curly fry

Don't know how I missed this the first time! I'm a professional sleepy head!! LOL.

First, go to a sleep clinic if you haven't done so already. They will work with you to find out what's going on with you. The best thing to do is the get a sleep study done, if you haven't done so already. That way you know what it is or what it isn't. I've been extremely sleepy for a couple years where everything would put me to sleep. Anything soothing like a train/ car/ plane ride. Anything involving repitition- sound wise or even activity wise. Even certain conversations with no points (like when people ramble) were causing me heavy eyes. I would sneak off into a quiet room during work and get a couple minutes of sleep because I just couldn't function. General doctors told me that I had bad sleeping habits- which I don't. And would give me about 10 Ambiens to get me into a 'normal' cycle. But I HAD a normal cycle. I decided to just live my life around naps, skip movies past 8pm, and cut my social life. No one wants to go out with a sleepy person who's ready to go home by 12 (I start verbally complaining at 12, but want to go home earlier!)

Finally I went to the sleep clinic, and months later, after trying out other methods, I got my sleep study done. While it appears like I'm sleeping, my brain wakes up all through the night which messes up with my actual sleep stages. I don't spend the right amount of times in my sleep stages or cut in and out of them which can lead to non restorative sleep! FINALLY some kind of answer and I no longer felt (feel) crazy! And because of all that, I have sleep deprivation and can literally fall asleep in 2 minutes or less<- which was shown on the MSLT report (a daytime napping test that calculates the time it takes to fall asleep and go in to REM). Again, another victory for me because I knew it wasn't all in my head. The easier it is for you to fall asleep, the more sleep deprived you are. And if you are sleep deprived, of course you're going to be sleepy!

All those results, as victorious as they seem, don't really help me though. How can I stop my brain from waking up at night and causing my oxygen level to drop as well as causing erratic heart rate?! How can I get my brain to go in to the correct sleep stages at the right time??? I can keep the most consistent sleep schedule ever, and that still wouldn't help :-/. So I take Lunesta at night and a small dose stimulant 1 to 2 a day. It's made all the difference in the world. My eyes are finally open and I haven't uttered the famous 'I'm tired' line in weeks. And I haven't napped in weeks, or fallen asleep during the last 4 movies I've seen!! I hate the thought of needing both uppers and downers... but when in between refills and run out of uppers cause my pharmacy hasn't gotten their order in and wont for a few days, I feel the difference and see my limitations, and it sucks. So I'm sticking to it.