Odd Type of Anxiety/Insomnia

Hi everyone

I'm a middle-aged male with a history of GAD, OCD, Panic Disorder, ADHD, Insomnia, Hypochondria, Stress Intolerance/Adrenal Fatigue, Tourettes, Chronic Sinusitis, Allergic Rhinitis, Deviated Septum, IBS, GERD and Gastritis.

While I've listed most of my ills and ailments above, the primary reason I'm here today is to talk about my anxiety and insomnia. I've been under loads of stress for about a year and normally, when I have bouts of insomnia they last a week or two and no matter what time I go to bed, I always end up awakening too early and only getting about 5 hours (or less) of sleep and then feel exhausted and run down for the rest of the day. I usually never have trouble actually falling asleep though.

This time around however, instead of early awakening, I've been having trouble getting to sleep. Either it's anxiety or disturbing thoughts. Sometimes I'm really tired but my mind is in overdrive or my thoughts are racing and other times my body is tired but my mind is wide awake. Sometimes I'll get multiple "rushes" of anxiety that seem to be shooting through my brain or traveling around my brain and this will wake me up throughout the night. Sometimes I'll have nights where I lay down to sleep and each time I start to drift off my anxiety will wake me up again until I finally fall asleep only to be awakened many more times during the night with anxiety and then have anxiety when I finally wake up. I also have these weird anxiety attacks in the middle of the night where I can almost feel and "see" the little zaps of anxiety traveling in a circle around my brain like a shoe in a clothe's dryer (really weird and scary). Another thing I get are these really super-intense dreams where I spend hours trying to solve some very complex imaginary issue that doesn't even exist in real life and when I finally wake up I'm exhausted from all the effort I put into it.

Anyone else deal with any of this?. Can the type of anxiety and/or insomnia a person has suddenly change it's pattern so that it behaves differently?. I've had GAD and bouts of insomnia for years but can't ever remember having trouble falling asleep or having anxiety at night, in the middle of the night or early in the morning so this is kind of new and strange for me.

I'm on Ativan and sometimes take Benadryl or Atarax for sleep but lately, none of these have been helping all that much and some of the antihistamines make me feel really anxious and wacked out the next day.

Thanks for any help or input - Seth

I have severe anxiety disorder and OCD, I know what you are going through! I'm on medications since the age of 16. I also suffer from severe guilt disorder which makes life miserable for me! Can this anxiety and guilt thing kill me?

Many years ago I went through a long period (a year or more) of the strangest sensations when trying to fall asleep.  It was like I was getting an electric shock to my brain just as I started to drift off.  This would happen five or six times before I finally fell aslepp.  I was sure I must be having mini strokes or something. I was told by my psychiatrist that this was a severe anxiety manifestation...but boy was it scarey.  I only get it once in a blue moon now but it still freaks me out completely and usually sets me up for more anxiety during the next day.   And I also have very, very vivid, and sometimes scarey or sad dreams that leave me completely drained and feeling weird all the following day.  So you're not alone, I can assure you of that....those of us with anxiety run the gamit of strange behaviors and sleep disturbances.  Good luck getting past them...you will in time.

''I was told by my psychiatrist that this was a severe anxiety manifestation...but boy was it scary.''

Hi
I suffered from normal anxiety attacks (if there is such a thing!) years ago: with just heart palps, I began to understand my anxiety, I learned to control it and it disappeared for almost 10 years, but recently the anxiety came back, but with completely different symptoms, like you said - so yes it does happen. Some of my symptoms were the same as yours, - weird zaps and sensations (which would happen only when I was trying to sleep or during the day if I started to worry about them occurring) I would focus intensely on them, it was extremely frightening because i didnt know/understand/thought i had no control of what was happening to me, eventually I could induce them just by thinking and worrying about them. Once I realised that this was a 'manifestation' of my anxiety, (like palpitations) I learned to control it, again, and now I am anxiety free for a couple of months and hopefully years to come. I wish everyone on here could learn to overcome it, an I hope you can too - it can be done if you break your anxiety cycle, understand what is happening to you and start thinking rationally when you feel anx creeping in..

Lemony Hello,

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