I’m still waiting for my trial of medications to help me sleep.. tried DayQuil as that usually knocks me out when I’m sick, nope I’m still up, it’s 1:38am I feel wide awake and not sleepy. I didn’t sleep the night before either besides an hour of sleep from 5am to 6am right before having to get up since I couldn’t sleep after that and had work at 9am so had to get up at 7am anyways. Last week I didn’t sleep for two days straight. I probably had less than 10 hours of sleep this past two weeks.
I work with special needs kids and it’s been rough staying focused. And have to drive 30 minutes to the clinic and back to see my clients while also supporting the therapists.
I’ve struggled with this since I was a kid. Always took me forever to fall asleep and in a light sleeper, and wake up to use the restroom frequently and struggle to fall back asleep or don’t and just lay in bed.
The only time I did get good solid 8 hours of sleep was when I was traveling for a few months state to state with a truck and an RV when I took a break after working for 10 years straight in the field.
Thankful I don’t have kids, but also sleep with two noisy snoring dogs and a husband who snores. Now we’ve concluded having to sleep in separate rooms.
I’ve tried melatonin worked first two nights and then nope.
I use to take 150 mg of Trazadone that helped but then doctor said I wasn’t suppose to be taking it every night due to loss of memory later down rhe road. But I already and have had bad memory. I rather get sleep. Dropped from full time to part time for work so I don’t have insurance. But now paying for another service to trial sleep medication as it’s starting to effect my mood and work again with lack of sleep.
This sucks.
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DangLifeisHell
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Doctors really need to look at what the long-term impacts of sleep deprivation cause. Possible medication side effects are nothing in comparison. Although I do recommend avoiding the antipsychotic class as sleep aids if you can find any other option or stay with only a low dose. Long-term negatives are practically guaranteed with seroquel and related medications that doctors were frequently prescribing for difficult to treat sleep disorders. Otherwise practically nothing any doctor will prescribe has more potential for harm than chronic sleep deprivation. One doctor pointed out sleep deprivation is used as a torture technique. Sadly he went back to the military before helping me any. I've rarely met another doctor that realized how big of impact reduced sleep can have on your life and health.
It's named "day"quil because it contains stimulant related compounds meant to keep you alert and functioning through the day and absolutely nothing that should be sedating. If it ever actually worked for sleep it was because it helped some health issue that is preventing sleep. It's merely Tylenol, a common decongestant, and the main ingredient in Sudafed. It would treat pain, improve breathing, and whenever an alerting substance helps sleep you should consider the possibility of ADHD.
NyQuil is designed to help sleep. Although these formulas are pointless as only a sleep aid because you don't need the extra stuff in them unless it's treating another health issue. It is the doxylamine in NyQuil that is sedating. It's an OTC antihistamine with the strongest tendency to cause drowsiness. It's even sold as an OTC sleep aid as unisom and similar names in the US.
Respiratory issues while sleeping and chronic pain are fairly simple to determine. Everyone with chronic sleeping difficulties should have a sleep study done. At minimum it will rule out obvious things like sleep apnea.
Mild ADHD often goes undiagnosed and even severe ADHD was frequently misdiagnosed in the recent past. It is still frequently missed in adults because they've learned how to cope with the obvious symptoms. Some may also have some of the same genes that impact dopamine function but not meet diagnostic criteria for ADHD. They often get diagnosed with some of the secondary disorders that frequently appear with ADHD. Including sleeping disorders like delayed sleep phase syndrome.
ADHD nearly always comes with sleeping difficulties. Trouble falling asleep, light sleep, and a shifted circadian rhythm causing you to sleep better at a later time than the average person. ADHD also often causes the opposite reaction to many medications and a failure of sedatives to help with sleep. I was taking amitriptyline, Seroquel, gabapentin, flurazepam, and when it first came out belsomra all together to get any sleep. I rotated amitriptyline with trazodone sometimes but found it triggered sinus inflammation. It also has a tipping point where a higher dose has a different reaction and greater risk of interaction with other medications. Usually around 100mg the effects change instead of of becoming more sedating and side effects become more common. That greatly limits how long it can be effective because as tolerance builds you hit a maximum useful dose or tolerable side effects quickly. It is a med with dose dependent effects and many doctors fail to realize that.
If sedatives aren't working at normal dosages and things that should make you more alert cause drowsiness it is worth investigating the possibility of ADHD or if dopamine enhancing supplements and medications actually help even if you don't meet ADHD criteria.
The most obvious reverse or paradoxical reaction is to stimulants or anything that raises dopamine and norepinephrine. These are called stimulants but in the brain they actually help with memory, concentration, decision making, increase tolerance to stressful conditions, stabilize mood, and help the sleep/wake cycle function. There are as many down regulating or calming receptors for dopamine as there are alerting ones.
A lack of dopamine has nearly identical symptoms to high dopamine. The difference with low dopamine is usually memory, concentration, motivation for required tasks, and sometimes excessive emotional reactions. Otherwise both high and low dopamine will make you alert, seem energetic at times even if sleep deprived, unable to sleep, not restful sleep, unable to start or finish required tasks you don't like doing, and less likely to stay on one topic in conversations.
It's potentially easy to test. Get some OTC l-dopa and see if you sleep better or worse. This will usually only work after your normal bedtime. Sometimes even caffeine will increase the odds of sleep and have a calming effect.
Part of the reason I was diagnosed with ADHD was I gave up on the "sleep hygiene" suggestions that never worked and after 10 years avoiding it I started drinking caffeine again. I felt less restless sitting at my computer and then I realized a specific quantity of caffeinated soda if I hadn't fallen asleep by 3-4 am would knock me out. Downside was that I then woke up needing to pee but I was able to go back to sleep immediately so it still gained me a few extra hours of sleep some nights. Switching to dopamine enhancing supplements like l-dopa and l-tyrosine(may cause headaches) had a less dramatic but similar effect without the problem of increasing urination.
I ditched all the sedatives taking 2 years to taper some and soon was put on prescription stimulants. Adderall turned out to be a far superior sleep aid in low doses to sedatives. At night I now take clonidine er, whichever orexin antagonist I can get cheapest that month (belsomra, dayvigo, quiviq), and hydroxyzine. Then adderall during the day.
Merely supplementing dopamine will not work for everyone with ADHD or those with some of the genetics that alter dopamine in the brain. For some there is too much of a problem with dopamine and norepinephrine transport or receptors. Stimulants or extra dopamine may still cause the same effect as it does in those with normal dopamine function because it gets stuck in the nervous system or other parts of the brain and doesn't go where it needs to. In that situation there isn't much for OTC options or experiments that might help with finding the right treatment. It requires unique prescription medication to treat the issues with neurotransmitter transport. Such as clonidine.
Took Melatonin did not work that well - first started with 1 tab, 3 mg, then increased to 2 tab. I also took magnesium glycemate with it. 2 hours before sleeping.
Now some one told me to take citrazine and am taking it. I should not be doing so but it helps to some extent. It is OTC pill.
At night when i dont get sleep i do the following breathing exercises ...
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Worsening sleep. Help!
chronic insomnia for 19 years 
What aspect of sleeping do you struggle with and how much sleep do you get on average per night?
still struggling with machine and mask 
