil type meds do nothing for me). I love to read but once I start a good book I can’t stop reading. Any ideas that you can share that work for you? Thank you!

[WA_Mom]

Hi CoastalRealtor ! First, melatonin in large amounts can actually do the opposite. My naturopath says 1.5 mg is enough. NyQuil has alcohol in it and alcohol can impede quality sleep. Are you exercising enough? Mindfulness and meditation helps me a lot! Some people can meditate without help, but I like to use this app. Downward Dog Meditation. Practice good sleep hygiene, such as maintaining a regular schedule, avoiding screens at least an hour before bed, don’t drink too much coffee. Do you like to read? The two books that helped me the most were written by Buddhist monk Thic Nhat Hahn. “Being Peace” and “Touching Peace”. They are short books and simply reading them helps me calm my mind. As always, talk to your doctor or therapist. I learned a lot in DBT also. Best to you!

[StanleyThyroid]

Hi CoastalRealtor I have the same issue as you quite regularly, its also exascerbated by the need to go to the bathroom in the night. I havent found anything reliable but I would say the worst thing is lying there fretting but to get up and do something. For me it will be watching something on TV and keeping going until I cant stay awake. It seems that the ADHD brain doesnt shut off like others, but rather we have to be at the point of exhaustion, so many of the neurotypical answers arent that effective.

There is also a evidencethat historically the idea of waking was quite normal in earlier times so what you are experiencing is possibly quite normal. bbc.com/future/article/2022... . Changing your expectation may actually be helpful to reduce the stress of not being able to sleep

Magnesium is supposed to help, but I havent noticed the difference. Also if you take meds try and take them early

[STEM_Dad in reply to StanleyThyroid]

The article is fascinating. I found one about a year ago that talked specifically about the same practice in early America (pre-industrial America). But the article you linked to has a lot more info about what people did during that time.

I've read that magnesium can help, but I haven't tried it. (I know that magnesium is used for other things, like helping to moderate blood pressure. My ex-wife was a doula and apprentice midwife, and magnesium was used by her peers to help their pregnant clients lower high blood pressure to prevent preeclampsia. I think it also helps as a mild muscle relaxant.)

[STEM_Dad in reply to STEM_Dad]

I do know that magnesium is touted as an aid in treating stress, but I haven't looked into the research on this. Stress can elevate blood pressure, and magnesium is supposed to help maintain lower blood pressure, so that might be how it helps to reduce stress.

[STEM_Dad]

In the early morning hours, melatonin levels start to decrease and cortisol levels increase. This is part of the circadian rhythm, the body's natural 24-hour cycle.

Many people wake up during that time (which for me is typically around 2:00-4:00am).

Anecdotally, it seems that people with ADHD are particularly prone to lying awake for a long time in the middle of the night, sometimes until morning.

What I have found to make it worse, make it more likely that I won't be able to fall asleep again are the following:

• overactive* thinking (by this, I mean all the minutiae of random thoughts coming and going in my brain)

• ruminating (mostly, I mean the worrying type of rumination, but even the philosophic type of thinking about things that interest me will make it hard to settle down again)

• intrusive thoughts (random, potentially unwanted thoughts that capture attention and linger; negative intrusive thoughts are much worse, in my opinion, than neutral ones, because they can cause rumination)

• Stress/worry/anxiety (just by having any elevated anxiety levels will make it much harder for me to get back to sleep, even if my mind is relatively still and quiet)

*One contributor to overactive nerve stimulation is a neurotransmitter named glutemate. It's the most abundant and a highly essential one... because it's responsible for telling nerves to begin transmitting their signals. When it's too abundant (or when it's counterpart "stop signal" neurotransmitter, GABA, is not abundant enough) it causes the neurons in the brain to fire excessively. (According to research, this excess glutemate/reduced GABA imbalance can also contribute pain persistence, more frequent issues with restless leg syndrome or migraines, and even overactivity in the digestive tract. GABA is supposed to reduce such activity.)

~~~~~

Things that I've found don't help:

• Electronic stimulation (such as scrolling on my phone, turning on the TV, even listening to a person giving a TED Talk or a church sermon... which is ironic, because I'll admit to having had to fight off sleep during sermons in church many a time)

• Reading an interesting book (I have to make sure that if I read, it's something like the Bible, or some technical kind of material, not a novel or a book/article of my interest du jour)

• I think that taking more melatonin in the middle of the night doesn't help me

~~~~~

Things that I've found can help:

• Taking a GABA supplement (helps to quiet my busy brain, so that when I go wake up in the middle of the night, I can actually settle down to fall asleep again)

• listening to "white noise" or or "sleep music" (I play YouTube videos that I find by searching for "sleep sounds black screen" ... chirping birds keep me awake, so I have to be careful what "nature" sounds that I play)

• Prayer, meditation, and mindfulness (helps, but only a bit... I'm a person of faith, so prayer is my longtime go-to, but in recent years I've learned more mindfulness and meditation techniques which seem to help me relax more)

• Drinking herbal tea or warm milk, and eating a light snack

I've found that in the last couple of years, the one most helpful thing has been the GABA supplement. (Research is limited in the effects of taking a GABA supplement. Dietary GABA has been believed for a long time not to be able to cross the blood brain barrier, but more recent scientific inquiry is looking into whether there is a specific GABA transport mechanism. It's mostly anecdotal evidence that led me to try it. (I actually did the research to try to help my ex-wife, who has had insomnia her entire life, is prone to intrusive thoughts, has a history of migraines and RLS, and developed chronic pain and digestive issues in recent years...but she never tried it even for one night. Since I had bought a bottle, I started taking it, and it seems to help me most nights.)

{Note: Do not take a GABA supplement if you are prescribed gabapentin, as it might interfere with the effectiveness of the medication. It's advised to always consult your own doctor before taking any new supplement.}

[NotAChevy in reply to STEM_Dad]

As I’ve stated before, I try to stay off any additional meds, or supplements, so I use a process called brain dumping that works really well for me( pls see my post describing it better).

[PinkPanda23]

Welcome! For once, I read the other replies before I responded, on the off chance that someone else already gave you my tip. 🤔

I'm fortunate in that I don't have trouble falling asleep too often, or waking in the night, either. But when I have it, I could lay there for hours trying to use my mind to calm my mind. As you can imagine, the results were dismal and eventually I just passed out from exhaustion.

But I found something that works for me! I love guided meditation, and once I was given this method as a cool down technique after exercising at the gym.

Basically, lie flat and breathe deeply through your nose and exhale through your mouth 3-5 times. Once you have a rythm established, start at your feet and tense them, hold, and release. I've found 5 seconds tense, 5 seconds release works for me. Move up to your ankles, shins, knees, thighs, abs, torso, hands, biceps, shoulders, head, and face. After your face rest, tense your entire body at once for 5 to 10 seconds and release.

By the time I've kept my brain busy keeping track of which body part I'm tensing and counting, I've broken the squirrel committee's hold on my mind and can drift off in a couple of minutes.

By the way, I cannot take meds for my ADHD, so I use only these types of tricks to help manage it.

Hope this helps you, and anyone else reading!

[ArtsyBrain]

Hi CoastleRealtor!

I was a bit reluctant to post here as I am very new to this forum and have just been newly diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 67. (I always suspected I was because I had all the classic symptoms, but was never formally diagnosed until a few months ago.) I've struggled with severe insomnia all my life because, like you, I “can't shut my mind off.” I used to tell my mom, when I was in high school, that it was like trying to fall asleep in the middle of a party! When it was 3:00am and I'd been laying in bed for hours trying to get to sleep, and I had to get up at 6:00, I would often bolt upright in bed and plead with God to “Please, let me get some sleep!” Over the years, I've actually developed an aversion to going to bed, to the point that my wake/sleep cycle is totally reversed. So, obviously, I haven't resolved the problem yet, but I thought I might share some of the things I've tried that have or haven't helped.

First off, stay away from NyQuil and any medication with alcohol. I started taking NyQuil in college for insomnia, which seemed to help...until it didn't. Then I graduated to taking shots of whiskey, which worked even better, until I became way too fond of it and started using it for other (many other!) situations and became a full-fledged alcoholic in rehab just two years later. I've since learned that women can become alcoholic MUCH faster than men, especially if we're using it to try to cope with other problems like depression or generalized anxiety, which I was. I personally will also avoid any powerful sedatives or “sleep medicine”, like "Ambien". Besides the potential danger of addiction, I've also heard horror stories of people sleeping for days after taking one or, worse yet, getting up and going about their day with no memory of it later (what we alcoholics call “black-outs” and they're very scary!)

Counting Sheep: Forget it! I tried this and realized it wasn't working when I got up to 300 sheep and was still wide awake.

Focusing on my breathing. As an asthmatic, that's the last thing I want to focus on.

Progressive Relaxation? All this did was made me more tense, and by the time I reached my upper body, my lower body was already tense again. Also, as a person with body sensitivities, who has to cut those irritating tags off all new clothing, it just makes me more aware of every little wrinkle in the sheet, itch, or other discomforts.

Meditation: Maybe I was doing it wrong, but it was that “clearing your mind” that was the problem in the first place. My mind would still wander and go off on tangents.

That said, here are some things I have tried that sometimes work for me (none are fool-proof):

I seem to be able to get to sleep faster if I feel I've “accomplished something” before turning in, otherwise I feel like the day isn't over yet, and I keep ruminating over things I've got to do, want to do, wish I could do, or have done and wish I hadn't, etc. So I try to make sure I've “completed” something, anything, to top off my day before going to bed. But, like you, I can end up reading, or working on a project, all night before getting to a “stopping point”. So if I can break my task up in smaller increments beforehand, or commit to reading just ONE chapter of a book, or one episode of my favorite streaming series, it helps.

I will sometimes make, review, or add items to my “to-do” list right before going to bed, so I'll know exactly what I need to do tomorrow and don't have to think about it. And if there's still something keeping me awake, I'll get up and add it to my “to-do” list.

Here's a radical idea... if you've been laying in bed for hours trying to sleep, get up and do something. One time, I was obsessing over an idea I came up with for rearranging our living room. So I finally said, “Oh, for Pete's sake!” and got up. There I was at 3:00am rearranging furniture. But I slept like a baby after that! Sometimes I'll get creative ideas for poems, song lyrics or art projects, but worry I won't remember them in the morning. So I'll turn on the light and write them down. I've already written an entire song or poem at 2:00am. I figure, better to lose a little sleep doing something productive than to lay there for hours “trying” to sleep. And I typically fall asleep faster afterward. If it's a complex project, just the act of writing out the steps needed to complete it may suffice. Sometimes, even just adding it to my to-do list will help me to mentally let it go of it until the next day.

Sleep with pet. No, I'm not kidding. I have a theory that Chihuahuas (or probably any small dog or cat) emit a kind of natural tranquilizer through their skin because holding and/or petting them always makes me sleepy! There's just something about having a small (or large) furry friend, who absolutely adores you, cuddled up to you in bed, that will bring on instant relaxation!

Here is, perhaps, a rather bazaar mental exercise I do that's almost sure to put me to sleep fairly quickly. Since my mind tends to race and wander, thinking about a million things at once, I give it something specific to think about. I pick a certain time or event in my life and try to “re-live” it in my mind. For example, I try to recall, in detail, every pleasant memory I have, starting with the very earliest one. For me, it goes back to the age of three; What did our house, my bedroom, the kitchen, our yard, the neighborhood, look like at that time? And I get very specific; What colors were the bathroom and kitchen tiles? How was the living-room arranged? How did it look, and feel, with a Christmas tree and presents on Christmas morning? What about that kitchen table I used to dance on without my mother knowing? And my first memory of school? Visualize them in detail. Try to recall the sounds and feelings as best you can. It seems to silence much of the other "noise" in my mind, and I'm almost never able to get past a certain point before falling asleep. Be sure not to pick a traumatic time or event that might trigger stress, though. I was once working with what I thought was a relatively benign, or even pleasant, event, when I suddenly began to feel panicky without knowing why. So I had to turn on the light, re-orient myself in reality, and “switch the channel.” This may be a form of “guided imagery”, “meditation”, or even “self-hypnosis”, but since it's something I discovered on my own, I don't know.

And remember that when you're laying there in bed trying to get to sleep, you're in good company. There are many more of us ADHD friends out here trying to do the same! Sweet dreams!

P.S. Sorry about the long post. This is my first time here, and it was a topic near and dear to my heart.😉

[Colorfulme2020 in reply to ArtsyBrain]

Welcome ArtsyBrain! Glad you are with us. I haven't checked in with this group for SO long but came back because of this insomnia issue. I am so glad that you brought up the alcohol as a sleep "remedy " that, as you found out, doesn't work. But, like the typical alcoholic that I am I kept drinking at night anyway. That eventually turned into drinking through the night. And I'm sure you know the rest of that story! This was all before I was diagnosed with ADHD. Now many of my destructive behaviors make sense to me. Obtaining knowledge and understanding of this diagnosis has helped to keep me sober and out of shame. Thank you for sharing your experiences, we all learn from each other and through trial and error.

[ArtsyBrain in reply to Colorfulme2020]

Thanks for the feedback! Nice to meet you! Yes, I'm sure there are a lot of alcoholics who started by using alcohol to deal with insomnia. I used to know a guy who was addicted to Robitussin. People don't realize that NyQuil, and many other "nighttime cold medicines", are usually 25% alcohol. Like you, getting an "official" diagnosis of ADHD actually came as a relief to me. And when I found out that people with ADHD are more prone to addictions, it made sense as to why after quitting drinking, I took up "compulsive spending"... which I'm still struggling with.

[BrighteyedADHDer]

Hey, this might be a bit contradictory. But something that really helps me is to not have to shut my brain off. Because there is nothing more boring than telling my brain it has nothing to do and go to sleep. I manage to fall a sleep listening to a story or watching monotone YouTube videos. So that my brain does get some stimulation, but also gets to unwind. Like I said this really helps me, but is very contradictory compared to the general sleep methods. But it might work for you, that is why I am sharing.

[Colorfulme2020]

I love that you brought up the "contradictory " methods. I have been to sleep specialists and read copious amounts of literature about sleeplessness throughout the years. I have tried in earnest their recommendations of property sleep hygiene but could never embrace all of the methods (BTW, I hate the words "sleep hygiene"). I wonder if any of the research has been done with ADHD subjects? Does anyone know? Because I am sure that I am not the only one who has failed in this area. So much of the information (in my observations) deals with the mind letting go of stimuli. What you found out is that it is even more stressful to let go than to embrace the fact that our overactive brains are continuously looking for stimuli and giving them just a trickle helps to soothe. Like a cell phone that is expending battery life always searching for a signal. Thanks for your input!

[OldIndigoBlue]

I've mentioned ASMR here before, and I still use that at night sometimes to get to sleep. It's a vast field, tho, and you have to find which ASMRtists "work" for you. I find watching people silently doing art is very peaceful. I've used ASMR for about 8 years now? So I've got my favorite people to watch, but I also have found that I tire of one particular type of video and move on to something new (ADHD trait of course). I also take magnesium - in several forms. I use a magnesium chloride spray on my arms; I take magnesium taurate (but I've just started that and can't yet comment on efficacy), and I take an anti-migraine supplement that also includes magnesium. I think that helps too. I've found meditation to be problematic for me - folks here have mentioned how difficult it is for those of us with ADHD to "silence the mind." I'm a big fan of the School of Life books many of which are in very short "chapters" and I find reading those peaceful as well. These things don't work consistently, but they are worth a try... let's hope we get some good sleep at least once every ew days/nights!!

[ArtsyBrain]

Another thing I forgot to mention: I always have to sleep with a rolled up T-shirt over my eyes because the slightest bit of light, even the LED "on" light from an electronic device across the room, will keep me awake! The little bit of weight on my eyelids also seems to be helpful.