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Can't sleep :(


michellep

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Well, it's 2:30 am for me. I've been awake since about midnight with less than 2 hrs of sleep. Seems these meds don't want to co-operate. My mind won't stop....the thoughts just won't go away. The loneliness ....the fear....the endless pain.

I'm trying so hard to pull myself together and I can't!

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Michelle Breathe in and out!! Hugs and prayers and Vent away or PM me if need be !! Wish I had the answers for Ya, But always can listen...

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Michelle,

I lost my husband three months ago. I am totally lost. I guess the biggest emotion I am dealing with now is sadness.

However, I get up everyday knowing I have two options:

1. I can choose to live or

2. I can choose just to survive.

I have chosen to live. No matter how hard this road of grief is, I will not let it defeat me and I will not live the rest of my life being miserable.

With the assistance of my grief counselor and the coping skills he has given me, I know I can make it through this.

Good luck to you. I am keeping you in my prayers.

Jean

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Michelle the first month after I lost Johnny I would sit up until 3 or 4 in the morning. When I would finally fall into bed I didn't always sleep. Most nights I felt as if I just lay in bed and thought all night. Then by 5 or 6 I was back up. I was smoking stll and I am sure that I lived on just coffee and cigaretts and one or 2 hours of uneasy sleep for well over a month.

It was an experience that gave me a little sleep. I know that I told you about that. I will always believe it was real and because somehow Johnny knew that I couldn't go on like I was.

I will tell you too that the very thing that you are depending on to help you sleep may be keeping you awake. The drugs can't take away the pain. Sooner or later you are going to have to start getting by without them. I don't want to frighten you but you will have to greive and I mean you will have to do it with or without the drugs. It will hurt no less with them than it does without them. They are only a small temporary solution and from what you are saying they aren't working.

The problem with depending so much on medication is that if it doesn't work you take more. Often your body will get so used to it that it won't work and then you need more and more and more. In the end you end up with another problem and the pain is still there.

You don't know how many times I thought about taking something. I even bought a bottle of wine a few nights and killed the whole thing. The only thing it did was make my headache worse and left my heartache still with me.

You just lost the love of your life. It is not going to be an easy road to travel. Look at me and Ann and so many others who have been dealing with our grief for years. You just will come to a point where something will shake you up enough to make you want to get on with a new life.

I will never forget something that Ry said one day to someone after her John died. She said " you have to build a new life from the ground up because the old one is gone". That is just so true. It is up to you what you want to make of that new life. Believe me it will never be easy but it is doable.

When my ex died and I saw my 20 year old grandson grieving so much that he was totaly lost and felt like even to laugh was being disloyal to

Denis I told him that his Paw Paw had loved him so much that he wanted the best life for him possible. Having a good life meant doing all of those things that come naturally, things like laughing loving and just plain living. I told him that if he didn't do those things that he would be disloyal to the love that Denis had for him.

As I was telling him that a light went off in my mind. I realized that sense Johnny's death I had been doing the same thing. I knew too that Johnny loves me so much that he would want me to have the very best life possible. He gave me a second chance with his love. If I throw that chance away I am being disloyal to all the love we shared.

I am not saying don't grieve. You will grieve and you need to grieve. You may find something to distact your mind for a while but the pain is going to be there. You just have to find a way to live with it until it becomes so much a part of you that you would miss it if it wasn't there.

Oh my friend how my heart aches for you. I see so very much of myself in you at this time. I am here for you. Don't ever forget that.

Just make sure to always remember the love the two of you shared. That is what will sustain you through the roughest times, not the meds.

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Michelle.....

To merely say "hang in there" sounds no words of any real substance but, from my experience, that's about all you can do right now. I would just hang in and hold on with each passing day and after a while, seems seemed to get a little easier and although the pain has never really stopped, it's not quite as strong as it was 7 years ago.

At this point, there are no words that are really going to make you feel completely better. You yearn for life as it was before losing the love of your life. I found that, rather than listening to words from others, I felt better after talking to a friend and just letting my raw feelings all roll out. Luckily, I have a friend that is a very good listener and I have talked about a million hours since 2002. There are times now, that I call her up and go over all the details, 7 years later.

Please know that we are here for you and are all ready to listen. So...just shout out when you need us!!!

Ann

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Michelle,

It is over 5 years for me. I still miss Earl and grieve for him every day. But as I have said so often, it does not get easy but it gets easier.

I think the most important thing to do is get busy, important busy, stupid busy, or just busy busy.

As Jean said, I chose to live my life. I know Earl would want me to be happy and purposeful. As time goes by, it is easier to remember the good times - thankfully I have very few pictures of Earl when he was sick, so I am surrounded with the healthy, happy Earl.

Take each day. Cry as you need to. Laugh and don't feel guilty. But get busy - work, volunteer, shop, bowl, golf, play cards - anything. And most important be good to yourself.

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One thing that helped me was to start a different bedtime ritual. It was strange to be sleeping alone so I started to read in bed prior to going to sleep. I had never done that before and it helped shut off my mind until I was tired enough to fall asleep. Now when I wake up in the night I grab my book and read until I am sleepy.

The other thing I did was to start a journal. I started writing in a journal and told John what I had done that day, vented about things and just got it out on paper.

Xanax worked for me also -

I posted a book in the sticky area and that book really helped me.

I know it's hard. It will get easier.

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My routine consisted of a nightly talk to Deb under the stars.

Yelling at God for about a week demanding an explanation!

Picking a room and cleaning it out. Things were Donated. My Sister and her daughter have Debs Jewelry box and I have the rings and a very special diamond pendant.

Clothes were donated to good will. Debs wedding dress has been cleaned and stored away with other mementos.

The art supplies she used were donated to the students at the Local college were she had been taking classes. The car got sold after a year cause i had to pay taxes and was not using it.

The nightly rants and screaming are gone. The paperwork is done for a few years. I did good until daisy Our dawg passed away from cancer on the dining room floor in my arms and then I went back to yelling for some reason. I have 2 photos of her in the house. I took flowers once a week and what woman doesn't love fresh flowers every week.

Forward 3 aqnad a half years. I have a new Puppy Named Mocha in my life because the silence in the house was killing me. I have a wonderful roomie named Mike who is getting married and leaving soon to go to war. He has been like a son to me! :(

I go to the Cemetery sometimes depending on my mood. I still talk to deb under the stars once in a while when times are tough Sometimes I take flowers for Holidays now.

yes I still have painful days and my friends can tell at work or online. I am doing much better. tried the dating thing and it did not work out for now..... So..................... I am living for every day now!! You will also!

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I really appreciate all your kind words and advice. Maybe in time it will all make sense, but right now it doesn't. I feel like everything that has happened for the past 9 months is just a "nightmare" and I'm going to wake up.....please dear God....WAKE ME UP!!

I want so very much to think about about the wonderful memories and years Don and I shared, yet it seems that my mind continues to go toward the illness...the suffering....all the "what if's".....what more could I have done...what could I have done differently....how am I going to get a job?" These thoughts are torture and the lack of sleep is magnifying everything for me.

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Michelle, my deepest sympathies to you on the loss of your beloved. It is very hard to face all of the future while you're still holding on to so much pain over the past-the what ifs, the how could that happens, etc...Give yourself time to come to terms with what happened in the past year, it will help you to be able to move forward once some healing has started to happen.

I know it probably doesn't help much, but I'm sending you thoughts and prayers of comfort, plus some cyber hugs too. ((((((((((((((Michelle)))))))))))

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Oh Michelle dear it feels like a nightmare because it is. So many times I would find myself begging for Johnny to wake me up.

He had had nightmares often and he had told me that when I saw him jumping or mumbling that I should wake him up. I did wake him up but when I begged for him to wake me he couldn't because my nightmare was real, sometimes it still is.

My childhood was not the best. Then later as a teenager I met Johnny and it was so wonderful to feel the love, to have him hold me and love me. Then he disappeared without warning and my heart wasn't just broken, it was shattered. That is when my nightmares started.

Over the years I had a recurring nightmare. Each time it was about someone I love being in some terrible accident and my standing there seeing it and unable to move. The horror of it was just so bad that my mind and heart were screaming and I couldn't get away from it. Sometimes my pain would turn into a big orange blob and just cover me, then I would wake up.

When I lost Johnny I was living that nightmare every day and as I said sometimes I still do. The point is once my nightmare became my reality the nightmares in my sleep stopped. I haven't had that particular nightmare sense Johnny's death and it had been a constant for over 40 years.

I think my nightmare was a preminition of what would come. I even dreamed it one night about Johnny before we were together again, that was the last time, then his death made it reality. No one could wake me from it not even my dear love Johnny.

It takes time Michelle. I know that it seems like time will never help and your heart will never stop bleeding but in time it will. It may still be scared badly but the bleeding will stop.

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