I have problems sleeping.

For almost a year I’ve been having sleep problems. I can rarely get to sleep on my own but it was easily fixed by over the counter sleeping pills. The last couple days however…

I found myself being awake longer and longer each night but I would eventually fell asleep. The night before last that wasn’t the case. I was awake for about 30 hours. I’m sure we’ve all been up literally all night before but this time it was different for me. My brain was freaking out. I can only describe it as mental agony. That may sound dramatic but it wasn’t. I had dizzy spells; that “aura” thing when I walked around. My brain would rapidly switch from being hyper, to exhaustion. I was shaking, could barely eat and my behavior was odd and even though I KNEW I was acting strange, but I couldn’t really stop it. I didn’t feel like I had complete control.  Boredom and sleepiness blanketed all those sensations.

See, I’m the sort of person that needs constant stimulation or I quickly fall into boredom. Vegging out isn’t really an option for me. Even when I have the flu and I’m hugging the toilet, I’m usually reading between vomiting (I know, you didn’t want to read that) out of boredom, and it has the added bonus of making me feel more nauseous so I’ll empty the contents of my stomach faster. Okay, sorry for that grossness.

…ANYWAY

So yeah, the boredom thing…I did different things to try and occupy my mind since my repeated attempts of sleeping didn’t work. Tried video games to occupy my mind (even if it didn’t make me sleepy) and it made me dizzy so I had to stop. I tried coloring in a mandala to try and focus on something and enter a meditative state. Didn’t work, it made me dizzy.  Tried reading too and while it made me only slightly dizzy, it wasn’t comfortable.  Tried falling asleep to a particularly slow moving documentary and that didn’t work. I tried a slowly eaten hot meal but that didn’t work.  I didn’t have chamomile tea and we have no money so that was out and probably wouldn’t have worked anyway.

Last night…

I slept! I woke up once an hour but I slept! I feel far from normal but I still feel much better! The agony is gone and is replaced by that hollow sleepy feeling when you don’t get enough REM sleep. It’s a preferable feeling.

I’m going job hunting today and have to create a retail-oriented cover letter since the only one I have is ECD-oriented. This will be difficult for me because I hate retail but I’m not going to be picky about the job I have…at least until I get a career-type-job. Who wants to write my retail cover letter since I can’t really think of a good lie about how much I love retail and thrive in that environment! I don’t really feel up to doing anything but I need to do it. It’s been over a year and I’m not in mental agony anymore and it’s not like I can sleep more.

I’m worried that I’m developing a sleeping disorder. I’ve been unable to sleep unaided for far too long and apparently I’m gaining a resistance to sleeping pills (because they all have the same crap in them) and will need to go to the doctor to get a prescription…both of which I can’t afford.