Posted by TheTaoOfPhil on March 7, 2008, at 6:44:51
In reply to Re: Interrupted sleep with Celexa: me or the drug? » TheTaoOfPhil, posted by rgb on March 7, 2008, at 6:21:13
Hi Folks,
Thanks for the input and suggestions.
I think what may be happening is that the sedating effect of this med is wearing off: whereas it _had_ be knocking me out at bedtime, last night it took me a while to fall a sleep. _And_ I woke up again several times and then finally woke up at 4:30 a.m. The odd thing is that I feel pretty good at the moment. I think I'll try taking the next dose first thing in the morning. I suspect I'll find that it's not really so sedating in the morning any more. And if it is, maybe I'll just have a second cup of green tea :-)
As for zolpidem, I wonder if this isn't similar to Lunesta, which in turn is similar to ambien? The problem with Ambien (and this side effect is mentioned in the literature about Lunesta, too) is that it can cause people to effectively sleep walk for long periods of time and not remember a thing that they did in the episode, to include driving to bars and having sex with strangers. My pdoc, who as I mentioned is quite conservative about side-effects, won't prescribe ambien any more, unless the patient commits to handcuffing himself to the bed :-)
I've heard of trazadone and maybe will ask the pdoc about it again. The first time I mentioned it she said it can be helpful but of course warned me about the worst side effect which for men would be priapism. But I don't know how _likely_ that would be. . . .
I've used melatonin quite a bit and my experience has been that it helps me fall asleep but not stay asleep. But I haven't tried the extended release type. Here again, the other problem is that my pdoc gets nervous about melatonin (and 5-HTP) because there are no _studies_ about their interaction with other meds. I'm at the point where I'm almost more comforable with medications that are studied as opposed to things that are less certain.
All right, well, I'll just try not taking the Celexa this evening and see what happens when I take it in the morning.
Thanks all for sharing your experiences!
poster:TheTaoOfPhil
thread:816564
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20080303/msgs/816689.html