How did you sleep? How do you normally sleep?

[NJmaverick]

Do you fall aspleep easily? Do you have trouble falling asleep? Are you a sound sleeper or a light sleeper? Do you have trouble sleeping? How many hours a day do you need?

[tekisui]

1. I lay down and am asleep within minutes.

I sleep soundly for 6-7 hours. I wake up immediately when the alarm goes off, many times just before and am out of bed.

[NJmaverick]

8. You are so lucky

[tekisui]

10. It's easy. I just quit thinking.

:P

It drives my wife crazy when I tell her to just quit thinking when she can't get to sleep.

[av8rdave]

2. I fall asleep very quickly but often wake up in the middle of the night

Last night I think it was knowing I had to be up at 4.

[NJmaverick]

3. That is an awesome picture!

[av8rdave]

4. Thanks....I loved it as soon as I saw it.

It's actually a fridge magnet I found (in all places) Alabama.

[moriah]

5. Insomniac, work nights.

Doc is calling it Shift Work Sleep Disorder combined with alpha-delta sleep anomaly and mild RLS.

I have a very difficult time falling asleep despite trying to implement behavioral and environmental methods to address it. I actually got one of those lamps people who have seasonal depression use, and use it in my "morning". My bedroom is as dark as I can make it, and I have put heavy draperies in the windows of the other rooms to prevent much light setting me off in my "evening", but it's still an issue. It's exacerbated by the fact that sometimes you just gotta do things during the day on your days off so I can't keep a proper rhythm. I do not read in bed or any other stimulating activities (well aside from sex but that can be a very good sleep-inducer!)

The alpha-delta and RLS do make me wake up more often and get less restorative sleep. As a consequence, whenever I actually do get to sleep I can be in bed for 12-14 hours and still wake up tired. When I've had an especially bad week, my first night off I will sometimes sleep for 16 hours. I usually wake up every 2-3 hours but am so tired I get back to sleep fairly okay. When I can't get back to sleep, though, I only lay there for 15 minutes before I get up and either read a very difficult book (I like English translations of Carl Jung's works) or meditate, then lay back down and try again.

Prescriptions given for it include Ambien, low-dose Klonopin for the RLS, and I've been given Elavil to attempt to resolve the alpha-delta but it didn't work very well. I do not take the Ambien all the time -- I do not take it if I don't have to go to work when my allocated sleep time is over, and I always TRY to get to sleep first. To keep from getting tolerance to the Klonopin I do three weeks on, one week off, and haven't had to go up from the 0.5 mg dosage or had withdrawal symptoms on my week off.

(You asked....)

[NJmaverick]

7. I never knew someone with RLS. I was beginning to think the drug

companies had made that one up. Sounds like you need to get off the night shift though, it doesn't sound like your body likes it.

[Rising Phoenix]

6. like shit

and like shit

[NJmaverick]

9. I hear ya, and can relate

[LeftyFingerPop]

11. I have sleep apnea. I put on the CPAP mask when I go to bed...

and normally fall asleep fairly quickly.

However, I usually semi-awaken after a few hours and rip my mask off.

If I get 5 hours of sleep a night, I'm lucky.

:hi:

[NJmaverick]

12. Do you find you at least sleep better and feel better

since the sleep study and CPAP machine?

[LeftyFingerPop]

13. Yes. If I can manage to keep the mask on for at least 3 hours or so...

then I find that I experience much less daytime fatigue. I am assuming that is because I am getting a quality sleep at least during those 3 hours.

[lizerdbits]

14. I've had some sleep issues for a couple years

My dad has sleep apnea so I had a sleep study done but don't have it. I do wake up a lot during the night according to the study but I'm not conscious of it, so that's why I feel hung over a lot. Was on several drugs but they either did nothing or made the daytime worse. Benadryl is more effective and cheaper though I don't use it a lot, only if I'm stressed and can't fall asleep. Dr has my trying melatonin now which doesn't seem to be doing much so far.

[NJmaverick]

15. What about some of the herbal sleep suppliments?

have you tried them?

[moriah]

16. Glad you ruled out apnea.

I'm assuming the sleep study didn't find any other symptoms, like reduced sleep efficiency or the oddities that showed up on mine (the alpha-delta anomaly or RLS/PLMD)?

Melatonin can help, and I have used it myself in trying to ensure my sleep schedule stays on track, but it only works if you take it at the same time every day, regardless of if you are sleepy or not. Another odd cocktail that sometimes helps people is a combination of melatonin, GABA, and 5-HTP. I am unsure if the GABA or 5-HTP is actually what does it (neither of those supplements have had any studies done on them regarding their efficacy and many chemicals like those will either not cross the Blood Brain Barrier or are destroyed by the acid in the stomach), but it does seem to help some, possibly because those are precursors to brain chemicals -- if they survive the stomach acid even if they don't cross the BBB they might be effective in helping the body produce more of the real thing.

Valerian also works for some but if the formula you buy doesn't stink like the devil it's not likely going to work. Valerian root is horribly, horribly stinky, some describe it like dirty socks, others just can't think of an odor that matches its pungency. It is more effective in a decoction -- get some of the dried, VERY stinky valerian root, put about 2 tsp of it in a tea ball, and put it in boiling for 10 minutes -- and keep it boiling the whole time. Turn off the heat and infuse another teaball with herbs to cover up the flavor. Mint, chamomile, and hops is a good mixture (1 tsp of the first two and a tablespoon of the hops), as the chamomile and hops will also help with sleep and the mint can help with the flavor. Let the infusion mixture steep in the no-longer-boiling-but-very-hot valerian decoction for 5 minutes. Add sweetner of some kind or another, hold your nose, and drink it down fast. Works better on an empty stomach. Air freshener is a good thing to have handy afterwords.

Cats LOVE the smell of valerian and will seek it out more readily than they do catnip -- I didn't have a good place for it once and my cat got into the stuff. I found her laying there, rolling in it and acting MUCH more stoned than she ever did on 'nip. I called the vet and she said even if she'd eaten some of it it wouldn't hurt her but that I needed to put it away better in order to keep from contributing to the delinquency of a feline. *grin*

Benadryl can work but be careful about its tendency to dry mucous membranes. If you take it to sleep, make sure you are scrupulous with your oral hygiene before you take it, drink only water after, and keep a glass of water by your bed. Otherwise, you likely will develop cavities very quickly, much more quickly than usual (something I learned to my regret). It can also cause problems with your sinuses and lungs -- mucous needs to be wet to be effective and to allow you to cough it up easily if you catch a cold. Guaifenisen with it can help if you feel like your breathing or sinuses are suffering from it, but you will need to drink much more water to help it along.

... last ditch ... Ambien has been a miracle drug for me. Lunesta is better to take if you take it on a regular basis but I can't afford it (now that Ambien is available in generic form it's only $5 a month under my insurance, and without insurance from USA Drug it's under $30). Both are tolerance-forming and habit-forming, but Lunesta is considered to be less habit-forming than Ambien. I don't take it every night specifically to avoid habituation and tolerance. Some people have very weird reactions to both drugs and Ambien is more likely to cause them than the other "Z" drugs (Lunesta and Sonata, the generics are zopiclone and zapelon respectively, Ambien is zolpidem). Please forgive the caps, but this part is important: DO NOT TAKE UNTIL YOU ARE ACTUALLY IN BED READY TO GO TO SLEEP. All of the "Z" drugs hit hard and fast, and if you stay awake while on them you can have blackouts -- you won't remember what the hell you were doing but the people around you might think you're perfectly sober, or you may act very strange and do things very out of character. (I've had people call me and me not remember it, though they thought I was fine, just a bit tired. One time I took it and then got distracted before I went to bed, and I posted some very odd things on a forum.) The "Z" drugs work much better on an empty stomach.

Wish you the best of luck in dealing with your sleep problems.

[lizerdbits]

18. For some reason this doc wasn't interested in sleep drugs

just drugs that affected various neurotransmitters which he believed I had too much of causing me to wake up a lot. The usual side effect is worse memory (which is already a problem when you don't sleep well). The study said my sleep is not restorative (no shit, that's why I'm getting this study! LOL!) and my MSLT was normal (my dad also has some narcolepsy and a gene associated with it so that was automatically added), and I didn't have much limb movement.

There may be be a hormonal component for me, as BCPs I took for severe bloating have resulted in improvements though that could be coincidental, and I felt fabulous for a week and a half last fall when I had a period without being on the pill. I also have night sweats during the off time from the pills. (I'm 34 so no one will test things like FSH to see if I'm hitting that time early.)

I can ask the dr about the valerian though the whole smell thing makes me nervous. If I have time later I can check out pubmed to see what kind of data there is before going in. And thanks for the warning about cats since I've got one!

[Mutley]

17. Like crap. I woke up a lot.

I usually sleep pretty well. If I wait until I'm tired to go to bed, I can fall asleep moments after lying down. I'm a light sleeper, and I need between 7 and 8 hours. I can function on less, but not happily, and only for so many days in a row.