RLS/WED and meditation

[rlsjanet]

Hello,
I've searched on the internet and in books and although I read quite a bit about how to meditate with chronic pain, I can't find anything about meditation and RLS suffering. I would love to meditate but, as many know, to ignore RLS invites it to scream at you. My solution is to focus on walking meditation, which is wonderful, but it would be good to know how people with RLS/WED manage to sit and meditate.

[ViewsAskew]

It's hard. I let my long-time mediation practice go several years ago. I fall asleep within 2-3 minutes if I'm medicated and if not medicated then the WED starts. My life is so topsy-turvy with time (sleeping odd hours), that I seem to rarely get done the most major things - all other things have gone to the wayside.

One of the other mods - Beth - has managed her practice, I think. It might be interesting to do a search on the work meditate or meditation and read back posts. Let us know if you're not familiar with the search process on the board.

[rlsjanet]

Thank you!

[badnights]

I try to do walking and moving meditation. Lots of yoga. I mostly follow DVDs instead of on my own, nowadays, so I choose instructors with calm voices, otherwise it's a work-out not a meditation. But I've been failing lately, the last 3-4 weeks, and I can feel my stress level rising, the old vicious circle, and the WED getting worse because of it.

I do 5-10 min of breathing exercises sitting up in bed before lying down to sleep - even just simple ones like long, slow exhale to match long, slow inhale, but sometimes fancier stuff - and this really helps me get in the right frame of mind for sleep. But - this is why I usually do simple exercises - I can't do complicated exercises, because I forget where I am, because I start sleeping while doing it.

I used to do sit-down meditation. But I can't do it at night, or I'll fall asleep, and I can't get up "early" and do it before work, and I've never managed to prioritize my life to do it during the day. When I used to do it, pre-WED, I did it at night or I got up early enough to have some free time before work. That's un-imaginable now.

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