Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

[Isolde]

It's long overdue, but here it is.

We all know how important a good night's sleep is for our overall health and well being (and ability to function the following day!). At lower levels, bac tends to help us sleep deeper and better than we have in a long time. But as we get into higher doses, the opposite is true - we toss and turn constantly, wake up frequently, or flat out have insomnia and can only catch a few hours a night. This is the place to discuss everything related to that, what we're currently experiencing and how we're all trying to find ways to deal with it.

[bleep]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzz

[bleep]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Sorry Is, I know it's more serious than that, I couldn't resist.

I sleep between 2 and 4 hours a night, it was probably about 6 or 7 hours pre-baclofen. For now though, I love it. Something in the baclofen prevents me from feeling tired, unless it's 11 o'clock at night, at which point I will fall asleep standing up if I don't get to bed, or a slow afternoon in the office, which is very tough to stay awake through. The rest of the time I feel fine.

I love the extra time that the insomnia gives me. It would be a different story if I was tired all that time though.

[Isolde]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

I don't have a lot of time right now, but I'll go ahead and get us started. Here's a snippet from my update yesterday in my thread:

Isolde wrote:
Sleep is still hit and miss. (Just remembered I was supposed to start a sleep thread! I'll have to get on that!). I convinced myself that my old mattress was the cause of my back pain and was also contributing to the tossing and turning. So now I'm adjusting to a new mattress. It's memory foam, which I'm not used to. It's definitely more supportive than my old mattress, but I'm still not getting a solid night's sleep. Hopefully it will just be an adjustment period, and I know that the level of bac I'm on is contributing to it at this point too.

It seems that after almost 2 weeks, I've gotten used to the .25mgs of xanax that I've been taking nightly. I'm going to bump it up to .5mgs for a few days, while I continue to titrate down. Hopefully at that point I'll be at a low enough dose of bac that I can quit the xanax completely for awhile and just sleep normally. I'm not even sure I know what normal sleep is anymore!

So I took .5mgs last night and had a better, deeper night's sleep than I've had in longer than I can remember. I only woke up once, and that was because one of the dogs that was sleeping in the room with me wanted to leave.

I'm also a "hot sleeper". I'm pretty much always cold during the day, but at night, I turn into a furnace. I finally bit the bullet last night and switched out my blanket. I have a super soft and comfortable (very light weight!) down comforter that I love, and figured that if I can't use it in winter, when CAN I use it? So I was loath to retire it, especially since I just got it a few months ago. But my sleep is more important. I put on a really light blanket instead and was more cool than hot for a change.

But I'm sure the blanket was just icing on the cake. Over the past few weeks, I'd been getting night sweats and just about chewing through my mouth guard (I'm a big time clencher). It's like all of the stress and anxiety that I can talk myself down from during the day runs rampant at night. That probably has something to do w/me being a hot sleeper, too. When I take enough xanax to do the job, not only do I not wake up drenched in sweat (even prior to the blanket switch), but I can pretty much sleep w/out my mouth guard.

For anyone reading this that hasn't been around for the whole xanax debate, which includes a LOT of good information for both the yay and the nay, just a quick disclaimer to say that it is a benzo with a potential to be addictive (though Dr. Levin says that the bac will prevent that from happening), and your body can pretty quickly build a tolerance to it, causing you to need more. I'm sure others will come along and add to this part of it.

That was more than I was planning to write (damn bac wordiness! :H), so now I'm off to get ready for work!

[Longshot]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Hmmm

As most of you know I've been struggling with chronic insomina since about Nov.

Thanks to Bill Gordon I identified it as myoclonic twitch

My solutions NLP hypnotherapy MP3 while in bed. I've ordered something online to help with the twitching. I'm taking melatonin, and triazolam.

The problem with the triazolam, is I build up a tolerance so stop taking it every few days to let my body not build up a tolerance

And while 1 isnt enough 2 is too many and I have the most insane dreams (last time I found myself awake, making and remaking my bed, for a dream imaginary drill instructor)

So I'm running alot, getting more exercise. That seems to help.

[Ne/Neva Eva]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Thanks so much, Is.
One of the things I have been thinking about is the nature of the sleep disruption.

I used to sleep fitfully, wake up in the middle of the night full of angst and anxiety. A little panic and remorse thrown in there too. I've certainly had that experience taking bac, exacerbated in no small part by AL, in my case.
But with just bac I tend to wake up feeling like I ought to start the day. There aren't really obsessive thoughts, certainly nothing that compares to how lousy I felt when drinking, before or since taking bac.

The hardest part, until recently, was talking myself into staying in bed and waiting for sleep to return. Now it's a little more difficult because my days are more demanding and I am really suffering from the lack of sleep at times when I ought to be productive.

I haven't had the experiences that Longshot talks about. That must be extremely debilitating.

I'm not sure yet how I'm going to resolve my own relatively minor issues about sleep. Everything and nothing is on the table until I know much, much more. I'll approach it the same way I did with bac-treatment. Find what works for others like me, and try it. So I very much appreciate all the input.
That said, I'm going to try to get a little more kip before I start my day!
zzzzz

[prancy]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

With bac, I get to sleep okay, but wake frequently after terrible, despairing dreams. I come totally awake and am completely awake and depressed. What's the deal with the dreams?

[Murphyx]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

I get to sleep without any trouble, but then wake every morning between 2 and 2:30. If I then take a few tablets I picked up at the health food shop*, I can sleep through to about 5:30, then I'm wide awake and just waiting for the 6:15 alarm to go off. If I don't take the tabs then I'll wake every 30 to 60 minutes until 5:30.

The tablets are called Natrasleep. The active ingredients are valerian and hop powder. And they come from Holland and Barrett if any UKers would like to try them.

[beatle]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Maybe someone can repost some of the posts from other threads on this subject so we don't have to repeat a lot of it here?

I see the direction of the thread is unique, which is great -- much needed -- I'm just thinking about the sharing of information element.

Sorry, I'm too busy to do it right now. This is why I never started this thread (too much work to consolidate info).

On the other hand, maybe it's best to just let the thread have its own life?

[Lo0p]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

O h m y g o s h. If I start trying to analyze this (not that I haven't already) I'll probably lose even more sleep thinking about it.

On a more serious note: Thanks Is, it's a much needed thread.

[Greg]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

I encoutered almost total insomnia, 1-2 hours sleep, which made me turn to methods besides high-dose baclofen in order to be sober. This happened whenever I took a largish dose soon before bed. I never worked out why it happened, since baclofen is supposed to have a sedating action. I can understand that people who are already taking a large daily dose could experience insomnia as the baclofen wears off during the night, since it has a very short half-life compared to most drugs.

As for other drugs to help with sleep, I have taken 1 mg Xanax every night since not drinking, about 13 months. Unfortunately I have now built up a fairly large tolerance, which would probably also reduce the effectiveness of any other benzodiazepine in helping me sleep. One solution is over-the-counter antihistamines like doxylamine or diphenhydramine, although tolerance also builds to these...rotating between a benzo and an antihistamine every few days could maybe prevent this tolerance. Other ideas include L-tryptophan, melatonin, and herbal products (if the dose is strong enough). There are also the so-called 'z drugs' zolpidem, zopiclone, eszopiclone, and zaleplon...tolerance to these could unfortunately occur in someone who is already used to benzos however.

Anyway I just wanted to give my thoughts on this, since it definitely affected me enough for me to change treatment. However, if high-dose bac was my only way of quitting alcohol, I would have persisted with it. It is still a treatment I'm hoping a couple of my alcoholic friends will find success with. By the way I did feel quite alert the day following a terrible night's sleep on baclofen, as others have mentioned.

[Lo0p]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

On days that I can. I try to not take baclofen past 6 pm. It seems to work sometimes

[Bill Gorton]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Longshot;1061164 wrote: Hmmm

As most of you know I've been struggling with chronic insomina since about Nov.

Thanks to Bill Gordon I identified it as myoclonic twitch

My solutions NLP hypnotherapy MP3 while in bed. I've ordered something online to help with the twitching. I'm taking melatonin, and triazolam.

The problem with the triazolam, is I build up a tolerance so stop taking it every few days to let my body not build up a tolerance

And while 1 isnt enough 2 is too many and I have the most insane dreams (last time I found myself awake, making and remaking my bed, for a dream imaginary drill instructor)

So I'm running alot, getting more exercise. That seems to help.

Actually, the thanks go to 37degrees for clueing me in on myclonic twitch. What did you order for it? It bugs the hell out of me sometimes.

[Longshot]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Bill Gorton;1061605 wrote: Actually, the thanks go to 37degrees for clueing me in on myclonic twitch. What did you order for it? It bugs the hell out of me sometimes.

5-HTP: The Natural Alternative to Prozac® - Section 2 | Smart Publications

5-Hydroxytryptophan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

5-HTP. Ordered online. Let you know how it works.

[Isolde]

Bac Induced Sleep Issues or The Sleep Thread

Longshot;1061782 wrote: 5-HTP: The Natural Alternative to Prozac® - Section 2 | Smart Publications

5-Hydroxytryptophan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

5-HTP. Ordered online. Let you know how it works.

Hmm, I used to take 5-HTP after rolling, to help replace the depleted serotonin. It never even occurred to me to take it in general to help with sleep! I've still got some sitting around. I'll have to take a look at the articles when I have some free time. Thanks for the rec.