Due to a combination of caffeine and hot flashes, I’m not getting much sleep lately - which, for a narcoleptic like me, is a very bad thing. When I don’t get enough sleep, it throws off everything. (I fell asleep at the wheel for just a second the other day and it scared the hell out of me.)
I don’t even drink much caffeine to begin with: A cup of tea when I wake up, and one when I get to the office. Maybe some iced tea with lunch. It doesn’t seem like a lot, but at this point, I’ll try anything to get to sleep and stay there. So yesterday was my first day without caffeine.
Caffeine is my friend. After all, I’m an unmedicated ADDer, and I figure a few cups of tea is a reasonable tradeoff for not being on Ritalin or Adderall. I didn’t decide to go cold turkey lightly.
I can report the one good thing about my first caffeine-free day: No more tics.
I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it, but that’s one of the side-effects of ADD medication. (That, and teeth grinding.) I developed a lot of tics and even though I haven’t taken the stuff for years (okay, there was that half an Adderall I took once while I was packing), the tics are still going strong. My eye and upper lip twitches (I call that one “Elvis”) and muscles in my thighs and belly do it, too.
So no tics but still, not much sleep. I went to bed at 9:30 and woke up at 3:46, read for a while, tried to go back to sleep and finally gave up. Here I am.
I think about sleep all the time now. I’m so jealous of anyone who gets eight hours. I would be thrilled to sleep more than my usual five and a half.
weird, brendan can’t sleep either…
Susie…
you need to work out - HARD. Nothing like physical exhaustion to get you into a deep sleep.
(P.S. For us men sex helps too, but I’m not so sure about women.)
Don’t worry about 5-1/2 or 6 hours of sleep. At our age, that’s all we need.
you and me both susie.
For the past week or two,I’ve been waking up like clockwork at 3:00 AM, and then falling into that weird twilight for the rest of the night.
Nothing seems to work, and I don’t drink caffeine after breakfast.
My friend Tim says to eat more fish. he also says chris should fix the comments at brendancalling.
Why fish?
BTW, don’t know if you know this, but alcohol also disrupts sleep. So don’t be sampling the home brews!
I didn’t sleep well for six months last year. I had a sleep study, pretty normal. My doctor wanted to send me to a surgeon to have a mouth appliance made. I couldn’t face that. Yucch.
My female friends prescribed this to me for sleep disruptions, and my sleep has improved: Chamomile or other sleep tea 1 or 2 hours before bed, with a melatonin pill.
you know what’s been working like a dream for me? sleeptime extra tea, the one with valerian. the regular one does nothing, but that valerian really works for me.
Susie,
I’ve not slept well most of my life — could be I have ADD, as it was defined long after I’d left childhood behind. I agree with two writers above — hard physical exercise helps and so does sex. But I’m not as disciplined as I need to be about exercise, and really prefer sex to be more than a sleeping pill. I’ve recently begun taking a capsule of L-Tryptophan before going to bed and as a result am having far, far fewer sleepless nights. I still have my customary 3 cups of coffee in the morning, but no caffeine after 11 a.m. Melatonin might work also. I tried it years ago when it was in the news so much, but cannot remember why I quit.
I know that adrenalin is a factor with me, as I have lots of trouble settling down after any very exciting or disturbing event. You strike me as a person with very intense feelings, and I believe that has a chemical effect on the body, making it difficult to relax. I have always resisted medication, but am hoping I do not discover any adverse effects from the L-Tryptophan. I’ve been taking it for about 15 months with no apparent ill effects.
You falling asleep at the wheel scared the hell out of us, too.
My friends and I find that a couple of ibuprofen before bed helps a lot.
There’s a relativley new discovery from the Amazon that is turning up in several health-food products: the Acai berry. The berry grows on a type of palm that used to get harvested just for the heart-of-palm, (depleting the rain forest). Most of the product available is not processed fresh, so the anti-oxidant, omega-3, and phyto-nutrient benefits are lost.
The one company that is working with the indigenous people to propogate these trees, (saving the rain forest) and processing the fruit locally to lock in the nutrients is MonaVie. My kid brother is in his late 40’s, he’s a cancer survivor, and he’s had a few nasty injuries throughout his life invloving dislocations and broken bones. Needles to say, he’s been living with chronic pain in several body parts. He’s been drinking this MonaVie juice for about 8 months now, and he looks 5 years younger. He’s got a spring in his step that wasn’t there a year ago.
I’ve been drinking it for almost 6 months, and I don’t have the backaches I used to get, I don’t reach for my reading glasses in the evening when my eyes get tired, the tingling numbness in my left hand has gone away, and I’ve been sleeping much better, too. The Acai berry is the only known food that you could eat exclusively for a month and not show any health deficiencies.
Let me know if you want to try it and I’ll send you a bottle, (or a case). Drink 2 oz. every morning and every night and let us know what you think. Has anybody else heard of this stuff?
I too have not been sleeping — for months! Last night I tried 500 mg of magnesium citrate (relaxes the muscles and stopped restless leg syndrome) and half a dose of generic tylenol PM. I woke up once and then the next thing I knew it was morning! I felt like my old self today - what a difference sleep makes. Magnesium may work on tics - I dunno. Good luck!
Americans and pills? (Or disguised pills with herbal teas)! Start training for a marathon and your problems will be over.
Considering that I can’t even do yoga until I get my ankle operated on (and go through two months recovery where I won’t be allowed to put any weight on it), training for a marathon isn’t an option.
Wheelchair marathon?