Sleep Problems

Hey everyone. Been away for a while. Busy and doing alright so you know how that goes. Everyone disappears when they're in remission. I tried keeping up, but just got too busy. I'm still doing alright, knock on wood. My only complaint right now is I'm having trouble falling asleep at night. I feel exhausted all day and it doesn't matter if I take a nap or not during the day, I can't fall asleep at night. I've tried making myself stay awake all day instead of taking a nap if I have the option, but it still doesn't help to fall asleep later. I know my iron is probably low, my doctor told me I could take some at my last appointment, but I keep forgetting. That would help with my fatigue during the day though. I just don't know what to do. Even if I feel completely exhausted at 10:30, by the time I finish brushing my teeth and putting my pajamas on, I'm wide awake again and spend at least 2 hours trying to fall asleep. Then I wake up in the morning and feel like I could sleep for days.

I have Young Living Essential Oils and I have the "sleepy time" blend in my diffuser right now, don't know how well it's working. I also put some lavender lotion on my hands. I've also tried the whole turning off electronics an hour before, but no luck. I'm comfortable and my room is a good temperature for sleeping. I think the lights outside my front door don't help though. I live in an apartment and outside every door are like porch lights that you can't turn off. I shut the blinds, but I can still see some light. I could try melatonin maybe. I just don't know what else to do. It just doesn't make sense to me that I'm completely exhausted all day and then when it's finally time to go to sleep, I can't sleep. So frustrating. Help!

Whoops I forgot to say I take the Melatonin at night usually around 10 PM

I always have my fan on. I could try Benadryl. Forgot about that. Been having some allergy fun anyways.

I suffered from severe insomnia in my 20's so I feel your frustration. Have your obgyn check your hormone levels. I know my insomnia was worse during pms.

The thing that helped me the most was keeping to a strict sleep schedule. Reargardless of how sleepy you are, always get up at the same time even on weekends. No naps. And to bed at the same time. If you do this for a week or 2 it will reset your internal clock. And cut out sugar and caffeine.

You may look into sonata to help the first week. It's a mild prescription sleep medicine. I had zero side effects and never felt hungover.

Good luck!

Those are actually textbook anemia symptoms. What medications are you taking?

I would work on normalizing iron and folate levels. I'm not sure if melatonin will help much if the root cause isn't addressed.

You could try the following: enriched foods like pasta, bread, legumes, gentle iron supplements. Make sure to follow up with vitamin C after eating non-heme and heme foods.

My iron is always a little low too and I've had insomnia since I was a kid but I had a very stressful childhood and that continued on under different circumstances of stress as I grew older, so as far back as I can recall I've had insomnia, the only thing that's helped me is either sleeping pills which I didn't want to become dependent on since they will stop working from over-use, or marijuana, which works very well for me and there's no side effects like with sleeping pills or an issue with using it every night like with sleeping pills.

You could try natural sleep aid from a health food store, that might be helpful.

Hi mcfarl73,

I have crohn's colitis since my early 20's and developed IBS-C about 12ish years into having constant flaring with my crohn's colitis (CD affecting the colon continuously, on and off in the rectum) I had terrible eczema when I was a kid (looked like flesh eating disease it was so bad) and a terrible mother that was verbally and physically abusive which is likely partly why I developed the severe eczema (plus she wouldn't take me to the doctor for a long time after it got out of control and they tried to give me antibiotics in pill form which as a 10 year old was scary to try and swallow what looked like horse pills and that didn't go over very well, so yeah a lot of stress and poor care...but my mom ended up developing UC a few years after I got sick with my crohn's...needless to say she was a huge detriment to my health both physical and emotional/mental.

I totally understand where you're coming from (I hate the smell and the taste of mj) I only did it a handful of times when I was a teen but I like smoking cigarettes so I smoke my mj with my cigarette...I recently applied for medical and just waiting for the approval to go through, with medical I can use the kief to cook with rather than smoke if I don't want to smoke it and they can flavor it so that smoking it won't be as gross with the taste or smell apparently and they can give me a script to use for during the day with no THC so I won't get the mental high but for bedtime they can give me a script with the mental high and make it strong or weaker depending on the circumstances I want to use it for as I just explained. I don't mind having the mental high when I go to bed cuz I fall asleep so quickly when I smoke it before bed mainly cuz I'm already tired at bedtime so it just gives me that extra I need to fall and stay asleep all through the night.

Definitely look into natural alternatives that you mentioned, I know people that have had success with teas and natural herbs from health food stores. I have tried the Zquil when I go out of town with hubby and have to sleep with him, he's a very loud snorer so I need both mj and sleep aid to fall asleep next to him cuz he falls asleep very easily and I only do now when it's quiet and I'm stoned so the zquil definitely gives me that little extra help for sleeping next to a snorer, at home we sleep in separate rooms so I only use mj at home.