Anyone else suffer from insomnia?
I've reached the point where I've got to admit it. It's not just trouble sleeping. This has been going on for years, and it affects my daily life. I'm basically drunk at work due to the sleep deprivation, and as my job is being a teacher, this has repercussions. I'm not as sharp as I need to be. I can't lead as effectively. I'm unable to motivate my students to the degree that I need to. Sometimes I'm just a fucking zombie.
Looking back, maybe I always had it. As a kid, I'd hate school because I'd always have trouble getting up. Mostly because I'd have trouble sleeping in the first place. I remember in middle school I'd just listen the radio all night because I couldn't sleep. Come morning, I'd be passing out on my desk from exhaustion. It affected my studies, among other things.
When I first left the U.S. for work five years ago, it hit hard. In China, in a different place, with different beds (they're HARD!) and different air and time. I mean, I can't sleep on planes. I can't sleep in cars. I've only rarely slept on desks. I can barely sleep in beds, and generally not in ones that don't belong to me. But China was the turning point, and I put it all to the fact that I was just stressed with starting out as an English teacher.
But it kept up. And it stayed with me back in the States, soft mattress or not. And by the time I arrived to Korea, it mutated. Once a month I'd miss a night of sleep. Then it became biweekly. Then my entire sleep structure depreciated. I became used to sleeping four hours a night. Six would be a good night's rest. I'm utterly dependent on coffee.
I abstain from sleep medication because I know I've got an addictive personality. I know the moment I pop the benzos or whatever tranquilizer the medicinal dealer throws at me, I'll need it the rest of my life. Worse, I'll probably like it. Alot. Too much. So I just try to relax alot before sleep.
Last night I slept for three hours. This time, what woke me was a nightmare. I get them a lot. I enjoy them. At they're best, they're horror films for me to sit back and experience. Sometimes, I even use them for fiction ideas. And frankly, when I'm able to draw inspiration or even plot from my nightmares, when they work for me, they work damn well. I won't go into the nightmare too much. Suffice to say it involved molestation, a possessed doll and possible cannibalism.
Do you have insomnia? Tell me your stories. How do you deal with it?
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Well I hope to encounter the story those elements inspire!
I always had a bit of trouble sleeping, I started listening to audio books when going to sleep (things like your podcast lol!) I am not sure how much it ever helped me sleep, but it helps me not think so much about not sleeping, which some nights is half the battle.
It is so frustrating how your mind builds habits, and even when factors that had stopped you sleeping are removed, it is just too used to doing that. I am sure you already try telling yourself all kinda of wonderful twisted tales. I have found repetition to be really helpful. I do exactly the same things before bed every night, in the same order. I say the same things when I say goodnight, I even try and think the same sets of thoughts as I am getting ready for bed. It drives other people round the bend, but sod em, it helps me sleep. I also move things in my room depending on if I can lie in or not, things on the windowsill that affect light levels seem to work the best, and it helps me not wake up earlier than I need to.
That said, I now take pills for migraines that affect my sleep, they don't feel in any way good, and in some ways degrade the quality of awesome-scary-dreams-where-bad-shit-happens-but-this-isn't-a-nightmare-cos-I-love-it. They do make it easier to sleep despite the myriad of downsides, but I wouldn't recommend them. It is amitriptyline, I really didn't wana give in and take it, but migraines send me into my own dimension and it was becoming a problem at work.
Then there is weed, always sleep better with a bit of that, but travelling and teaching that can't be much of an option. Have you tried magic mushrooms? Not that they help you sleep there and then, but they do seem to help more long term, you don't want enough to trip balls (or maybe you do lol), you can even do a dose or two in really small amounts. It is something you can do one time, somewhere it is legal, and feel the benefits for months after.
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your migraines are a medical issue. no bullshit, take the medicine to fix/cope with them. no moral question of purity!
I've thoroughly enjoyed mushrooms, et.al. back in my 20s. I've had the good and bad trips from psychedelics. In my experience, mushrooms were much smoother than the 'LSD' I took. Enjoy responsibly.
What are your migraines from? A genetic thing?
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It is more the long term effects of taking the tablets that puts me off - I really hate that I now also need them to sleep, so every time we try and change the dosage around, I don't sleep well for weeks. No idea what causes them, nothing on scans, I find it a bit disconcerting popping pills to hide something without knowing the cause but it is the lesser of two evils.
I have friends who swear by the long term sleep cycle benefits of 'topping up' every couple of years with a mini-trip, but it may just be an excuse, one that could also work for you lol
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I have a difficult time falling asleep it can take hours. If I want a good night's sleep I have to factor that in. I really am a bit jealous when people can just lay down and are out after 15 minutes. Once I am asleep I can usually sleep 7 hours unless I'm interrupted. I'm a night owl so this has played havoc with me in my life getting up on time to go to work. It seems my natural window would be from 2am to 9am to sleep, but that doesn't suit most corporate jobs that expect employees to be to work earlier. I get nightmares when I nap sometimes especially if I'm overtired. The themes usually revolve around me failing at something, or loss of something important to me, I'm guessing it's a kind of guilt over napping when I should be doing something more productive or engaging during normal hours with normal people.
I've never taken sleep medications either. I'm like you for all your reasons. Sometimes I might take a hit on some weed, and that took trying different kinds to find the right effect. Some cannabis has psychedelic effects which I personally do not want while trying to sleep. haha I prefer really mild stuff with just relaxing effects.
It's cool you are able to draw some inspiration from your nightmares but I gotta say I do feel for you and hope someday you get a full rest just for your health.
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Same. If I had a different job, maybe my sleep would improve.
I've never been able to nap.
I think if I had some weed I'd be able to relax more (supposing its the right blend). I miss it alot. South Korea is super harsh on weed and they compare it to shit like heroin. Hell, if I went to Canada and smoked weed and came back with THC in my system, it would be the legal equivalent of smoking a blunt in front of a police officer.
Fuck I could use a joint...
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A flexible job would be nice for sure. Have you ever perused writing full time as a career? Of course it's very disciplined but I do think one of the perks is the working hours are less structured. It's hard for me to nap too, at least properly, I always end up going 2 hrs when "they" say 20 minutes is the ideal.
Oh wow that's really harsh about S Korea! Dayaaammmn...
Welp, you could always move to California where it's legal. There's a 33 percent Asian population in the Bay Area if that is your expertise with teaching and I'm certain you could find work in such a fast growing tech environment. However it's insanely expensive to live here.
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Ya my brother lives in LA. Such an expensive place.
My dream is writing and getting paid for it. Teaching English is less my expertise and more a way to make a living. I'm trying to finish editing a scifi book I wrote and begin the shitty process of finding an agent for it.
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Editing for yourself must be a challenge I would imagine? I've always heard one should have a separate editor, but I suppose that's costly. Finding an agent sounds like fun to me though, I get the Writer's Digest newsletters and they give a lot of tips on how to do that. I don't think getting rejected would be fun though ugh
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rejections part of the process. the trick is to no longer give a shit about anything. I'm editing it as a writer. If you get an agent interested in the manuscript, the next step is editing it another round before sending it to prospective publishers.
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i have hereditary insomnia. It comes in cycles. the longest period of not sleeping was a week and i started hallucinating it was fun-not ... I was on the phone with a friend it was the early 1990's and i saw a train drive through my bedroom ...i said to my friend i know it is not real but there is a train with graffiti a meter away from me passing through ... sleep meds are not a solution as they do not put you through a full sleep and regenerative cycle. the only time i take something is if i hit the 7 day mark . But thankfully that has not been for a while . i have come to learn to sleep like a cat though 2 hours here ...one over there ... it is a brain chemistry thing and fun fact often comes with an high IQ ... joy .... there are something that help but they are hard to implement with a common world carrier and life :( I wish I had more positive stuff to say :(
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No worries. I feel the real effects of this and I know the reality of it. You're hallucination stuff is terrifying.
Sleep meds knock you out. Yeah, they can't replace full REM sleep. If I didn't have my mandatory work schedule, I think I'd be able to split my sleep up and catch up with what I've lost.
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<3
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I cannot tell if I do even have insomnia, but I might as well develop one that will be a facsimile of such. But often what I do to combat this facsimile, and I often confirm this with my friends who do suffer not sleeping right but may not suffer from insomnia:
Though a wild and surrealistic example, atemporality does often paint history as such to be such: a random and disconnected points of history that had no scale of time involved and was just... there. And it's no wonder that as Neo Liberalism hit the block, we got an explosion of insomniac cases. Maybe it is true that politics and the economy play hand-in-hand while making the Social Being of a person, for insomnia often plays and screws the structured sleep schedule of a person, thus making the waking and sleeping phases feel uneasy. Which is perpetuated by Capitalist Realism's atemporality being the guiding principle of passing one's life and the economy enforcing that, lest one want's to be in debt to overcome that enforced principle out of their life.
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This one helps me the most. If I don't work out, I get ancy as shit, having slept the night before or not.
I really think capitalist discipline is the biggest cause for me. If I could just have the freedom to sleep when I naturally felt like sleeping, not giving a shit about work, I think I could eventually find the right 'time' for my brain.
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Yah, the discipline coupled with atemporality makes life confusing and always anxious of what is to be done in the next second.
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It's more like I'm bad at falling asleep, meaning I alone deprive myself of sleep. What you have, on the other hand, in juxtaposition to my own doing, sounds unfortunately worse.
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Have you tried meltonin?
It helps me greatly, I work sporadically, sometimes all night, sometimes I'm at work at 4 am.
So I feel you on the sleep deprived thing.
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yeah but its not easily accessible in South Korea. Whereas the shit is in gummy-bear-form in the States, I have to see a psychiatric specialist and get a prescription for 10 pills, which altogether will cost about $40.
any medicine outside the government approved list is not subsidized and is therefore more expensive.
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