Monday, December 3, 2007

Why Is It So Hard To Sleep When I'm So Darn Tired?

So how come I'm bone tired by the end of the day and barely able to keep my eyes open, but as soon as we turn out the lights it's like I'm wide awake?

And it's not that I'm napping too much, because it's actually worst on days that I get up to see Ellie and Scott off and end up staying up all day. Thank goodness I don't have too many days like that. ;)

But seriously, I can be totally worn out, eyes at half-mast, but when the lights go out, my brain starts churning. I have imaginary conversations with people I need to talk to but haven't lately. I write blog posts and emails in my head (and unfortunately forget all the details when I get to my computer the next day!).

It's kind of like I can't turn my brain off.

I have tried taking Ambien and a newer sleep drug ... Lunestra? Something like that. They don't really help much. I don't benefit from Tylenol PM because the sleep ingredient is essentially an antihistimine and I've been on constant allergy medicine since early childhood so even massive doses of those don't make me sleepy.

I cut caffeine out of my diet in 2001 when I was dealing with chronic stomach ulcers, so it's not that. (Ok, I didn't completely cut it out of my diet; I still eat chocolate occasionally when I can't resist or am PMSing, which I guess is redundant.)

A big part of the problem is my pain levels. Even a pretty good dose of narcotics just brings my pain levels down to tolerable, it doesn't make it go away completely. It's very difficult to find a comfortable position to sleep in, even though I use at least four pillows for support, and sometimes more. (And when I do find the perfect position, I inevitably need to get up to pee and lying back down exactly the same as I was before won't work again.)

If you have any good suggestions, I'd love to hear them. Either comment here on the blog, or email me, please!

1 comment:

Sherril said...

I blogged my answer: http://theiciexperience.blogspot.com/2007/12/response-to-sick-mommaa-blog-post-why.html.