[embee1]

Life story coming up!

I'm a female twenty year old student and my sleep is seriously ruining my life.

When I was a teenager, before I left home, I always loved to sleep and could do it for hours. At sixth form I would sometimes take mornings off because I was too tired but just assumed I was being lazy. Then last year I had a severe bout of depression and anxiety and my sleep just went haywire. I would stay up all night and then fall asleep as it was getting light. The depression slowly eased off but I continued to have this sleep thing. I would go to lectures on no sleep because it got to a point where there was just no point going to sleep, then come home and sleep till it got dark. Even if I stayed up for 36 hours I'd get back into the same pattern. It was awful- I couldn't do anything and my life went haywire. Even running errands was difficult- I'd be rushing to get to the shops or post office or whatever before they closed at five.

About 3 months ago my sleep cleared up, but only due to my parents & cats dragging me out of bed in the morning (I went home for the summer). Now I'm back at uni and it's gone haywire again. I'm not depressed, I don't take any meds and there's no reason for it to be doing this again. I come home most weekends and its still like this.

I'm going to go see my GP- what should I say? Sleeping pills dont work, I need my body clock set back, but I can't afford to pay for a private sleep clinic. What do you find helps? I love getting up early, I love the daylight, but it seems to be slipping away from me!