Hello all,
I know this is a very old thread, but as it's one of the only things that comes up for people who have our problem, I though it's useful to keep everyone posted.
Like everyone here, I was confounded and shocked by this sudden ailment, back in late August. Out of nowhere, I was suddenly stricken, unable to fall asleep at all. Every time I would just be drifting off, a powerful surge of adrenaline would shoot through my whole body, forcing my heart to race and wake me up, sometimes with a sense of not being able to breathe. This would happen over and over and over, all night, until the sun rose. By the third day, I really feared I was going to completely lose my mind. A truly horrifying experience. It really felt like my body forgot how to fall asleep, and I was going to die from it, or spend the rest of my life like this, a zombie. I had never had any history of anxiety or panic attacks or anything of this nature, so I had no idea what was going on.
Finding this thread was one of the things that gave me at least some hope, if only proving that I wasn't just losing my mind and that this was a real phenomenon, so thank you for everyone who posted here.
After three days of no sleep, I drank the better part of a bottle of Whisky just to force myself to pass out (which worked!) I woke up massively hung over, but it was just a relief to have gotten some manner of sleep. After that I tried every over the counter sleep aid to no effect. Melatonin, Walsom, etc.... all did nothing. As many people on here have said, you almost develop a fear or dread of trying to sleep, which only makes the cycle worse.
I went to the doctor but they could find nothing wrong physically. At first they only prescribed Trazadone, which didn't really have a strong effect. After much urging, they finally prescribed Ambien. I know the risks of addiction are strong and all that, but it was the only pill that truly worked. One of those, and I was out like a light in 15 minutes, with no side effects. It wasn't until I had Ambien that I could sleep through more than one consecutive night in a row, so to anyone at the end of their rope, I would try that as a temporary solution.
I was wary of the long term addiction effects though, so I began switching to Trazadone some nights, and eventually tried weaning myself off of them. The first night I slept without any meds I thought I was cured, only to have it come back the next night. A sleep study told me to try a CPAP machine, but I found that experience so horrible that I couldn't use it for more than 20 minutes; just wasn't for me. Actually, the experience was so bad that as soon as I took off the CPAP, I fell asleep normally, without meds. I honestly wonder if it shocked my body back to its normal state. But from then on, about November 9, I could sleep with no issues again, and I'm now completely back to normal.
So the entire experience was about 2 months. To any of those stumbling upon this thread as I did, and being terrified of being stuck with this problem forever, I can only offer you some hope that it will pass. I can only say what worked for me, using ambien/trazadone in the interim until your bodies rhythms go back to normal. Still have no idea what caused it, but I'm back to my old sleep habits, so try and hang in there!
