i had a stroke on 10/11/2025. i am still afraid to sleep at night.
i go to gym almost daily chat with friends and and my husbnad but i still feel alone.
i am unsure if anyone has view this yet. i am very new to this platform
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Hi @456
Welcome to the community, I’m sorry to hear about your stroke and that you’re struggling with sleep and feeling alone.
You’re in the right place to feel less alone and I’m sure some of our members will be along shortly to welcome you and offer some advice. There are many people who have similar to how you are now and are doing well.
If you need any help with this, we have a help with this site section which has lots of guides. You can also ask here if you’re unsure of anything, some of our members will also be able to help. You can also tag me using the @ symbol and my username.
Anna
It’s good to hear you are managing to keep socially and physically active despite having had a stroke. Are you getting enough sleep though? Did the stroke occur while you were sleeping?
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Hello @456 and welcome to the community.
Yes, your post has been viewed. In fact as I write this I can see it has been viewed 11 times (mine is the 12th time). You can see this at the bottom of your post.
What you are experiencing may not be that unusual, but I cannot say for sure because each of us are different and we tend to experience and recover differently. Whist there may be some similarities, i find in many aspects we are unique.
You say you are afraid to sleep at night. If I may ask, what is it that you fear and that stops you from sleeping, or do you in fact fall asleep but you just fear going to sleep?
You go to the gym and chat with friends and your husband, yet you feel alone. Is it the case you would like to spend more time with people than you already do or do you feel lonely even when you are chatting with your friends and your husband and when you are at the gym. How does this loneliness manifest itself?
Before you had your stroke, were you able to go to sleep without being afraid?
Did you feel lonely before you had the stroke?
Is it the stroke that you attribute to the fear of sleeping and of feeling lonely?
This question is pertinent as it probes a possible link between your fear of sleeping and having a stroke and I should (as I expect Rupert @Rups would too) be interested to know if you did indeed suffer your stroke whilst you were sleeping.
Wishing you all the best.
Namaste|
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Aye, I think ruling out this trigger is the first step of broadening the conversation, and you have brought up some pertinent points about loneliness or feeling alone @ManjiB as @456 has a reasonably active social life.
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Hi & welcome to the community @456 sorry to hear of your stroke & your difficulty with sleeping at night.
What is it that is making you afraid? Is it the fear of another stroke? If so, I suspect you are on the medication now to help prevent another stroke whixh hopefully will reassure you a but. I think a lot of us have the anxiety of another stroke initially but it usually lessens over time when you start to realise that you’re doing things and nothing bad has happened.
If your anxiety is overwhelming though it may be time to speak to someone about it. Your GP perhaps.
Hopefully being part of this community will help you feel less alone. Is the feeling alone because you feel others don’t understand what has happened and what you’re going through?
Keep talking on here. We can try & help.
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Hi I am good thanks
I had stroke at the while I was asleep
That causes my fear to sleep
It’s been 7 months since my stroke.
It was so unexpected.
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I had my stroke while asleep too, so it’s not just you. I know that healing takes place during sleep, so maybe that thought would help you.
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Seven months is a mere stitch in the great fabric of post stroke time and anxiety can be overwhelming as the brain is on high alert. Looking for patterns can help, in the seven months, when you have slept, nothing happened. You fell asleep, woke, up and, consequently, no stroke. Thinking in safe patterns gets the brain used to reducing the fear. I think they call it exposure therapy. The more you do something and are aware that nothing nefarious has occurred, the easier it is to overcome the fear. Another technique I used was to tell myself that if a stroke happens again, it will happen at anytime and there is nothing I can do about it, but at least I am aware of what a stroke feels like and can address it more effectively than the first time. This allowed me to go walking in the woods, I told myself that a stroke at home on the couch is just the same as a stroke out walking. I told myself this in order to allow me more freedom away from the fear. Also there is time, I was on tenterhooks for the first year before my mind became so distracted with other things that the fear increasingly faded. It hasn’t left me, but it isn’t as present.
This is possibly the most important takeaway from this.
As far as I have been able to ascertain, there is no way to predict when a stroke will happen, nor can it be prevented. It matters not whether it is the first stroke, second stroke or any subsequent stroke.
I don’t believe anyone has ever actually seen a stroke coming and stopped it before it happens - this is just one of those things in life. It happens!
All you can do is when a stroke happens, deal with it as best as you can.
Sure, you can reduce the risk, but you cannot prevent and when it happens it happens. The best thing you can do in my view, is accept this and then get on with your life as best as you can.
Hi Dexster
Thanks for your email. Since joining this group it’s so good to hear I am not alone
Regards
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Hi
True take it as it comes along
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Well, you can race for time and try and lessen the result, but if it is immanent, it is going to happen. It is a contingency that can only be aimed to avoid but not escaped, nevertheless, a part of our controlled hallucinations to a degree.
Yes it was at night and it was a shock
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VDK might help, it is used for PTSD and I find it very useful. I have written a post about it here.