Making Up for Missed Prayers
4-2-2002 | IslamWeb
Question:
1) During the month of Sha'baan I was in great mental and physical disturbance due to the life I was living and my friend advised me to seek help from Allah, and I did so and help came. Now my mental and physical state are fine. But I'm experiencing another problem now, neglect of my prayers. I don't want to do so, but there times when I find myself missing my prayers. I need guidance.2) Someone told me that for all the time I missed praying I have to do Qadha, but he failed to tell me how to do this Qadha for I have missed prayers for so many years. Do I just start praying until I'm tired or do I pray Qadha during that particular period of Salah that I have missed, e.g. early morning prayer with Qadha for early morning.
Answer:
All perfect praise be to Allah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allah, and that Muhammad 
is His slave and Messenger.
One has to make up all the missed Prayers according to his capacity till he makes sure that he has performed all the missed Prayers.
If the missed Prayers are so many and he cannot make them up at once or in a short period, then he has to perform them as convenient to him. He has to devote himself in making up the missed Prayers as long as he does not face any physical harm, such as becoming weaker or contracting a disease, or a monetary harm, such as failure to manage his worldly matters etc. (refer to Al-Mughni by Ibn Qudaamah)
Some other scholars are of the opinion that he has to make up the two missed Prayers with each obligatory Prayer; i.e., he has to pray with Thuhr Prayer the missed Thuhr and ‘Asr Prayers and with ‘Asr Prayer the missed Maghrib and ‘Isha Prayers and with Maghrib Prayer the missed Fajr and Thuhr Prayers, and so on till he completes making up all the missed Prayers.
We advise you, dear brother, to turn to Allah in sincere repentance, to attend the congregational Prayers, to memorize the Quran as much as possible, to learn the rulings of the Sharee’ah, and to be with pious people.
Know that Allah forgives all sins except committing Shirk. Allah Says (what means): {Indeed, Allah does not forgive association with Him, but He forgives what is less than that for whom He wills.} [Quran 4:48]
For more benefit on how to make up many missed prayers, please refer to Fataawa 86918, 84403 and 83727.
Allah knows best.