Apparently I'm "mildly abnormal"

[drwex]

I thought I had written about going for a sleep study, but seems like not.

People near me have been pushing me to get a study for years. I sleep less than normal - like 5.5-6 hours/night - and there are no meds approved for early waking that isn't co-present with depression. Most people who have sleep problems have problems falling asleep, or wake up. People with common sleep problems such as apnea or restless limbs sleep a normal amount but wake up still feeling tired. I wake up feeling like I've slept but man I wish I could sleep more hours.

The thing that tipped me into finally getting it done was discovering that having untreated sleep apnea raises one's risk of congestive heart failure by 20-30%. I got my physician to schedule one for early this month and the results just got mailed to me. As noted, I'm "mildly abnormal" but my apnea is not sufficient to recommend treatment unless it gets worse or I have other symptoms. Which, see above, I don't.

On the one hand that's reassuring. I wasn't looking forward to trying to adapt to sleeping with a mask, not to mention the effect of the noise on Pygment. On the other hand, it leaves me with no options for getting more good sleep.

I was amused to read that "REM supine sleep was not achieved" to which I said "no shit, Sherlock." How anyone can sleep at all with that level of crap glued to and wrapped around them is beyond me. I normally sleep pretty deeply but between all the sensors, the breathing bands, the crap hospital bed, and the overheated stuffy room there was no way I was going to get a real night's rest.

Comments

[tshuma]

I also suffer from "early waking". For a period of time, I was balancing medications against each other to find the best fit to handle depression + anxiety. The medication I was prescribed for the depression had a tendency to increase the anxiety, especially in the early morning, and keep me a little too buzzed to fall asleep easily. So I was prescribed Ambien for the falling asleep, which has very different effects than trying to use Benadryl for the same thing. However, for the morning anxiety, I was prescribed the smallest possible dose of Lyrica as a side label use. (I do also have nerve pain in my hands, but it is minimal.) The Lyrica has a calming effect. I still woke in the morning but I didn't tend to surface completely, which allowed me to fall back asleep instead of lying there with all my thoughts buzzing until I would give up and get up.

I'm no longer on these medications, but I was on them on a consistent schedule for about two years, and it helped immensely. Installing true dark curtains on the windows has helped me since I stopped the medications, but it isn't sufficient.

I can't tell from your entry exactly what form the morning waking takes, so I'm not sure if this is helpful or not, but it might be useful to explore this realm.

[drwex]

Many mornings I do wake up and have to calm the mental buzzing as you put it. Unfortunately, my anxiety is not significant enough that I can get a prescription for it. I suppose if I pushed the doc, maybe. When I did have insomnia I was given a scrip for sleep meds (I don't recall which, but I think it was pre-Ambien) and I did sleep a solid 8 hours with that, but they're considered addictive and my doc was unwilling to renew prescriptions in the absence of continued insomnia. Since I can control my insomnia largely with behavioral methods (no reading in bed, no lying awake for more than 20 min without getting up and doing something else, etc) the pills are considered unnecessary.