- User type
- OCD Conqueror
- Date posted
- 35w ago
Sleeping aids?
Does anyone take sleeping aids to help with sleep? Does it affect your OCD?
Does anyone take sleeping aids to help with sleep? Does it affect your OCD?
any sleeping medication has just fucked me up worse and made me feel awful in the past. as if sleep deprivation wasn't bad enough, LOL. i avoid sleeping pills like the plague. last time i took one was like 5 years ago, as a college freshman before the pandemic.
I use klonopin to knock the edge off sometimes on nights I’m super anxious. My provider was okay with it since me and sleeping meds did not agree well.
Sleep aids are a slippery slope for me. Over the past year I relied on them to get sleep during times of OCD uprising. BUT then I had an insight that I would always OCD out about what would happen if I didn’t get enough sleep which would keep me up even more. So I would take the pill and within 10 mins or so, before I felt it, I’d fall asleep. It was a new ritual for me and I was becoming more OCD about sleep- so I added more rituals like sunlamps, avoiding light types, sleep sounds, etc. Those made the OCD worse too. It took me about a month or so to unwind that OCD pattern and lots of sleepless nights. Back to normal and now I just accept those random nights OCD keeps me up. I say this not because I’m against meds or anyone using them. You obviously know what’s best for you. I just want to share my story in case you get sleep OCD like me…it took me far to long to recognize it.
@ZJT Do u still feel pain whilst on sleeping pills
Thanks everyone for your responses!!
I don't use typical sleep aids but things like magnesium lotions and sprays, sleepy teas with ingredients like valerian and skullcap, and other bits and bobs.
Does anyone have tips on good sleep hygeine? What does everyone use to relax and wind down before bedtime?
It started when I became an adult, and started receiving my mental health diagnosis. I hyper fixated on each and every action I did and how it could be related to my diagnosis’s. It then lead to fixation to my physical health — making appointments and seeing every specialist I can to rule out every possibility. I currently have been suffering with obstructive sleep. I woke up the past few days with severe pain from the lack of sleep whilst believing I was oversleeping. Luckily my fit watch tracks my sleep cycle and it turns out I am not receiving any sleep. I had an extreme panic attack — bursting into tears on the phone with my mom wondering what this case might be. She told me it could be sleep apnea and that a simple sleep study could figure this out. However, knowing my family history I made appointments to every specialist I can to make sure it is nothing serious. The unknown of health can be scary to me. Watching my mother suffer with her physical health chronically since I was a child lead me to be very conscious and aware of how my body is functioning. This morning was one of the worst moments of physical pain. I should just take one step at a time with the sleep doctor instead of taking measures to see every specialist that could pertain with this issue. However, that is very hard to me. I don’t want to ever wake up in the pain I was this morning. Does anyone else suffer with health-related OCD? And if so, how do you find a sense of ease during moments like I expressed?
Hey friends, I hope you all are well. I just wanted to check in and ask people's experiences about being on medication. I have had OCD pretty much my whole life, just got recently diagnosed 4 months ago and my therapist recommended that I get on meds for it so I have a psychiatrist appointment set up. I'm a little apprehensive about getting on them, but I've realized that I do have some sort of chemical imbalance in my brain that plays a part in my OCD and anxiety. I would love to hear anyones experiences or words of encouragement. Thank you, I hope you all are well.
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