Pain Making You a Lyme Insomniac? Tips To Help You Sleep

Pain can interfere with sleep.  The aches and pains of Lyme disease often do. People with chronic Lyme are completely exhausted.  Pain making you a Lyme Insomniac?   Some Lyme patients have problems with insomnia and bad dreams separate from pain.  Anxiety Depression and specific nutritional deficiencies  of Lyme can also derail a good night’s sleep.

My issue with sleep centered on pain.  The problem with this is while pain interfered with rest, lack of sleep brought more pain.  My brain learned not to sleep.  This cycle escalated to make me one tired miserable person.

Prior to Lyme I was a champion sleeper.   Then I got Lyme and less sleep.  I woke multiple times a night. At one point I used 6 or 7 pillows to cushion all of my pain points.  It still didn’t work.  I really missed my sleep.  Doctors would tell me get plenty of sleep but no advice on how.  I had to learn.

Pain can prevent you from falling to sleep.  Or Pain can wake you up in the middle of the night and keep you out of deep sleep.  A comfortable position is completely elusive.  You toss and turn unable to relax. Here are some of the ideas that helped me.

 

Fall asleep easily

In The Lyme disease solution  and a number of other books, Lyme literate docs suggest that restful sleep is critical to heal from Lyme disease.  A consistent bed time routine is a keystone habit for good sleep.   What does this mean?

Well a keystone habit is one that bears the weight and holds things together.   Establish the habit of hitting the sack early enough to get at least 8 hours of sleep a night.   Make it a clear priority.  Be consistent with early bed time to anchor the habit.

Plan for more  than 8 hours sleep if you doctor recommends it or you need it.  At my sickest I needed to sleep 10 hours a night.  That meant going to bed at 8:00 pm at the latest.  Now I aim for 9:30 pm most nights.  See this article for some additional tips.

Lyme Insomniac Sleep Wind Down Tips

Put a wind down routine in place so that you are ready for bed by 9:30 pm.

1. Move this stuff to the daylight hours.

• Fights with spouse or kids or parents or sibling…..
• Financial Discussions
• Violent TV
• Enlivening workouts

2. Have dinner done by 7 pm, close the kitchen so you have time to relax and do some self care.
3. Bring peaceful music, relaxation or meditation into your evening routine.
4. Lower lights and noise.
5. Set an alarm to keep remind you to go to bed on schedule.

 

No more interruptions, just a good nights sleep.

You can’t always control waking up in the middle of the night, but there are steps you can take to wake less often and get back to sleep quicker.

Wake less often

1. Time your evening pain meds to help you sleep through the night.
2. Make sure your mattress and pillows give comfortable support. This may mean a new air bed or foam mattress.
3. Ease painful tender points with self- massage or roll them out on a foam roller or a tennis ball
4. Do gentle stretching to relax.
5. Soak in a warm tub with Epsom salts and or a calming essential oil before bed.
6. Try EFT (Tapping)for pain before bed

Get back to sleep quickly

• Biofeedback
• 61 points
• Progressive relaxation
• Meditation or Reiki
• Night light in the bathroom

If pain is making you a Lyme insomniac take action.  Try some of these tips.  Restful sleep is fundamental to the healing process.  Work with your health care team to optimize your rest and help your healing.