sleep...

[naamplao]

These are some of the questions that you may be asked to determine if you are possibly narcoleptic

You may be narcoleptic if....

1. you have an overpowering desire to sleep at an inappropriate time.

For example you are in an office meeting with an important client and find yourself nodding off.

2. you went to a movie or concert that you really wanted to see but fell asleep during the performance.

This has happened to me many times. I also used to play chess with my son while lying on the livingroom floor. I would nod off in the middle of the game. It bugged him at first but when he realized I had a problem he would just watch tv until I woke up...10 mins later (narcoleptics are great power nappers)

3. you have terrifying dreams and wake up thinking the senario is real.

I constantly wake up thinking I have a final exam to write on a subject that I have not even cracked a book....which is more laughable because I haven't taken a serious course in 20 years.

My "bad" time is between 4:00pm and 6:00pm. I was driving home from a sales day...a 5 hour drive. I felt sleepy so pulled into a service area and stopped in front of a restaurant. I was just going to have a nap in the car...rolled down the window a bit for air, reclined the bucket seat, turned the radio down and fell asleep. Well I dreamt I was still driving....I flicked open my eyes and saw me headed for the restaurant window. I paniced and literally slammed on the brakes, honked the horn and braced myself for the unavoidable collision....only to discover 15 sec later I wasn't moving. Soooo embarrassed Everyone in the lot was looking at me...I started the car. slipped it into gear and went to the next service area for coffee.

4. you have ever driven on a highway and not known where you are, until you see the next highway marker.

5. you have decided to drive to the shopping centre but suddenly realize you are heading for the office.

Those are just some signs that you may be narcoleptic. Many of the stories are funny in retrospect...I have several more. This problem eventually was a contributing factor in me giving up my career as an industrial salesman. I still drive but I am very careful and take many nap breaks along the way if it is a long trip (over 3 hours).

 

[wordofvirtue]

I have fibromyalgia which involves horrible sleep disruptions. I feel your pain. I have used ambien for the last oh, I dunno, 7 years -- maybe closer to 8. It still works as well today as it did the first night. And it recently went generic, woo-hoo! A word of caution: don't even think about posting anything on any forum (or email) anywhere after you've taken it. It could be called "amnesien". The next day you'll be horrified about the terrible writing that you never remembered doing in the first place. That's the thing. It's not a "knock-out" pill. You can be awake. But you won't remember it.

 

[DeeZire]

I can't sleep without my 8 oz. glass of wine. But it's tricky. Follow the wine with a glass of water, and then hit the sack. If you wait too long before you go to bed, you'll lose the buzz, and then you'll want another glass of wine, and another, and another...
Without my glass of wine, I'm awake in bed an extra two hours, at least, before I can sleep.
Exercise helps too. Perhaps do an intense set of pushups, situps, stairsteps, whatever you can do at home. But do them early, so you have time to wind down before going to bed.

 

[helix27]

yea wine would not work for me. i can do one beer sometimes and sleep though. I actually have a decent sleep schedule so that i can get some stuff done during the day. its nice and all, but, i am going to be pretty tired at my gigs thursday, friday, and saturday. speaking of sleep going to go try now. my eyes are sore.

 

[Mr_G]

Listen up helix because I use a technique I believe might help you. The problem with falling asleep is often that your mind is racing at the end of a busy day; yet actually trying to actively concentrate on nothing can often be just as distracting. Try this: imagine a very plain room with a baloon floating in it, and a table. Now imagine a color for each, for example: Red baloon, orange room, blue table. Visually imagine the room and objects as being these colors for a few seconds and then switch the colors for each; continue this until you fall asleep. The point of this is that your mind isn't racing, and you aren't thinking OMG I have to sleep. It's basically a placeholder until you doze off.

 

[cocolacroix]

 

[naamplao]

okay, ill just share this because its funny...i have insomnia and i get about 2 hours sleep a night and i was friends with a guy who had a form of narcolepsy where he would drop out about every 2 hours...and i have to say, my life is miserable and im a zombie all the time but dropping to sleep mid conversation or whilst driving your FRIENDS around a deserted damn horrible ISLAND is so much worse than not sleeping much.

Hahaha....yes It can be funny. I usually was ok when I drove...or at least I could recognize I was getting really sleepy...usually.

But when I was a passenger it was another story. I was returning from sales meeting one time. I didn't take my car to the meeting but rather carpooled with another salesman. He had a much longer distance to drive after he dropped me off so I offered to drive the first leg to my place so he could relax. He declined the offer so I sat in the front seat beside him.

I believe the role of the passenger on a long trip is to maintain a conversation while riding a long distance to keep the driver awake. But as the drive continued its second hour I drifted off to sleep....but I still kept talking!!!

Of course it was gibberish!!! After a few minutes I woke up and looked at him and saw a weird look on his face. I looked at him and said "I guess I fell asleep,eh!?" He laughed and said "and you wanted to drive!!!???"

You are most vulnerable when you are passive...

 

[MaydayUK]

My ex was a nurse and would sometimes work the night hours. She bought some very heavy, thick drapes for our house which were quite effective at making the room dark during the daylight hours. This helped her tremendously.

I second this - when I was in my bad phase I climbed around my room and taped rolls and rolls of thick brown packing paper over the skylight, turned off every light (even LEDs on my stereo etc), and slept with two sleep masks on. For a few months that was the only way I could sleep, any light at all made it impossible.

I have fibromyalgia which involves horrible sleep disruptions. I feel your pain.

Same here (or rather I "had" it . . . a year or so ago most of the symptoms basically vanished. I'm feeling some of the pains and tiredness start to come back though, which concerns me a bit).

Either being completely unable to sleep for days, to the point of hallucinating; or needing to sleep 12 hours a day to have any energy at all; to taking a few hours to go from asleep to awake so I couldn't function for half the day anyway.

I actually thought it was possibly narcolepsy related, in that when I sleep I have very vivid, very deep dreams immediately - I mean I can fall asleep and wake up less than a minute later (eg on a bus) and in that time I will have had a completely convincing dream. Narcolepsy is the only sleep disorder I can think of with intense dreams starting immediately on falling asleep and lasting all night (though I think some people with fibromyalgia report it too).

I've been advised by a sleep researcher that I certainly have a late bodyclock (can't remember the technical term) and very likely a sleep phase disorder, but no way to be sure or do anything without a sleep study, which would be impossible here.

Anyway - Helix, I hope you're feeling better!