Just looking for advice
So I’ve had insomnia my whole life, have never easily been able to fall asleep but when I turned like 20 my dad passed away, then covid hit, and since then my sleep has just steadily continued to decline. I have a rx for both zolpidem (the short acting melt under your tongue ones) and lunesta, of course I never take both at same time but have them both handy so I can pick which one to use on a certain night depending on what I need. If I don’t take any sleep aid I normally can’t fall asleep until like 3-4 am. If I do take something I can usually get to sleep by like 1-2am. Luckily I have a job where this normally isn’t a problem, I am an astronomer so being a night owl actually works out fairly well since I don’t have to get into work until 10am, and I frequently have later night stuff as well. This month I ran two space camps at the museum I work at, and especially the 2nd one, for younger kids, WRECKED me. I’m agnostic but like god bless each and every summer camp counselor I don’t know how you can do that for a whole summer I barely survived a couple weeks. It would take so much out of me mentally and physically that I would be absolutely exhausted when I came home every day. The bright side was I went to sleep at a normal time for like the first time in years. I felt sleepy by like 10pm! Even though I am often tired I usually don’t feel sleepy, (as in, just want to lay down, feels like I could easily drift off to sleep, hard time keeping eyes open) until much later in the night. I have a really good bedtime routine, I do all the things that are supposed to be good for sleep health, but nothing works. Sometimes I don’t even feel sleepy at all I just force myself to lie down and close my eyes for hours yet I still can’t fall asleep. It even lasted for a few days after the camp ended. I was so excited and thought maybe I had sort of rebooted my sleep schedule, I kept getting up on the earlier side and I’ve even continued to be more active and busy to hopefully keep myself tired. But tonight, I think I’m back to my normal. I’m so tired but not sleepy at. It’s like if I don’t absolutely work myself into the ground and overdo it, I don’t ever get sleepy enough to want to go to bed on my own. It’s really frustrating and I feel like I can either be so exhausted after work that Im useless and miserable but I do sleep like a normal person, or I can function as a normal person the whole days yet it feel like sleep becomes a battlefield
Posted Jul 29, 2025, 6:15 AM UTC