Please tell me others of you have been so tired it seems that I am ill from something else. I am tired all day then cannot sleep at night, then don't want to get up and go to work. While sitting at my desk I just want to get under it and go to sleep at work.
Help
Hi mjlizard,
I have experienced this among the other peri symptoms. I fall asleep in the car when my husband is driving us somewhere, and right in the middle of him talking to me. I feel so bad and don't want him thinking I am ignoring him. He has been so good to put up me thru all of this. I almost fell asleep at the library yesterday while I was using the computer. How embarrassing.
Sometimes all I can think of is going to sleep
Yes I have extreme exhaustion too. If I get one thing done a day then I'm on the couch afterwards trying to get some energy back. It is very disruptive from living life. For me peri brought on depression so I think it's part of that along with insomnia.
I unfortuanatly still work so sitting at my desk has become such a hard job
Yes. Fatigue is a symptom of perimenopause. I feel that way maybe once or 2x a week. Try taking vitamin B12. It helps me at least.
Thankyou
Hi mjlizard, I have the same problem. I have been taking a small dose of melatonin nightly (3 mg) that helps some but still not sleeping through the night and waking up with awful sadness and panic every morning. Glad we are here to help each other and I'm sorry you are going through this, I know it is really hard. Take care.
Thankyou,
Just joined on today, alreay feeling less alone
Hi mjlizard,
I really feel for you ladies who have to work. I don't think I would have coped (I was signed off for bi polar disorder) I had mega depression which was thought to be the depressive part of the illness. I don't think it was because HRT has made it so much better when nothing else has worked.
I still have big sleep issues. I promised to take my daughter birthday shopping today, I did it with no sleep at all last night, walked round like a zombie all day and know from experience that it will make no difference to my sleep tonight and that I will likely be here reading posts at 430am.
I had it so bad in the past after 3 nights of zero sleep I'm a danger to myself and can't drive etc. As a last resort then I have to take Tamazepam.
Yes and feel like you're just coming down with or just getting over the flu all the time and the more tired you are the worse you feel.
For some bizarre reason sleep in the daytime comes easier and these days I can do that sometimes, but when it started in early peri I had to keep going with a daughter to get to school, house work shopping. I could never manage a cat nap for an hour, usually being unable to get to sleep and occasionally falling asleep and not waking until 8 or 9 at night with a hungry and angry family to deal with.
I'm hoping my post doesn't depress you, the point I was going to make is, I feel if someone had wondered in the early days if my problems could have been peri related and tried me on HRT back then I think I would have fared much better than I did.
Also really interesting and exciting for me is the fact that the first 8 nights on estrogen gel I felt tired at 11 PM was sound asleep by just after midnight and woke with a start at 815 am in exactly the way I always would have before peri began. I just wish that had continued but a few weeks later I went through a phase of falling asleep only to wake at between 3 or 430am this has also not happened since a point in early peri. So I'm hoping that maybe an increase in estrogen when I get round to seeing the doctor to ask (worry because I'd rather stay on minimum dose) could do the trick.
Zigangie,
I too am waking at 3 or 4am, even sooner sometimes. Once I am up, there is no going back to sleep, no matter how tired I am. This has been going on for months now. Can you tell me a bit more about the estrogen gel? Is it bioidentical gel? How did they tell you to use it? Thanks
Hi Snowbell, Yes it's bio identical. I use oestrogel 2 pumps one on each arm after my bath and Utrogestan pills for the first 12 calendar days of the month. I started bleeding again days 7 or 8 of the Utrogestan until days 14 or 15.
Mine started odd nights couldn't sleep then a couple of years later waking after a few hours.
Then complete insomnia at first I just thought I'd use the extra hours for myself quiet things making cakes etc.
But it soon starts affecting everything you do.
They gave me all sorts anti depressants anti psychotics, anti histamines cough medicine, always saying this one helps with sleep that one will help.
I tried (you could give some of these a go because they work for some people) valerian root, magnesium, 5htp multi b vitamins melatonin. I gave up caffeine, tried not to smoke a few hours before bed. Tried cannabis occasionally alcohol (I hate being drunk or drugged but things got very desperate)
Zopiclone gave me a disgusting metallic taste in my mouth which worsened to almost unbearable by the early hours.
Diazepam worked but only for 4 hours. Lorazepam the same.
Temazepam works but I'm now so used to it I have to take twice the dose so they don't like me having it.
Alcohol worked but I just seemed to need more and more and feared becoming an alcoholic. I don't really like alcohol luckily. Cannabis made me paranoid.
I had got used to it and asked for HRT because after 2 years period free I was just so hot I had no libido and vaginal dryness so bad it felt like razor blades if I had sex.
So I was gobsmacked when my depression and anxiety lifted this year I had the best Christmas in 10 years. Also 8 nights of perfect sleep did wonders. Improved libido dryness and being too hot all the time.
Discussing with my husband if there is any way I can see a meno specialist if my doctor is not happy to try tinkering with dosages. This is easy to do with oestrogel you could use another one or two pumps and still take the same amount of Utrogestan.
I'm at week 15 on it so still quite early days but I so wish someone had thought of trying me on it years ago when it first started.
I've had a few other improvements, some but not all aches and pains, nausea and a horrible taste also the constant loo trips, these do come on occasionally but more like early peri they come and it's not long until I feel ok again.
I am so glad you are finding some relief. Im going to check into estrogen some more. Thanks
Glad to meet you... I just joined recently as well and have found everyone to be supportive and kind. Hope you find the forums helpful, too. Can relate to wanting to crawl under my desk!
I start on estrogen next period. I'm on birth control to even out moods but my last period I went lower down in my depression and was so bad could hardly get out of bed and so going to take HRT, at least the estrogen part instead of placebos. Other choice gyn gave me was to stay on the pill without having a period. That doesn't seem natural to me.
As for insomnia I'm waking up about 2-3 hours after I fall asleep. Then I take my first Ambien. Then wake up around around 3-4am and take my second Ambien. I hate taking this stuff but I'm non-functional as it is with this severe depression and anxiety. Peri is truly hell.
CCinCal,
Please keep me updated on how the estrogen is working for you. I need some relief and hoping estrogen may be the answer. The anxiety and depression is absolute hell in itself not counting all of the other horrid symptoms peri is bringing. I hope you get some relief from it.
Mjlizard,
I too suffer from fatique. I feel tired when I wake up and I have a desk job as well and want to crawl under and take a nap some days. I take 2500 of B12 every day but I can't tell if its really helping or not. I'm developing weirder symptoms the closer I get to menopause. Just looking forward to the day I can skip the tampon/pad isle in the grocery store lol
Just wondering does symptoms not improve and settle down when your in the menopause? Ie a year or more without a period?I thought it was peri that was worse!! 😢😢😢😭
I am so fed up of dry stinging eyes and wanting to go to sleep, yet at night, my mind can race and I can wake literally every hour sometimes. I am frightened it's something scarey, fingers crossed it's just the peri but it takes it out of you. I hope you start to feel better soon x.
Yes I am concerned too. I just feel like everything in me is shutting down.