Hyper Alertness

For everything and anything else not covered in the other RLS sections.
Ladyslider
Posts: 30
Joined: Wed Sep 06, 2017 3:46 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by Ladyslider »

I took my Oxycontin at 4:00PM today. I'm hoping by the time I go to bed around 10:00PM the hyper alertness will ben worn off and I can sleep. My alarm goes off at 5:00am. So if I don't get to sleep pretty soon or wake up restless (which happens a lot) I am functioning on 3-5 hours of sleep. I drag thru the day. By the afternoon I'm beat! I'll see how today and tonight works out. I'm keeping a detailed RLS diary. I was very lazy today and just took it easy. Caught up on some much needed sleep.

Hopefully you can get a cocktail that works for you. It's such a drag to "drag" thru each day.

debbluebird
Posts: 2386
Joined: Mon May 21, 2012 3:27 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by debbluebird »

Polar Bear wrote:There is no way I could have continued to work on the sleep I was getting.
Being retired means no clock watching during the night and not being worried about the alarm going off for work.

However, I just wonder if I've let it go a little too much the other way.

At present my sleep aid is amitriptyline, having tried just about everything else and gaining no benefit. Dr wanted me to try it as it would also help with my Fibromyalgia. Instructions are to take it about two hours before bedtime and so I take it around 9.30pm. Often I might nod off a little during a television programme, perhaps for a half hour, probably not as much as that. Get to bed and then I'm wide awake, read for a while and eventually get up again. These last few weeks I'm going to sleep around 5am. Sleep is fractured and I get up at perhaps 9, or 10, or whenever. This morning it was 11am. I was awake before this and up, but went back to bed tried to lie on and read. Soreness and stiffness sometimes get me out of bed. As does a neck-headache.

For goodness sake, I'm taking sleeping aids at 9.30pm and still awake at 5am.
When I get up for the day, be it 8.30, 10, or 11, I'm slow to start, have coffee, check on my emails, this discussion board etc etc. sometimes it's lunchtime before I make it to the shower, get respectable for the day.

At my next appointment I shall ask to try a sleeping-aid-cocktail as per badnights' regime.


I looked up the side effects for amitriptyline. There are 3 that disrupt sleep. Maybe this is what is happening. If it were me, I'd stop taking it.

Polar Bear
Moderator
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Joined: Tue Dec 26, 2006 4:34 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by Polar Bear »

I know that anti depressants i.e. amitriptyline can disrupt sleep. I am like this on any sleep aid I've tried and I've tried a lot over about 15 years. Yes deb, I'll be talking to Dr soon.
Betty
https://www.mayoclinicproceedings.org/a ... 0/fulltext
Opinions presented by Discussion Board Moderators are personal in nature and do not, in any way, represent the opinion of the RLS Foundation

Ladyslider
Posts: 30
Joined: Wed Sep 06, 2017 3:46 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by Ladyslider »

[quote="Ladyslider"]I took my Oxycontin at 4:00PM today. I'm hoping by the time I go to bed around 10:00PM the hyper alertness will ben worn off and I can sleep. My alarm goes off at 5:00am. So if I don't get to sleep pretty soon or wake up restless (which happens a lot) I am functioning on 3-5 hours of sleep. I drag thru the day. By the afternoon I'm beat! I'll see how today and tonight works out. I'm keeping a detailed RLS diary. I was very lazy today and just took it easy. Caught up on some much needed sleep.

Hopefully you can get a cocktail that works for you. It's such a drag to "drag" thru each day.[/quote

Taking the OxyContin at 4:00pm helped with the hyper alertness. I went to sleep at 10:15pm and slept solid until 3:30am. The OxyContin wears off in 10 hours for me. So I’m counting this as a good night . Only 5 hours of sleep but it was uninterrupted.

debbluebird
Posts: 2386
Joined: Mon May 21, 2012 3:27 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by debbluebird »

Betty, as I was lying here, I just realized that your sleep aid doesn't work for about 8 hours, before you are able to go to sleep. Maybe you should take them around 2 pm in the afternoon? Or is it that they just don't work?
When do you lay down? Or do you stay up? I don't ly down until I think I might be able to sleep.
Just wondering.

debbluebird
Posts: 2386
Joined: Mon May 21, 2012 3:27 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by debbluebird »

Also, with my daughters antidepressant, it made her hyper alert. So instead of taking it at night like they wanted her to, because they said it would make her sleepy, she started taking it in the morning. Now, she sleeps fine. Of course, she does not have RLS, but it was the drug, that made me think of that.

Polar Bear
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Joined: Tue Dec 26, 2006 4:34 pm
Location: United Kingdom

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by Polar Bear »

deb - Dr told me to take the sleep aid about 2 hours before bed. I take it at 9pm and go to bed around 11 usually. Read for as long as it takes, so sometimes I fall asleep after an hour but only sleep for an hour or so. Then I'm up for a couple of hours.
Or sometimes I just don't sleep until morning.
I believe the medication just isn't working for me at all.
Be it a bad habit or a good habit, but my entire life I have 'read myself to sleep'. Always, regardless of time.
Betty
https://www.mayoclinicproceedings.org/a ... 0/fulltext
Opinions presented by Discussion Board Moderators are personal in nature and do not, in any way, represent the opinion of the RLS Foundation

debbluebird
Posts: 2386
Joined: Mon May 21, 2012 3:27 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by debbluebird »

Sometimes meds side effects work the opposite of what they should do. That is why my daughter was wide awake at night when she took the pill at night. When she took it in am, then she was sleepy at night.
I would try it, just for kicks, but that's how I am. It might take two days, because of the change.
Your drug is an antidepressant. Sleepiness is a side effect.

debbluebird
Posts: 2386
Joined: Mon May 21, 2012 3:27 pm

Re: Hyper Alertness

Post by debbluebird »

Also, it treats nerve pain. I wonder if it would help my spasms? As well as depression ?

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