Hello, my problem is a bit detailed but please hear me out. I'm very frustrated.
About 1 and 1/2 months ago, I decided to start working out (lifting weights). I've worked out for 2-3 years about 12 years ago. I've had no trouble sleeping. So, I went into it hard. First time, my workout was intense using heavy weights. I'm skinny and really not in shape so doing squats with 25 LBS dumbbell on each side was pretty challenging at 12 reps. I did other exercises for about 1 hour. My sleep that night was light and shorter than usual. I thought whatever, rested a day and worked out again intensely the day after. That night, my sleep was light and shorter than the previous one. At that point, I didn't attribute my quality of sleep to exercise because I was thinking that exercise ALWAYS should give me good quality of sleep, so I didn't give it much thought. I rested a day and the next day I went into it hard. That night, I got the same poor quality sleep. I rested 2 days and worked out hard again. That night, I got NO sleep. Not even a wink. Wide awake. While I was awake, I recalled my quality of sleep on my previous workout days as well and did some searching online. It said that overexercising can result in insomnia. So I assumed that's what it was. I'm 40 now, so I'm assuming that plays a factor too. I've also had a slight injury where my wrist was hurting me a bit. After those workout sessions, I decided to take a break for a week.
A week after, I went into hard again. NO sleep. Might I add that all my exercises have been late morning or early afternoon. Between 11am - 1pm. I was frustrated so I decided to take another week off but during that week I couldn't sleep 4 days out of 7. I decided to take a longer break. About 2 weeks. After two weeks, I worked out again. For some reason I thought that I was stronger so I did squats with heavier weight. It was a pretty intense exercise. No sleep that night. The next day I got no sleep either even though I didn't exercise. I guess I was in denial and thought I was fully rested which is why I went into it hard. Two days later I developed muscle soreness in my left trapezius and tendinitis in my left arm. I decided to take a break until the tendinitis and the pain went away.
Yesterday, while I had very light pain and some tendinitis, I decided to do a light exercise for 30-40 mins, without putting strain on my trapezius and left arm. So I did some body weight planks. Did squats and deadlifts using a 25 LBS dumbbell, which was not heavy at all, but I broke quite a bit of sweat. But I thought that was because I sweat alot during workout anyway and it was humid that day. NO sleep again last night. I couldn't understand why.. The only thing I can think of is that, I haven't fully recovered yet. But I'm thinking I should have recovered somewhat and that light exercise shouldn't have kept me awake ALL night. I literally was lying in bed for 8 hours, jumped out of bed and writing this.
I'm concerned now because I feel like I can never lift weights again. And even if I did, it wouldn't be anything that would help me gain muscle and strength. I'm skinny already so cardio would literally make me even thinner. Should I wait few months before easing into it again? Is over exercising really is the cause? I'd welcome any advice and input.