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[Kebooo]

I have struggled with this for more than a year now, off and on.  Perhaps there is no solution, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask.  I have a fear of falling asleep.  No, not because of some perception of evil monsters or enemies attacking me, but the actual loss of consciousness itself.  Several years ago I had a night terror which felt as real as the act of my typing this post, I truly thought my death was at hand.  It was the only one I ever had.  But about a year ago I had some similar dreams that seemed to happen right after I fell asleep, where some horrifying or gruesome face or creature would be approaching me, and I would try to wake up only to be in a semi sleep paralysis for some moments.  This caused me to pay attention to my falling asleep. 

Of course I got over such things because they so rarely ever happened.  But paying attention to my sleep began to make me hyper aware of the loss of consciousness.  As if I could feel the loss of control throughout my body, even my mind, while I fell asleep.  Some nights I can slip seamlessly into slumber, others I have incredible trouble, like this one.  Sometimes I will lay in bed for hours, feeling tired, even exhausted, in body and mind, but almost instinctively moving a limb, rolling over, or thinking thoughts that will prevent that loss of consciousness, all while I lay there in the dark with my eyes closed.  I began to feel that the loss of consciousness is what it must be like to pass into death, my deepest fear in life.  I'm a rational man and understand these to be irrational fears.  Often fears or phobias are overcome by facing what you fear and desensitizing you to it.  But I "face" this every single night, an inevitable part of every day, and still, after a year, I struggle.

I have tried many things, melatonin (which seems to create vivid, nightmareish dreams), focusing on thoughts completely unrelated to sleep, or trying not to think at all.  But my downfall is that I'm not an easily distracted person, even as I think of something else, or try not to think, there is a separate, almost uncontrollable thought about the loss of consciousness and the resulting fear.  I'm at a loss on what to do.  Usually I eventually succumb to sleep, but sometimes it can take up to 2 or 3 hours to do so.  I wouldn't say it's insomnia as most of the time I can fall asleep in 20-30 minutes.  But I seem to, beyond my own will and desire, keep my mind awake and aware, and then the fact I linger awake just compounds on the thoughts.  I wish I could simply tell my brain to stop thinking, to completely lose the capacity to dwell on such thoughts, but that is beyond me.  I understand this is probably bizarre, I can't find many examples of such nonsense out there.  And the fear is not a petrifying one, in fact, I'm not even sure I could call it fear, perhaps an anxiety.  I have considered using anxiety medication for it, but that seems awfully extreme simply to fall asleep faster.  But I went through my whole life enjoying sleep, being able to peacefully end the day in rest.  Now whenever I begin to try to sleep there is this anxious feeling inside me, as if I have to battle against my own thoughts and fears every night, fears I try to rationally explain away yet rarely ever succeed in doing so.  Does anyone have any suggestions?

[IronyOwl]

Uh... wow, that's, uh...

It sounds like you've got one of two problems. As luck would have it, I don't know of good ways to describe either. I think the issue is either that you're afraid of sleep, or have become aware of death. A good analogy is becoming afraid of bugs because they're icky, or realizing you could fall down stairs and die.

I guess the easier solution would be to just think of sleep as a natural crossing. Sure, it's similar to death in some ways, but crossing the street is similar to suicide in some ways. You're just going under, then coming back up, no different from dunking yourself underwater. It's not drowning, and it has to happen. (in the bugs example, the only real solution is to stop thinking they're quite so icky)

If that's not the issue, then I guess you've developed an acute awareness of something that you'll have to overcome in order to function. Accepting that death is inevitable and always a danger to some minor extent is the only way to go here; once you've realized that there's nothing you can do about it, and I mean really accepted it, you should be able to function in the face of it reasonably well. (in the stairs example, the only real solution is to accept that you can't really live life never using stairs because of the absurdly small chance you'll die on them)

Hope that helps with your rather... unique issue.

[Bardum Idith]

Several years ago I had a night terror which felt as real as the act of my typing this post, I truly thought my death was at hand.  It was the only one I ever had.  But about a year ago I had some similar dreams that seemed to happen right after I fell asleep, where some horrifying or gruesome face or creature would be approaching me, and I would try to wake up only to be in a semi sleep paralysis for some moments

I often had nightmares exactly like that when I was younger, but they became rare as I grew older. My mother also hung a dreamcatcher over my bed, which worked quite well. Most likely it was a sort of placebo effect, strenghtened by my young age, but it helped 

I wish I could simply tell my brain to stop thinking

Meditation or Yoga could give you that ability, a cousin of mine who practices Yoga can deliberately make herself sleep within few minutes, but it requires some training.
Maybe a kind of breath-observing meditation (anapanasati) could help against the thoughts and fear, I successfully used this method in some other situations against bad thoughts or emotions.

Hope you get well again

[Toady Two]

The best way of fighting an irrational fear(as far as you can call the fear of death irrational) is to face it.

I've heard of psychiatrists using hallucinogens to help people overcome the fear of death.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,638080,00.html

I'm not telling you to go on an acid trip and see if that helps,  but you could try and contact a psychiatrist and get a prescription on something that will help you.

[Il Palazzo]

Oh, come now. You're too old for this kind of angsty bullcrap.

Change your daily routines so that by the end of a day you're too tired to think of sleep as anything else than the best way of spending your free time.

[RedKing]

I've long been prone to sleep paralysis as well, and yeah it's freaky as hell when you don't know much about it. But once I found out that it was perfectly natural, and the physiology behind it, it took away the fear and I became fascinated with the phenomenon itself. I liken it to going from being scared of horror movies to being fascinated with special effects makeup.

As to the latter part of the post, it's also perfectly natural and a lot more common than you might think. I have the same problem. Buddhists and Taoists call it "monkey mind", and it's the primary obstacle to meditation as well as sleep. I'd second the suggestion of yoga or meditation. There's also plenty of self-help books out there on "taming the monkey mind" or similar, although I can't vouch for how good any of them are.

When I really need to get sleep, I'll take an Ambien or a Tylenol PM just to take the edge off and give me a nudge into sleep. Otherwise I tend to be an insomniac and stay up until I'm ready to drop from exhaustion. In my case, it isn't fear that keeps me awake, it's a combination of two things:

1. The feeling that I have so many things I want to do, and so little free time (and late nights are about the only free time I have)
2. Hating lying awake and tossing and turning, so I don't want to go to bed until I'm sure that I'll pass out asleep.

[Kebooo]

Well, unfortunately my fear of death is in part caused by the inevitability of it.  There is no front to fight it, no chance against it, no way to persuade it, destroy it, avoid it.  If it wasn't so certain, so absolute, it would not be a fear of mine.  I know 25 isn't very old in the grand scheme of life, but when I looked back at my life on my last birthday, I thought "where'd all the time go?" and realized that when I'm 75 and closer to death I'll have the exact same thought.  I know my grandmother feels that way.  I'm the type of person that, given the chance, would choose to never die (assuming the world didn't become filled with zombies or Hitlers).  I don't believe in any afterlife and I have this absurdly heightened desire to keep my existence going.  The thought of 'the void' (nothingness) didn't used to bother me.  I don't care that I didn't exist in 1970, or 530 or 10,000 BC.  But it's that transition into the void that gives me anxiety, and my falling asleep is a daily reminder of something I am powerless against, something I am so incapable of ever accepting, even if it is unstoppable and natural, my dying breath will be cursing the nature of death.

I like complete control of my mind, my body, I don't like to lose control, so the inevitable, unstoppable fate of death can make me anxious.  When I really stop to think about the fact the day I die will, eventually, catch up to me, I'll sit there thinking where'd all the time go, it's not a pleasant thought.  I used to feel that the day would always be ahead of me.  But I realized, as I realized on my 25th birthday, that when the day does come, I will feel life was too short, feel helpless.  I hate to be helpless.

It's not so much the idea of sleep that gives me anxiety but more my heightened awareness of the loss of consciousness.  I'd say about 80% of the time I don't notice anything and I fall asleep fine.  In fact, after writing this post and going back to sleep, I didn't notice it.  But sometimes it's as if I'm still sentient when my body is falling asleep, wishing I wasn't so aware of my mind slowing down, the blackness deepening, my thoughts slowing, my limbs becoming less mobile, instead of drifting off into sleep it feels like I'm dragged down into some pit of death, beyond my own control.  Maybe my awareness has somehow created a form of sleep delay or disorder.  Hallucinogens are out of the question.

Even when I don't feel fear, or anxiety, or any negative emotion toward it,, it sometimes seems like my body has developed this kind of instinct to keep me awake, as if I'm in a warzone that I must not fall asleep.

[Armok]

Actually, that is a much saner and more intelligent viewpoint than most people have. Why do people who gain insight into horrible truths so often assume there is something wrong with their mental health? This is a bad symptom of a good thing. Sleep leaves you vounreble and helpless, it's only sane to hate having to do it.
I PMed you something important. (Just posting it would sadly probably start a flamewar)

[Tarran]

Actually, that is a much saner and more intelligent viewpoint than most people have. Why do people who gain insight into horrible truths so often assume there is something wrong with their mental health? This is a bad symptom of a good thing. Sleep leaves you vounreble and helpless, it's only sane to hate having to do it.
I PMed you something important. (Just posting it would sadly probably start a flamewar)

It may make you helpless, but it also gives you time to rest, constantly thinking all the time ruins the mind, your mind needs time to recuperate. Lack of sleep makes your mind all mushy and crazy, and slow thinking on words. (says someone who stayed up a whole day multiple times )

And besides, sleeping has many other benefits, like speeding up waiting, allowing your body to get ready for tomorrow, healing wounds, and calming the worried mind for the next day.

Sleep is something we cannot describe with words, but its very important to sleep. Even with it's downs. If you don't agree with me, try staying up for a day, you will notice many bad side effects.



Also, Kebooo, and don't worry about time flying by, just try to remember how long each day is and multiply it by 365, then 25, that's a long time. (9125 days, that's 219000 hours, or 13140000 minutes, or 788400000 seconds.)

Try reading a book or watching a boring movie, it always puts me to sleep.



Or, you could also just think what the next day would be like with headaches, slow thinking, incorrect thinking, and the general loss of ability to think or act normal.

Yeah, I don't know anything else to help you, just thought you would like to know some things.

[Kebooo]

I don't feel vulnerable in my sleep.  I actually enjoy sleeping in.  I don't expect any type of hostile entity to take advantage of my helplessness.  Once I'm asleep, I'm oblivious to thought and existence (mostly).  It's merely the feeling of, 'this is what it feels like to die' that bothers me so much and keeps me awake.  I don't understand why I'm more aware of it some nights than others.  It doesn't correlate with whether I think about it or not.  Sometimes I can be completely paying attention to my consciousness and not notice myself falling asleep.  Other times it feels as if I can fully be aware of it, as it happens, and how deathly it feels, as if my awareness is there, but my inner monologue is gone, my breathing is slowing, my limbs weighed down, complete blackness flooding over my perception, and overall just feels like the world is closing in on my mind.  I didn't ever have this sensation until I became more aware of the process of falling asleep.  It's definitely a case of ignorance is bliss.  I also notice sometimes my body will have an involuntary twitch right before I'm about to fall asleep, as if even my unconscious mind wants me to stay awake. 

[Il Palazzo]

But that's bullshit. It's not how it feels when you die(not that I have a firsthand experience).
Look around you, people die of heart attacks, violent accidents, being stabbed, ran over, set on fire, shot. Of painful and unpleasant diseases, due to choking, loss of blood etc. You name it.
When you'll be dying, you're going to be too preocupied with pain to think about losing consciousness, or your mind will be so far gone due to Alzheimer's(or whatever), you won't even notice.
If you want to fear something 'cause it feels like dying, start being afraid of getting yourself knocked-out in a fistfight, it'll at least bear some resemblance.

[Kebooo]

Of course, but those are even worse - the last moments of your existence are filled with pain, or the degradation of who and what you were.  Is there really a pleasant way to die, a moment where you can say "I don't want to live any longer" while things to live for still stand?  I think I would prefer to die with anxiety than burning alive or mangled.  I've always considered that the easiest way to die is probably in a war you believe in, your adrenaline is pumping and death is not a given, so you aren't expecting it, it's merely a possibility.  In some ways, NERD ALERT NERD ALERT, I can identify with the Klingons desire to die in battle from Star Trek (I can't believe I actually typed that).  But I'm a non-violent man and have no desire to actually fight in any battles, nor do I wish for wars to even exist outside of entertainment.

But if I'm an 85 year old, cancer eating away at me, merely waiting for the day I have a heart attack or the night I go to sleep and don't wake up, that seems just as bad, if not worse, than dying feeling like going to sleep.

The notion 'this is what it must feel like to die' isn't meant to be taken literally, it's more the idea that, if even for a mere split second, you become aware you're about to die, or your mental faculties are so far gone, the 'death' of your identity occurred long before this.  If I get Alzheimer's, some point in my life I will realize I'm losing my mind, and I am sure that will be an awful feeling too, if anything it would be like dragging death out over months or years, even more cruel than usual.  So really, there is no pleasant way to pass into the void, at least none I see.  And suppose there was - that wouldn't change the feeling I have (sometimes) when I go to sleep, that it feels like my mind is being smothered by some inexorable force, no choice, no escape, snuffing out my intelligence, enslaved by an outside force that is not my own.

[Il Palazzo]

Gosh, I don't know. Read some Nietsche, Kierkegaard, maybe Dawkins and Hawking to boot. Nihilism and/or existentialism might give you some consolation.
Or get a regular job that you'll grow to hate. After some years you'll get so tired of life you won't be bothered anymore.

[Kebooo]

There's always that possibility, getting tired of life.  But isn't that pretty depressing to consider?  Actually losing the joy for life, I would hope to never be cursed with that affliction.  Even people in horrible poverty in Africa usually have a desire to continue on.  And of course most people can retire at some point.  If someone told me I had to work as a slave for all eternity, of course I would choose the void.  I'd choose it over any traditional conception of hell, too, or some other eternally miserable existence.  But the average person believes in an afterlife.  Ever notice how many religions believe in an eternal afterlife?  I would say most people don't welcome the void, but whether it exists or not doesn't really affect my sleep any way.  We've got two separate ideas going on now.

Even the most mundane job still gives you plenty of time to roll Ulmish filth and enjoy other interests, hobbies and people.  I can derive enjoyment from merely watching the movement of my fingers, the wonder that my mind even exists, that a universe is here that resulted in me, and I am capable of analyzing my own existence, the beginning and end of the universe, etc.  Truly intelligence is the greatest wonder.  But I have a general fascination for every little thing, even dust on some level can pique my interest (can you tell I majored in science)?  Many things people may consider mundane or boring can be riveting for me.

There probably is no solution for this besides anxiety medication, which I opt against.  There's always listening to music or something that distracts my mind, but on the whole that would probably cut out more sleep than I would save.  I probably shouldn't have even created this topic, but when it's 4:15 AM, you're exhausted, and you've been trying to fall asleep for 3 hours, the frustration just builds.  Maybe I need to contact Agent Smith and get plugged back into the Matrix.

[Tarran]

And your mind is likely also mush at 4AM.