Back With a Bang

I am practicing cognitive-behavioral therapy with my psychologist, and it helps me handle my emotions. MS involves such ups and downs, it can be overwhelming. Right now my MS is on its way down.

I am having trouble sleeping. That began a month ago, at the same time as I had an increase in pain. Causal relationship? I am not sure. I suspect there is something underlying both problems, not that pain is causing the sleep problem (pain increased a day or two before the sleep problem showed up).

I have had incredible, mind-bending pain in the past and not had trouble sleeping. That makes me think that the pain is not the root of the sleep problem, but I cannot be sure.

My neurologist advised me to increase my tramadol, and he prescribed Ambien. I did not want to take it! I tried diphenhydramine (Bendryl, Sominex) first, at 50 mg, and it did not help a bit.

My sleep problem is that it takes me much longer to fall asleep than usual--a couple of hours instead of a few minutes. If I focus really hard, I can fall asleep after about an hour. The problem seems to be something like attention. My attention wanders, I think about things (not worrying, just thinking), and I forget that I want to sleep. I am exhausted, but I forget to sleep. If I can remember long enough and keep thoughts out of my mind, I can fall asleep.

If that were the only problem, I would be fine. I go to bed early enough that I have plenty of time to sleep even if it takes longer to fall asleep.

Unfortunately, it gets worse. I wake up every hour.

When I took 5 mg of Ambien, I experienced no change in my sleep. I tried it for two days.

When I took 10 mg of Ambien, I slept 4.5 solid hours, then I was up every 30-60 minutes.

Upon waking, I can go right back to sleep within five minutes. So I get a total of at least seven hours of sleep, but it is not restful sleep. I have done a lot of research on sleep since developing this problem, and I learned that I am probably not getting past level 1 or 2 of sleep. I need to get to level 5, which is REM sleep.

I feel like I am getting some rest, but not enough. It is not as bad as when I have been on steroids; I sleep about four hours and then stay awake the rest of the night. Then I am a zombie. I have been a zombie sometimes in the last month, but mostly I am just fatigued.

Sometimes the fatigue is so bad I feel nauseated or dizzy, or I might get a headache.

After 10 days of the problem, after making sure my sleep hygiene was excellent, after realizing I had absolutely no control over the problem, I developed anxiety. And depression.

Many times I have wanted to die. Too much pain, everything too hard. I am still working, and it is surreal to feel the way I do and still get my job done.

Yesterday I developed new problems: weakness in my right arm and pain and tightness in my right hip. Sometimes my right hip is extremely painful and feels like it has a deep bruise. It is okay when I am resting, but it hurts when I move it. I know that I did not injure myself. As I stretch and use it, I get better, but it tightens up again if I rest. Catch-22.

I will do a post of a "Thoughts Log," which is one thing I learned to do for my psychology homework. I want to get out every possible anxious thought. I want to sleep! I will do anything that might possibly help me sleep.