Strange sleep pattern, but it works

[November Girl]

For a week or two now, I alternate between sleeping about 12 hours a night, and 6 hours a night. But it's all good sleep! It beats the heck out of 8 or 9 hours of half sleep every night. This really isn't a lifestyle management thing, except that with our crazy bodies it can sometimes help to just go with the flow.

There's one thing I've noticed that will guarantee poor sleep. If I get way outside my energy envelope, especially mental energy, my brain can't rest that night. Sometimes I'm in the middle of doing something, and just don't want to stop. And sometimes I sit up very tired, but too exhausted to stand up and get ready for bed. So I sit and play solitaire forever on my computer. Not very smart! :thumbdown:

 

[ahimsa]

I'm firmly in the camp of whatever works for you is a good thing.

There's one thing I've noticed that will guarantee poor sleep. If I get way outside my energy envelope, especially mental energy, my brain can't rest that night.

I have a similar problem, but for me it's only the physical over-exertion that causes poor sleep. In particular, anything that aggravates my NMH symptoms (e.g., standing, sitting at the computer too long, heat) really messes up my sleep. So, if I rest all day, and stay cool, then my sleep is better. A few days in a row of this kind of resting (which I do only rarely - it drives me crazy to do so much resting because I really want to make some sort of contribution rather than making my husband do everything!) and my sleep gets almost tolerable (only 4-5 awakenings during 8 hours of sleep instead of 11-12).

Another observation that seems to confirm this NMH-sleep link is that after I started midodrine, a drug to help with NMH symptoms, my sleep improved. And since the drug has completely worn off by the time I go to bed (it lasts only 3-4 hours, and you are warned not to take it too close to sleeping to avoid problems with blood pressure going too high while lying down) then any effect must be an indirect one, not a direct one. In other words, the fact that midodrine helps reduce my daytime symptoms from NMH is what helps to improve my sleep. I talked with my doctor about it after I first started taking the drug and she agreed that this was probably true.

There are several web sites out there that mention sleep problems in the list of symptoms caused by NMH/POTS . I just wish more doctors know about all these complex autonomic system problems. It's sad that the one sleep specialist I visited had never even heard of orthostatic intolerance. Not only that but she was completely uninterested in learning about it, did not even look at the Johns Hopkins handout that I brought, just handed it back to me. Sigh.

 

[November Girl]

ahimsa, I've been paying a bit more attention since your post, and I see that pushing my NMH does make the sleep worse. It also stresses the brain, and makes me more likely to feel mentally tired & do something stupid like stay at the computer for all hours instead of going to bed! I'll take a look at the POTS section here and see if I can pick up some more pointers in controlling this.

ps - funny to think that most people would have no comprehension of the phrase "pushing my NMH" implies. i'm glad to have someone to discuss this with!

Too bad my doc back in the 70's didn't even want to hear about the symptoms. I wonder how much worse my ME is today because the only advice I received for years was that "I expected to feel too good" and that exercise would increase my stamina and energy. (It didn't)

 

[taniaaust1]

. If I get way outside my energy envelope, especially mental energy, my brain can't rest that night.

I get the wired thing too as far as mental energy or even pushing myself physically and my brain can end up getting wired.

Another observation that seems to confirm this NMH-sleep link is that after I started midodrine, a drug to help with NMH symptoms, my sleep improved

Since a doctor has prescribed me meds to try to help the POTS, my insomina has been much better. (I thou dont know if it is due to the POTS med or if it is due to a couple of other changes made around the same time).

I do believe thou that doctors are really missing how sleep issues can be caused by these things and hence treating these conditions may be the way to treat the insomina in some. I dont even hear our ME/CFS specialists talking about considering these things causing issues as far as sleep goes.