Heroin Permanent insomnia?

[shadowstryker]

Okay, so I've been addicted to a few different substances over a little over a year now. Main ones being alcohol, benzos, and heroin. I've been on something pretty much every single day for a year, at one point using each substance 3-4 times a day, and I've had insomnia for a long while as a result. The only exception is a month of being clean due to rehab, and I'm prescribed doxepin/seroquil to sleep. This works great and all, but I can't take the medication if I'm drinking because alcohol/doxepin supposedly don't mix. So basically, I'm laying in bed drunk right now wondering...will I ever be able to sleep without medication/drugs again? Previously drinking would get me to sleep but at this point I'm just laying in bed drunk and sleepless. Benzos, doxepin, and heroin still work to get me to sleep but alcohol is doing nothing. Have I permanently fucked up my ability to sleep?

 

[ziggo]

I've used a LOT of h over a few years. Times when I'd be taken to jail and have to go cold turkey I would not sleep, nap, pass out, black-out, not a wink of sleep at all until about 5-6 days, then I'd be able to sleep a few hours a night. One cold turkey I went 9 days without sleep, desperately trying the whole time too.

Alcohol is weird, most of the time it makes me pass out easy but sometimes I can't sleep no matter what on it. And that's without using anything else recent to it. Don't worry I can sleep easy 7-12hrs now a days without taking any drugs. It just takes a few weeks/months whatever to get back to an equilibrium. But.... if you keep taking that seroquil for a long time I dunno how long it will take you to start sleeping normal without it, that shit is stroong.

 

[tacodude]

That's why I and many others tell you to take a break. Stop using and yes it will suck for the first week maybe a month, but it gets better. Just cut back your use

Edit: I find alcohol to prevent sleep as well not induce it.

 

[shadowstryker]

I've been taking small breaks. I'm actually not physically dependant on anything right now, I just can't sleep. I suspect the sleep meds play a part in that too however.

 

[withlove]

you will be able to sleep again but it will take time.
waking up the same time everyday will help ensure you are tired at bed time.
having a good night time routine helps a lot too. it may sound kinda meh but i had such horrible insomnia for years, it made things really difficult and made my life hell some days.

i got into the habit of having sleepy time tea in bed, and reading and taking magnesium (200-400 mg) helped me get to bed.
i went from getting a very broken 3-4 hours a night to sleeping 7-8 hours a night 29 out of 30 nights a month ( i have one night usually when im pmsing that i toss and turn still)
and that is sober, no meds.
it took some time but it is totally possible.

 

[morphine-dreams]

The best thing for me has been getting (mostly) clean. I never realized how badly opioids were affecting my sleep schedule until I stopped, and even in WD I was easily able to readjust my sleep schedule. I currently use weed, mirtazapine, and melatonin every night and the combo works very well. I don't know much about seroquel, but I believe it's contraindicated with alcohol/benzos for similar reasons as mirtazapine (sedation). I find that I'm able to use moderate amounts of alcohol and fairly high amounts of benzos just fine, but when combined with phenibut, I passed out/threw up, so I'm just very careful with other depressants and dose carefully, especially with new substances. I'm not encouraging anything new to mix said substances, just sharing my personal experiences. As far as my insomnia being "permanent", I believe it is, but it can also be easily managed with legal and relatively safe/cheap substances. CBT has also helped a lot. While it hasn't directly improved my insomnia, I learned many useful non-drug methods to help manage my insomnia. Overall, I went from insomnia severe enough for doctors to want to diagnose me with DSPD or non-24, to (so far) a very normal sleep schedule, so I'm pretty happy even though I still rely on some substances. It's worth mentioning that insomnia was an issue for me since before I started using drugs, and while many recreational drugs ended up exacerbating the problem, self medicating my insomnia was one of the main reasons I started using drugs in the first place.