How Insomnia Affects Me

Of course, if you're reading this, you know what insomnia is. Everyone does. It means that you have difficulty with sleep. But I think it's more than that. I never truly understood insomnia until it happened to me. Insomnia affects many people in many different ways.

How insomnia affects me

Insomnia affects my life a lot. I live with chronic pain, chronic fatigue, and chronic insomnia. I have been living with chronic insomnia for nearly 2 years now.

I believe that if I were able to get rid of my chronic insomnia, then I would be able to treat my chronic pain and fatigue a little bit better. After no sleep at all, or very little sleep, my pain goes from manageable to excruciating. It causes me to have a huge flare.

Like I said above, insomnia affects me in different ways.

Waking up exhausted is a given

Sometimes, it takes me hours and hours to fall asleep. I just lie in the dark pretending to be asleep but often don't fall asleep at all. And when I do, it's not until the early hours of the morning, meaning I only get a few hours of sleep.

This is rare, but sometimes I fall asleep straight away. When this happens, I never stay asleep for the full night. This is caused by the chronic pain that I live with. Usually, an angry muscle spasm in my neck wakes me up. I move a lot in my sleep. When I move, my stiff joints from ankylosing spondylitis (AS) wake me up.

No matter how many hours I sleep at night, I will always wake up feeling exhausted. I'm not sure if this is because I live with chronic fatigue, or when I do sleep, I'm not sleeping right.

Is lack of sleep affecting my health?

Because I'm so tired all the time, you would think that I would nap during the day. I find this impossible. It is only when I am recovering from a procedure or the day after my biologic injection that I nap. I wish I could sleep at night. If I can't do that, then I wish that I could nap during the day.

I worry about the effect not sleeping has on my body and mind. Our body needs to rest fully, which happens when we are asleep. It needs to do this to allow our body naturally to repair itself. Is my lack of sleep affecting my health? I deal with enough health issues as it is. If I slept properly, would this help them?

What can I do to help my sleep?

I've tried many natural products and routines to help me get a good night's sleep. None have ever worked. I keep a sleep journal to see if I can find what influences my sleep or lack of it. I can't find the answers to that yet.

I take a lot of medication to treat AS; I don't want to have to take more. Maybe this is something that I will consider in the future. But for now, medication is my last option.

Can you offer me any suggestions?