Still Kicking!

[joeworkflow]

Just wanted to say, I'M STILL KICKING! :) I'm feeling better and better every day, even with relatively little sleep. I called my Dr's office this morning and asked him to give me a call when had a chance and we talked about the insomnia. At this point, I'm just going to stick with the Tylenol PM. His point was, "the body knows what it needs and will get caught up when and where it will! If you find you are really suffering from sleep depravation, let me know and we can look at some options." This is my PCP, who's been my doc since '91. He's great, and has been through so much with me.

You know what else is strange? I didn't realize how deadened my senses were. For the first 5 or 6 days, everything smelled the same, tasted the same...almost to the point of making me nauseous! But now, it's like all my senses are kicking at 150%! How cool is that? I grabbed a Mocha at Starbucks on my way to work this morning, and WOW was that sweeeeet! :)

Anyway...keeping up the good fight & actually liking it!

-j

[houghchrst]

Hi joe, I somehow missed your post yesterday. I am glad to hear that you are still going strong. I know what you mean about the ole taste buds. Once mine came alive a lot of the fast food that I was eating tasted greasy and kind of all the same (except for the old Big Mac) but so many things began to taste great. have to be careful or the addiction changes to food LOL. Mine did. Boy did I gain weight after I got clean. Still fighting it. As for the sleep , your doc is right. One night you will be so exhausted from lack of proper sleep that you will wake one morning and the last thing you will remember is your head hitting the pillow. Talk about SWEEEET! Jeez I still sleep irregular and hate it but that is because I have other things going on with me. It is great that you have a good doc. Sometimes they are hard to find and so many people are afraid to be honest with their docs so they miss out on a lot of help.

Great to hear from you, keep us updated!!

[Matuboo]

Just wanted to say, I'M STILL KICKING! :) I'm feeling better and better every day, even with relatively little sleep. I called my Dr's office this morning and asked him to give me a call when had a chance and we talked about the insomnia. At this point, I'm just going to stick with the Tylenol PM. His point was, "the body knows what it needs and will get caught up when and where it will! If you find you are really suffering from sleep depravation, let me know and we can look at some options." This is my PCP, who's been my doc since '91. He's great, and has been through so much with me.

You know what else is strange? I didn't realize how deadened my senses were. For the first 5 or 6 days, everything smelled the same, tasted the same...almost to the point of making me nauseous! But now, it's like all my senses are kicking at 150%! How cool is that? I grabbed a Mocha at Starbucks on my way to work this morning, and WOW was that sweeeeet! :)

Anyway...keeping up the good fight & actually liking it!

-j



Glad to hear you're doing well. I've suffered from insomnia for years and have tried a myriad of different drugs. I would have to say that for me, elavil and remeron (antidepessants) have worked the best.


Elavil is an old drug that's been around for many years, in order for it to work effectively for depression, it needs to be taken at a relatively high dose. However, taken at a lower dose (10-50 mg's) it can really be effective for insomnia and in some cases, pain. As for remeron, it's a newer drug and poses some risks but I never slept better than when I was on it. The problem for me was that it caused weight gain, about 25 pounds! This is not the case with everyone though. Tylenol PM is not the best drug out there for insomnia, not even close. You're probably better off simply taking benadryl since it contains with same sedating ingredient (diphenhydramine) without the tylenol, which in and of itself, does nothing for sleep. Not to mention the fact that tylenol can be hard on your liver.


Other drugs are out there for short-term insomnia, like ambien and ambien CR and obviously, benzos like klonopin and ativan but these are all controlled substances and the benzos can be very addictive.


M

[joeworkflow]

Well, I have my wife to thank for honesty with my doctor! She is a bull dog. Well sort of, my wife is Japanese, and not your traditional serve the husband and stay quiet Japanese wife either! She is a tall slender fighter! She scares me sometimes!! I don't know how she's been able to make it the way she has, well, that's not true, I do know how, but that's for a more personal time...Just suffice it to say, she is the glue that's holding our family together.

You guys know all the lies, manipulation, sneaking, etc that goes with addiction...we're master's of it! Well, my wife IS the pure standard of Divine Truth! (and I say that with great sincerity and affection! :) )

She was the one who clued my doctor on to my issues. And being the friend to me that he is, he didn't shame me in any way. In fact, he was very compassionate. I wanted to be honest with him from the beginning, but I was to embarrassed! Well, SHE makes sure of it now.

Some people reading this might think that's strange, but I'm in this for FULL DISCLOSURE! We're living in the light, baby! What I mean by that...for example...either she comes with me to my Dr. Appointments OR she calls my Dr. aftwards to make sure there is no darkness creaping in anywhere...

You know, we believe so much of the world around us will never understand (and for many of those we encounter along the way, it is true!) but I am learning there are so, so many that do. The lies of never telling anyone because they will reject us, or abuse use in some way. I was kept in such a dark place for so many years, simply because I was too ashamed to tell someone I was where I was. The stupid thing? Ahh...everyone already saw me as being right where I was...I had become the emporer without clothes. I had so many layers of masks to get rid of, and twisted thinking patterns that concocked grand schemes to manipulate groups of people in order to get what I needed...and what I needed was to get as far away from pain as I could. Only, no matter where I went, there it was. <sigh> It's not only about not using...it's about all the old patterns, as well.

I was clean for many, many years, living in Japan as a tenured associate professor and we were pretty much set for life until...BAM! We awoke one day in a world called autism (our son's diagnosis is profound autism). Knew the word, but didn't know what it meant, sought help from many medical professionals, but found none! Packed up and moved back to the States...that's about when things went from r-e-a-l-l-y bad to R-E-A-L-L-Y worse. Rats...I reached for a bottle of Jack Daniels and almost 7 years are a blur now. The lies, oh my gosh, I became a master at covering things up. How stupid...The operation on my neck in '04 was the beginning of the beginning for me.

I'm tired, so I think I'll stop here. I started writing this earlier, before we left for our Celebrate Recovery group, and started up after we got back. I'm spent.

Night!

Joe

[joeworkflow]

Thanks M!

I know Tylenol PM probably isn't the best. I was on Lorazepam (generic Ativan) for a very long time... and not therapeutic amounts either. I was taking the full 2mg tabs up to 6 times a day, and when they didn't help me any more? I learned if you crush them together with 30mg Oxy IR's they give a fabulous buzz... see where I'm coming from? I will put up with insomnia for as long as I must. It's OTC meds or nothing at all from here on out.

NOW I'm done. hehe :o

Night!

Joe

[Matuboo]

Thanks M!

I know Tylenol PM probably isn't the best. I was on Lorazepam (generic Ativan) for a very long time... and not therapeutic amounts either. I was taking the full 2mg tabs up to 6 times a day, and when they didn't help me any more? I learned if you crush them together with 30mg Oxy IR's they give a fabulous buzz... see where I'm coming from? I will put up with insomnia for as long as I must. It's OTC meds or nothing at all from here on out.

NOW I'm done. hehe :o

Night!

Joe


Yeah, I was up to 2 mg Klonopin three times per day, sometimes more. Never really got a buzz off it though as it was for medical reasons. As it turns out, it works great for my symptoms but it's probably the only addictive substance I've taken that I haven't actually abused, go figure. I have medical and CP issues that I have to take meds for in order to work and live a normal life. Because of a compassionate doctor who keeps a close eye on me, I am able to function normally and not abuse these drugs. I don't drink, smoke weed or do coke anymore, those were my demons. As for the pain meds, it's simple math, abuse them and I run out early (in pain with horrible WD's.) I've experienced enough bad WD's to behave myself!

Any rate, think about taking the benadryl instead, as I said, same thing - the tylenol, which you probably don't need. Either that or ask your doc about elavil (if your sleep problem becomes severe enough to effect your life.) As you probably know, it's not at all addictive and works well at a low dose, thus, very few side effects.

Good luck and congrats!


M

[joeworkflow]

Any rate, think about taking the benadryl instead, as I said, same thing - the tylenol, which you probably don't need. Either that or ask your doc about elavil (if your sleep problem becomes severe enough to effect your life.) As you probably know, it's not at all addictive and works well at a low dose, thus, very few side effects.

Good luck and congrats!


M

You know what? I must be one of those odd ducks that gets totally hyper on benadryl. I told my wife last night, "hey, maybe I should try some benadryl..." and got the..."are you out of your mind? You won't sleep at ALL! Remember what that does to you??" Ahhh...for good wives...who are worth their weight in (........)! <------please ladies, fill in the blank to your liking!---- :) She is a saint, really.

My head hit the pillow at 10:00pm and I was absolutely OUT! I awoke completely rested; problem? Ahh...it was only 1:00am! So, I climbed out of bed and yes, have been up ever since. Whatever. I feel so stinking good it isn't funny. I'm sitting here at work this morning with more energy (even for being up most of the night), than I did when I was "pain free". Amazing. As it has gone the other days...I know I will be dragging by 4:00, but the end is in sight at that point.

Here's to a good day!

-j

[joeworkflow]

Hi joe, have to be careful or the addiction changes to food LOL. Mine did. Boy did I gain weight after I got clean. Still fighting it.

You know, I'm just the opposite. My body goes into this hybernation state or something. I've been forcing myself to eat little bits and pieces here and there, so I have something to burn during day to give me the energy I need (which I'm obviously not getting from rest!). I've lost 11 pounds in the last 10 days. And again, feeling really, really good about everything. I will be honest (with you, myself and anyone reading this), I was really, really anxious going into this. Not even knowing if I could make it past the first day! BUT! I didn't have to make it past the first day...right...;) ...you got it! I just needed to make it past that particular craving. Once that passed, it was on to the next. The psychological leading to physical craving was the worst, and again, the skin crawling was next. But once those passed, it was just a matter of trying to remain focused and present in my mind to tell myself, "don't even entertain it, man. It's here for a second and gone!" Sure enough...hey, you put a string of those together and you got yourself a major victory! :D

One thing I have ALWAYS been good about is staying hydrated during the day, so there's no chance of just passing out some where in the building!

-j

[Matuboo]

You know what? I must be one of those odd ducks that gets totally hyper on benadryl. I told my wife last night, "hey, maybe I should try some benadryl..." and got the..."are you out of your mind? You won't sleep at ALL! Remember what that does to you??" Ahhh...for good wives...who are worth their weight in (........)! <------please ladies, fill in the blank to your liking!---- :) She is a saint, really.

My head hit the pillow at 10:00pm and I was absolutely OUT! I awoke completely rested; problem? Ahh...it was only 1:00am! So, I climbed out of bed and yes, have been up ever since. Whatever. I feel so stinking good it isn't funny. I'm sitting here at work this morning with more energy (even for being up most of the night), than I did when I was "pain free". Amazing. As it has gone the other days...I know I will be dragging by 4:00, but the end is in sight at that point.

Here's to a good day!

-j


Some people do have that experience when they take benadryl, the odd thing is, tylenol pm has the exact same ingredient (diphenhydramine.) It's kind of a strange drug, at high doses it can cause really strange effects and I've heard of some people (mainly kids) taking 10-20 pills just to try and get a buzz (read about it on Erowid.) Of course, they usually end up getting really sick. It's a strange world, the site also has a user report on Datura (a toxic plant) which people ingest in various ways thinking they'll have some kind of mystic experience, many end up in the hospital.


Hey man, if you can get by on a few hours of sleep, more power to you. As for me, if I don't get at least 6 you don't want to be around me.


M

[joeworkflow]

Hey man, if you can get by on a few hours of sleep, more power to you. As for me, if I don't get at least 6 you don't want to be around me.

M


Last night I didn't take the Tylenol PM, but rather, Melatonin, and that seemed to kick me in the butt for exactly 3 hours, but I did spring awake at 1:00 and just stayed up. It's so strange. I'm tired, yes but not so much that I'm groggie or anything like that. I'm gonna crash soon. It was really a very good day, today!