Seasonal Depression or Something Else

I'm taking a break from vulvodynia and pudendal neuralgia blogging in order to share something else personal.

I'm having some trouble with sleep and anxiety. The last few weeks I've had bouts of insomnia and an elevated level of day-to-day anxiety. I know daylight savings time really threw me off, especially since I was out of time that weekend. The darkness that begins to creep over the skyline at 4:00pm is really getting me down. But despite of the lowered mood and the shift in time, I can't fall asleep.

This produces one nasty cycle: I have trouble initially falling asleep, then I worry I won't be able to fall asleep, my anxiety level increases, and then I can't sleep. You would think there was a pill for that, well there is, actually, there are a few, and nothing is working for me. I take a low dose Ambien, but it hasn't been able to get me to sleep. I have drugs for anxiety, but they haven't been able to take the edge off to help me fall asleep.

It's a mess. I'm seeing my psychiatrist on Monday to tweak my drugs, but until then I have feeling I'll be pretty tired.

On top of the anxiety produced by trying to go to sleep, I've been really anxious about school. I feel low and panicky when I think about having to go to class.

So this leads me to wonder, is this seasonal depression? I've always loved the fall, so that seems unlikely. Is it stress from the end of the semester? I'm in the home stretch, but the concepts in chemistry have become extremely complex. Could it simply be that the efficacy of my drugs have plateaued and I need to boost them? Maybe it's all of the above.

Whatever it is, it's taking a serious toll on me. I might go buy an over-the-counter sleep aid to get me through the rest of the week.