shelovescliche

So in the past year I've developed severe insomnia, due to other health problems, and I've been on two different sleeping pills, because if I don't take something I won't sleep until 4 in the morning, sometimes I can't sleep all night, then pass out around 7 or 8.

I took Lunesta before I had ambien, and it worked really well. I went to sleep pretty quick, but my insurance wouldn't pay for lunesta after the first week, so I had to revert to Ambien.

Anyways, starting with Ambien, I started experiencing these TERRIFYING hallucinations. I'd actually SEE things surrounding me once the ambien kicked in; I'd see faces or just barely distinguishable shapes, and it made it harder to get to sleep knowing that if I opened my eyes, I'd see that.

I switched back to Lunesta (after FINALLY being cleared by the insurance co.) because I was having such a hard time with Ambien; I was told that it's very rare to experience such hallucinations due to sleep meds, even though it's a listed side effect, so they switched me off of it.

The Lunesta still makes me hallucinate. It's not so terrifying as when I take ambien, (I don't see objects in my room lunge at me), but it's still there. And every now and then, I STILL have nightmares, which started when I took lunesta.

The nightmares are ALWAYS about the same thing: the hallucinations I have. Except they're more vivid in the nightmares, and seem somehow more menacing or ill-intented. (By the way, I know this sounds completely insane.) When I have nightmares of them, I wake up crying. I don't scream when I get scared, ever, I just jump at the most, or in extreme cases, cry. And I wake up sobbing.


Over the counter things don't work, by the way. They seem to keep me up longer, if possible. Antidepressants don't work, and that's the first thing that they tried. I can't stop the Lunesta because I NEED the sleep.


Has ANYONE had experiences like this with any of the sleep meds? I don't know anyone who's ever had this happen to them, so I don't know if there's something I can do.