Manic Depressive Illness: Why Sleep is my new Drug
This post is going to be short. For the last day or so I have been trying to write, unfortunately nothing wants to come out of my head (note: I am sorry that I have not responded to all of the comments on my last posts, I read them all and I really love the support! However, I am really struggling with following up on them, I will eventually respond but it will take some time. So please continue commenting, because your responses are an important/essential part of this blog). I’m still struggling with motivation and as I write this post I am fighting to stay awake. My mind keeps telling me that I need to lay down and close my eyes. The thought of sleeping really excites me, because it is the only time I can be myself, it is the only time I am not afraid of the world, it is the only time I can live out my fantasies without the fear of rejection or ridicule.
To me, sleep is the ultimate drug. In fact at this moment, it is the only drug I can use. Sobriety has been a real struggle for me- because for the last seven years I was either drunk or high. That was seven years of avoiding my problems, my emotions, my fears and paranoia. During my drug and alcohol stupor, I had no emotions and the thoughts in my head were quiet. When I quit using, my mind was flooded by unwanted emotions and thoughts; it was a horrible experience that I am still recovering from. As such, I have been searching for a replacement, something to quiet my mind- sleep.
Because of the medications I am on, my dreams are extremely vivid. Sometimes I can’t even tell if I am dreaming and that truly excites me. The one downside is that I sleep way too much. Most nights (well days, because I sleep during the day and stay up at night) I sleep about 13-15 hours, which eliminates most of my day leaving me with very little time to do the things I love: read, write and play video games. As such, I have falling deeper and deeper into depression, because I have become completely reliant on sleeping and I am unable to do anything else. It is so hard for me to get up and it is driving me fucking mad. At the moment I am stuck, I want to change but I have no clue what to do.
Does anyone else use sleep as a “drug” or escape from reality? How have you dealt with sleeping too much? And for those who are addicts, how do you deal with sobriety? What gives you the motivation to keep going?
I want to end this post with a picture from graffiti artist Banksy:
(http://www.facebook.com/pages/Banksy/39713792073)
I hope you are all enjoying your weekend and I look forward to hearing from you 
Dave.
Hiya,
I’m an over-sleeper too. It can be such a relief if you’re feeling shitty just to sleep through it.
This morning I slept in until noon, which is extremely unusual for me as I’m a real morning person and am usually up by 7am. Felt rubbish and didn’t want to get up. Luckily my boyfriend was on hand to make me get up and said he’d take me to McDonalds for lunch- so that kind of did help get me up.
One of the best things we’ve ever done is get a dog. We rescued her from a shelter and have had her two years now. When I wake up in the morning and my partner isn’t here, I know she needs to be let out, fed and walked so I pretty much have to get up!! I love her so much, so I guess that devotion makes me get up in the morning.
Hope you feel better soon- I’m right there with you at the moment.
Rachel
I have to agree that sleep is a great escape. After I’d been up for a few hours this morning, I went back to bed. Be kind to yourself, Dave. I hope you can let yourself sleep when you need to and not worry about responding to comments.
Hugs,
Kathy
Finally back to my computer… as I said I had to quit a 20 hour a day habit and what I’m about to suggest sounds easy or cheesy depending on your mood but really it’s a bitch. I’ll start with the hardest part, you have to force yourself to go outside and walk for 30 minutes a day….j/k start with 10 minutes and work your way up…. pacing with a cigarette and walking in circles counts just get outside no matter the weather it engages your senses. Okay your thoughts, I had the hardest time with this as well tried every thing else that I could think of then caved in……. meditation, I know WTF? it’s not actually possible in your current state of mind so you start with guided meditation that can seem hokey but you listen and repeat and form a habit and work your way to independant meditation. I have a couple guided meditations in my itunes that I could try to copy and share or just give you the info and know a few websites with downloads….. Adam plack and deepak chopra are the most tolerable and its not one long meditation there are seperate tracks so you can start with as much time as you can stand and make the goal of completing how much ever…etc. Also supplements like vitamins are helpful but I am not going to suggest anything specific since I doon’t know your meds. but we can discuss that if you want I’m noot a doctor but i’v been dealing with this for 15yrs I might as well be a freaking well-being/nutrition/bipolar guru unfortunatly what I know is useless knowledge to most, so I’m not….lol so that’s the nutshell get back to me either privatly or twitter or comment etc. and I can be more specific because really your new addiction if a bipolar cactch 22 and managing it is your only option or you’ll just become a whole nother kind of disfunctional. Best, Ashley
Sleep does seem to be a good option during times of depression. Well, it certainly is for me. I find the best way to get out of depression is to take the initiative myself.
By this I mean – convince myself that it is time to get out of depression – find something positive to concentrate on – concentrate on it, initially for about one hour per day, every day – build up the time spent each day. I realize that this approach is not easy. However,it has worked for me on several occasions. Perhaps the key is realizing that it is time to fight depression.
I have successfully used this technique on several occasions. I have written about it several times in my blog. Click on my name to follow the series.
thank you for this Dave. I have done the whole “self-medication” thing, seeking sleep in the stupor that comes with enough Tennants and/or spliffs. Now in the strange new word of living without street or prescribed medication or anything. The mental health machine is obsessed with sleep, quantity rather than quality: now I eat when hungry which is all then time but drug-free regime has accelerated my metabolism such that I am back to a 30″ waist, sleep when genuinely tired and, dare I bruit it abroad, am happy most of the time
My work schedule doesn’t let me sleep as much as I want, but on weekends I sleep too much. When I feel well, it is from lack of energy. When I’m in a depressive spiral, it is just so easy to escape from all the negative thoughts and rumination. When I sleep I can forget about being me.
Thanks. I was wondering if it was just me that thought that way
That was meant to reply christina but this is relevent aswell
I also sleep too much. When anything feels too overwhelming or that feeling that an anxiety attack is about to come on I just pop a sleeping pill and drift off for 12 or more hours. Sleep often feels like the only escape from my brain and its tormenting thoughts. Today was a bad day and although I have a ton of work to do I instead curled up in bed and decided not to face the world today. I hate doing this. Sometimes I feel better when I wake up but other times I just feel like I’ve wasted a lot of time and then feel more overwhelmed with the work I let pile up. I’ve gotten extremely behind in the things I wanted to accomplish in the past few months and the anxiety just makes me want to sleep more. Sometimes I feel I can live a better life in my sleep than in reality and fantasize about sleeping forever. Especially when you’re taking a sleeping-aid that causes vivid dreams. I feel I can go and do anything in my dreams and if the dream goes somewhere I don’t want to go I actually have control over it, for once in my life, I can just end the thing that’s bringing me down. I can wake up and think about rainbows and ponies and drift back off into a beautiful dream world where interacting with people doesn’t matter or doesn’t exist. Why would anyone ever want to wake up. Reality sucks.
I’m 18 and my final year exams have arrived. I’ve been drowning in my studies, in order to get into a really hard course next year. I’m usually very social, but lately I’ve been isolated and losing touch with people, which is normal with exams but now I find it hard to speak to even my closest friends. I can’t stop sleeping and I don’t want to be awake. It really frustrates me too because I can’t afford to sleep most of the day when I should be studying. I’ve been more depressed than usual and I know I’m getting worse. When I read this blog I felt exactly like how you felt, and I do use sleep as an escape and what’s sad is that I enjoy sleeping more than I enjoy reality. Usually if I’m going through an emotional high, I’m unstoppable and I can’t sleep, and I do risky things because I love the adrenaline, but now my low periods are becoming more extended and so is my sleep. I find the reason sleep is so incredibly awesome as a method of escape is because I am not aware of my existence for those 12 hours, I am at peace and honestly its the only time my head stops spinning. I get to not be here, which is the closest to feeling ok I get. The only way you’ll not want to sleep, is if you have something that keeps you awake, like in the sense that, these exams, have sort of kept me afloat because i need to stay awake, I need to excell because its the only way I can fix my future, fix myself. I know that sleeping is the only escape, but I know I can’t give in to it and then eventually I snap out of it. But some days are so much worse than others. One day I’ll be independant of everyone and oneday I’ll make a success of myself and that’s how you keep awake, get a plan and force yourself, get yourself to want to live.
I know all about the sleeping to escape thing. I have been doing it for two years now sometimes it’s really bad where I sleep all day long. I haven’t had a job in that time and I was coming off a pretty severe mania. At first it was depression making me sleep, but now sleeping makes me depressed. It’s so frustrating to realize when I finally get out of bed that my whole day is gone. I try to stay up all night to combat it, but I just end up sleeping all day again. It’s a horrible cycle. I think other post are right I need to concentrate on something each day that pulls me out of bed.