it comes and goes. when the memories started to come back several years ago I went through a year of little of no sleep. I would awake constantly because of the images and feelings I had. I did not want to close my eyes to see the images. It was the abuse I had tried for a lifetime to bury--then I went into a period of on and off again sleep. Once I started therapy my sleep really went haywire--memories would keep coming, flashbacks so vivid and real. Now I am working through everything and I am finally accepting the abuse and other things that happened to me in my life as well as not longer holding myself at fault for the CSA and other torments in the home--I am now in a period of being able to sleep without intense nightmares or flashbacks--everything seems better controlled. So my sleep is improving with healing. I know there will be periods of anxiety as I uncover more of my life, but I think I can better handle the reality better than before--but I will let you know.

I have the same sleep problems, at first i couldnt stay asleep , then i couldnt fall asleep, now its a mixture of both, i have night terrors and sleep talk and sleep moving(not really walking yet) my ex used to accuse me of sleep eating which is prob true also. I have a reoccurring dream that i am on the edge of america on lake erie between canada and there is a yearly natural disaster coming that is a mix between a tital wave and a hurricane. and there is like a great wall of china but in this case cleveland. i have had this dream atleast once a week since i was a kid and i wake up in the worst place emotionally after it. Its a really weird nightmare that has no relevance to any situation in my life except for metaphorically. and i never remember why i am so upset when i wake up. usually i am crying in my sleep and my roommate wakes me up

I have similar issues. Falling asleep is very difficult, and then, when I do fall asleep, it is in short bursts of a couple of hours at most, so that I find myself looking at my clock at 3 am and deciding if I should just get up or not. I toss and turn as well, and cant sleep for any reasonable amount of time in the same position. Add bedwetting to the mix and it makes for a restless night.

falling asleep isnt usually a big issue its staying asleep... i wake up from nightmares almost every night. And if i dont i still usually dont get much more then 4,5 hours..

Wow,

Reading these reminds me of the times I would wake up with in terror and SWEARING that someone had entered the room: a flashback that would have me screaming "NO NO NO" that I still haven't figure out, but that has left me since embarking on recovery in these rooms.

I've always been hypervigilant and had my doctor tell me to stop living off adrenaline....

It Does Get Better......

i haven't slept yet, it's 5am. It used to be normal for me to stay awake to some time like seven or eight AM before I'd go to sleep. I didn't feel like i could go to sleep in the dark, then of course I slept until six or seven or even later that evening. Someone mentioned sleep paralysis, I experienced that a lot and still do though less since I've been sleeping in a regular bed in my own apartment (and other reasons I think involving drug use but even when I experienced it as a kid it was due to new sleeping arrangements/hypervigillance). I was so afraid of this but in the daylight it wasn't as bad as at night, still overwhelming but not as violent or frightening.
Otherwise I can sleep up to fifteen hours though in the past two or three months I'd say I have a pretty regular sleep schedule, usually 10 or 11 to seven am. Not bad. It's only upset sometimes like tonight.

I was up until somewhere between 2:30 and 3am last night. Had to get up at 6. (Actually managed to crawl out of bed closer to 6:45 at my wife's insistence that I had to go to work...)

When things are good, Midnight to 1 am is normal... when things are bad... all bets are off as the time I actually go to bed.

Artist,

My therapist told me that most dreams are garbage - don't mean anything - unless it's a recurring dream. He says it is almost always your subconscious thoughts manifesting themselves in the recurring dream. It means something.

Paul

.

2 am in a sound sleep, door to room being kicked in. The wife and two children screaming, heard a beep and now the child is saying I put listening devices in kitchen. It is so ridiculous, now they are fighting amongst theselves. I was in a great sleep until this. 25 minutes later it is still going on. I staid in the bedroom and did not say a word. They are going through every cabinet. I can only think how sad, now the son is telling his mother how she is wrong. Unbelievable, at leasr it is not a flashback.