anyone take sleep aids? do you wake up groggy? feel rested?

[greenbriar]

I suffer greatly from insomnia...probably why I post a lot


doc has mentioned that there are sleep aids that could help

but they scare me


I have to get up at 5:30 and I try to go to bed by 10:30 thinking I will get good rest

but I usually watch the clock

you know that commerical


I have resisted becuase I worry I won't wake up on time

what are your experiences

[Skittles]

1. I live on sleep aids

an OTC one that works for me is Unisom Sleep Melts - I feel fine waking up from those

[busybl]

2. I take ambien sometimes

it knocks me out for about 10 hours. There are otc that might be more friendly.

[greenbriar]

4. a lady at work says she takes a half of one

has offered to let me try one

I may take her up on it maybe on a Friday night when I have nothing on Saturday

[busybl]

5. good idea

[moriah]

17. Take it when you are already in bed -- seriously, I mean it

Ambien and the other "z-drug" hypnotics (Lunesta, Sonata) hit very quickly and cause amnesia for the time you are on them for a lot of people. Some people deliberately fight the onset to experience a high. The safest and best way to take them is to take the pill when you are already in bed, and don't even try to read or anything while you wait for it to hit you -- do relaxation exercises or whatever mental exercise you do to try to get to sleep. You should fall asleep within 20 minutes -- I'm usually out within 10.

I would start with a half if you've never taken them before -- you might require a full 10 mg if you have significant tolerance to benzodiazepines.

Good luck and good dreams!

[busybl]

21. moriah is right

I take ambien only after I am in bed and truly ready to go to sleep. It's like Louie Anderson's joke about Nyquil. You take it standing by the kitchen sink and wake up 2 days later on the kitchen floor.

[Taverner]

31. Ambien straight is great. The time release stuff - horrible

Something in that makes me get dizzy spells the next day

[merh]

3. dramamine is great.

if I have an upset tummy before bed it helps with that, it puts me to sleep and it doesn't leave me groggy in the a.m.

[ThomCat]

6. My muscle relaxers work far better than any sleep aid.

Muscle relaxers and many other prescription meds cause drowsiness and put me right to sleep. No sleep aid has ever worked so well. As long as my pain is kept under control I sleep like the dead.

And because the primary effect of the med is one I need, if I still feel a bit loose in my muscles in the morning, that's perfectly okay. It passes as soon as I start moving around. I don't feel groggy or anything. Just relaxed.

All meds have side effects. If you are already taking other meds, try to use those side effects to your advantage instead of adding more meds that you don't really need. Switch to meds you need that will have side effects that benefit you too. :)

:hug:

Be well. I hope you can sleep well.

[janx]

7. A lot of people are into pharmaceutical drugs,

but I'm not one of them.

I like wine, work hard, and sleep like a bat.

[RushIsRot]

8. How do you manage to hang upside down while asleep? It seems

a bit awkward.

EMWTK

[Suich]

9. Tylenol PM

No problems...wake up fine!

Good luck!

[fujiyama]

14. Be careful

The acetaminophen's long term effects on the liver aren't good.

[moriah]

18. Cheaper to buy the generic Benadryl, too.

Five bucks for 100 tablets, that should be like three months supply. Same active ingredient, no nasty Tylenol.

[Liberal Veteran]

23. Diphenhydramine makes me extremely groggy the next day.

It works, but a little too well.

[texanwitch]

10. I use herbs.

The pills I buy really work.

[old mark]

11. Melatonin. Has worked very well for me for years,

very gentle and no hangover.

mark

[murielm99]

15. Melatonin does not work for me.

Neither does tylenol p.m.

Some people recommend benadryl. I haven't taken it, because I take some prescription meds, and I don't want to mix it with those meds.

When I had bronchitis, I had a cough medicine that was working for me. Of course I am not taking it now.

[JCMach1]

12. Valerian, Melatonin, Kava Kava all have worked pretty well

for me over the years. I would generally alternate them so there is no loss of effectiveness.

[AlienGirl]

13. I like Ambien (which I currently can't afford)

My insomnia tends to be driven by anxiety and hypervigilance, and Ambien makes me feel safe. It gives me the mental illusion that someone else is awake to take care of watching out for danger. I don't get residual grogginess from it like I do with Benadryl or Dramamine, and I don't get headaches like I did with Trazadone.

Tucker

[busybl]

22. zolpidem is generic for ambien

[AlienGirl]

25. I know; it's still quite expensive, and not on the $4-generic plans anywhere

[busybl]

28. darn, that's too bad.

I think that type drug docs won't give you samples either.

[moriah]

16. I've tried lots of them.

Ambien/zolpidem -- still the most effective for me. Do NOT take it unless you are in bed. Swallow the pill, keep a glass of water beside your bed, then start trying to sleep -- do breathing exercises or count sheep or whatever relaxation stuff you try to do to induce sleep. Do not take it unless you've got a full 8-10 hours to sleep. Do your best not to have to answer the phone or be woken up, or you might not remember what you said/did.

Lunesta/zopiclone -- same rules apply as to Ambien. Not as effective for me and leaves a horrid taste in your mouth.

Sonata/zapelon -- Same rules apply as to Ambien and any of the other "z-drugs", the weakest of the three. If even Lunesta throws you for too much of a loop, Sonata might be a good choice. You can take another Sonata if you wake up in the middle of the night, you can't with the other two. It has the shortest action time of the three.

Restoril -- temazepam, the best of the benzodiazepine sleep aids, sometimes they will give clonazepam/Klonopin but it lasts longer so you can be sleepy in the mornings with it. Tolerance seems to build quicker for the benzodiazepine sleep aids than it did for the "z-drug" sleep aids for me. Would not take it every night due to tolerance. Any of the benzodiazepine or "z-drug" sleep aids can cause memory loss for the time you take them, so follow the same rules as for Ambien.

Benadryl -- use it or generic benadryl instead of Tylenol PM -- same active ingredient with no Tylenol to kill your liver. Dries your mouth out (not good with my Sjogren's, totally reverses the effects of Evoxac). If you use this as your sleep aid of choice, brush your teeth very thoroughly before you go to bed and don't drink anything but water after you take it until you wake up and brush your teeth again. Trust me, you don't want rotten teeth.

Combination of Melatonin, GABA, and 5-HTP -- the separate ingredients are available from the health food store, works better than Melatonin alone. Best to take it at the same time every night regardless of if you go to sleep from it or not, the Melatonin can take awhile to work but taking it daily at the same time (about an hour or two before bed) can help you get back on a sleep rhythm.

Tea of Valerian, chamomile, and hops -- Get 2 teaballs, boil some water, put a teaspoon of Valerian in one tea ball, and boil for about 3 minutes. Turn the heat off, and put a teaspoon of chamomile and a tablespoon of Hops in the other teaball, and drop it in, let it steep for about 5 minutes. Remove both teaballs and drink, add sugar or honey, and drink it holding your nose -- it tastes AWFUL. But it works.

There are other prescription drugs they will sometimes give for sleep -- I haven't tried the one that's supposed to act on Melatonin receptors (Rozerem). Elavil/amytriptiline can help with quality of sleep but not for getting to sleep for me, and can make you gain weight. There are several other antidepressants and antipsychotics that are sometimes prescribed as well, but they have lots of unhappy side effects. The safest/most effective of the antidepressants for sleep for me was Trazodone. It didn't make me gain weight and I built up to a dose of 150 mg at one point.

Wish you the best of luck....

[cwydro]

19. Usually I sleep pretty well,

but when I have needed something I'll take melatonin or Sleepytime tea. That knocks me right out.

Benedryl works well too.

I would never take prescription sleeping drugs; just don't trust them.

[nuxvomica]

20. Melatonin gave me headaches and l-tryptophan, grogginess

Nowadays on the rare occasion I can't sleep, I take a homeopathic remedy and I wake up refreshed.

[theNotoriousP.I.G.]

24. Yeah, be scared, very scared.

I've been on some meds since April after my sister committed suicide. Two anti-depressants and an anti-anxiety. One of the anti-depressants was to help me sleep. It has been changed 4 times now. The latest is Lyrica which keeps me awake until after 4 in the morning and sleeping until noon. If you can take something herbal, do it.
After my dad died, one of his AA members who sold Herbalife gave us some Sleep Now which is totally natural and worked wonders. Here's a link.

http://www.achieve-better-health.com/product_info.php?products_id=138

Good luck.

[femmocrat]

26. A glass of milk and a banana.

Makes me sleepy and prevents leg cramps. :)

Sometimes the fruit gives me crazy dreams though!

[GoCubsGo]

27. I use Similasan...

It's an OTC herbal product. I bought it at Rite-Aid, but I think most drug and grocery store chains carry it. It works better than anything else I have tried over-the-counter. My problem is not falling asleep, but staying asleep. This works pretty well, and I don't oversleep with it. It's made by a Swiss company, and the Europeans are way ahead of us when it comes to herbal remedies. The dosages are standardized, which is not a guarantee with herbal products produced in this country, sad to say.

http://www.similasanusa.com/products-sleeplessness-relief.cfm

Check out the link for the coupon in the upper right hand corner.

[pitohui]

29. the ones i can afford don't work, the ones that supposedly work are too risky anyway

i think i've learned the hard way that if it has no side effects (unisom, melatonin) then it ain't gonna work for me

those that do work sometimes make you sleep forever --
i've known friends to kill themselves, prob. on purpose w sleeping pills and i've seen people on ambien in public which is just...scary...they could v. easily destroy their lives and end up in prison for something they don't remember doing ...scary scary scary

people here are pretending ambien is something people take after going to bed and maybe that's so on DU, in the real ambien is prescribed as the jet lag drag and i've encountered people on it in public who were clearly operating in black out, i've also had to climb over those same people because they were immobolized by the ambien -- if the plane crashes or if some fucktard fires a gun into your house, you gonna just sleep it off? or you gonna let the drug move your body while your brain sleeps and you have no idea what you're doing?

since i drink i don't take tylenol pm, those who don't drink apparently have a good result w. a fairly safe OTC drug but be honest w. yourself, if you drink a glass of wine every night you're already stressing your liver (again in MY humble view)

[Taverner]

30. Yes I do - Alteril (Melatonin, Tryptophan and Valerian)

Works for me

[BuddhaGirl]

32. Tension RX-Nighttime by Biochem

This has worked wonders for my insomnia...sometimes I take extra L-Theanine to help quiet my mind:


Supplement Facts
Serving Size: 3 Capsules
Servings per Container: 30
Amount Per Serving % Daily Value

Vitamin B6 (as pyridoxine HCl) 50 mg 2500%
4-Amino-3-Phenylbutyric acid 1000 mg *
GABA (gamma-aminobutytic acid) 200 mg *
L-Theanine 100 mg *
Citicoline (CDP choline) 50 mg *
5-HTP (5-hydroxytryptophan) (Griffonia simplicifolia) (seed) 50 mg *
*Daily value not established.

[rcrush]

33. I dont think I've ever NOT been groggy when I wake up

I dont take anything to sleep

[begin_within]

34. Sometimes I take Simply Sleep,

which is diphenhydramine HCL (also sold as Benadryl or Nytol, or just sold as generic "sleep aid" pills in the house brand of many drug stores. It makes me sleep better and I feel great the next day for having gotten some quality sleep. However I have noticed if you take it more than one day in a row, it doesn't seem to work as well. I guess you develop a tolerance for it. For me it works best if I haven't taken it in a while, like at least a week or two. But it seems to work well for me with no side effects.

I have tried taking doxylamine succinate, the other over-the-counter sleep aid, sold under the brand name Unisom, and also sold generically under the house brand of drug stores. It is stronger than diphenhydramine, and makes me sleep well, but both times I took it, I woke up with a headache. So I haven't tried taking it again.

[likesmountains 52]

35. I have a similar schedule. I have to wake up around 4:45 so I take 5 mg Ambien at

9:30 or 10 because it only makes me sleep for about 6 hours. If I have a cup of good, strong coffee in the morning I don't feel groggy. Take the advice above though..be IN BED when you take it. Don't try to walk around and finish up a few chores or anything...just be in bed and ready to fall asleep.