I don't know if this is it, but I've looked back on my life and how I am today, and I've noticed that I'm ALWAYS tired. Not to mention I grind my teeth like crazy at night and have been told I move around a lot in my sleep. Been on every kind of medication there is, nothing has worked except benzos. Could this sleep disorder be whats casing anxiety or is it the anxiety causing the sleep disorder?

I have all of those symptoms plus more...I am always tired...more so now since I had my first full-blown anxiety attack...my dentist says my teeth are showing wear from grinding at night and eventually may need some sort of plate for sleeping to stop the grinding...I never sleep through the night and my goodness, you should see my bed when I wake up...blankets are all over the place from my constant tossing and turning. I do have a lot of other symptoms that make me fall into an anxiety category though. I think my anxiety causes my rough sleep patterns.

when I had my anxiety I also had undiagnosed sleep apnea and my constant exhaustion was blamed on depression, I eventually diagnosed the apnea myself, and now benefit a lot from a CPAP machine

heavy snoring is often present with a sleep disorder so is a clue, but occasionally there is no snoring

since there arent any expensive heavily advertised patented meds for sleep disorders, docs seldon think of the possibility

not all sleep disorder sufferers are anxious

a videocamera is helpful for gathering evidence of your sleep disorder, either leave it running or ask someone to photograph you when your breathing stops or you are tossing around in your sleep, a tape recorder is better than nothing

a football mouthguard helps with the toothgrinding or the dentist can make up a thing to wear when asleep
if there are apneas or breathing interuptions, these may not last for more than a couple of seconds and be present with almost every breath, so there may not always be long periods with no breathing

show the evidence to a GP doc and ask for a referral to a sleep lab or sleep studies dept for an overnight sleep study, as mentioned, many docs know almost nothing about sleep disorders and usually blame the exhaustion on depression :o

Hi topballer,
I can totally relate, i have ground away my back teeth, ( dentist made me a mouthgaurd, i get a new on every other month, my gp and dentist have said that they associate the grinding with stress, but after i explained these boards, they are happy to believe mine is anxiety and the possibility anxiety can cause the stress)
I also punch dh quite often in my sleep not to mention the talking shouting crying sweating, kicking tremors..............
All a sign of anxiety, is it any wonder i wake often thru the night?????
I would try to get a mouth gaurd made for you to save your teeth! ;)