Meds...yuck.....

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I'd tried OTC Benadryl years and years ago. Wasn't crazy about it. This doesn't affect me the same way. Well, now that I cut it down in half. Just hits me fast.

What approach are you trying now?

Liquid benadryl, which is actually Zzzquil, or whatever it's called. I try to take melatonin, but only one half-hour before I want to go to bed, not when I actually go to bed, or it could delay my sleep. I have benzos which I only use when I absolutely must be somewhere at a certain time, or else I'll become addicted.

My neurologist is making me record all of my sleep patterns, and apparently he is going to use the information to figure out what my circadian rhythm is so that he can try to change it to normal. I'm not entirely sure how he's going to do that. So now I am just basically keeping records so that he has some information to go on.

Hmmmmm, that's interesting. Yes, keep up with that.

Is the Melatonin prescription?

They still put people on Prozac? Awful.
I was put on it for a short time years ago before my diagnosis along with I don't know how many other drugs. I had to go to the hospital to be taken off of it soon afterwards. I know I'm hypersensitive to the side effects of such drugs, but they didn't care, they just wanted me to be a lab rat.

It wasn't just "yuck", it was pure torture and I curse the "professionals" at the hospital for making me go through such sheer hell. And the people at the homes I was in and out of for making me live in a place that is not good for an Aspie, and trying to force me to act less like one. It's only when my living situation improved that my sleep and general well-being improved as well.

It's funny when I hear that. People forget that what's good for one can be disastrous for another.

All the 'good meds' that were supposed to 'fix' the problems with Prozac cause me great difficulties. Prozac did just fine by me. None of the side effects others complain about.

I have a prescription, but my insurance doesn't cover it. It's actually cheaper for me to just buy it as a supplement. I only take 3mg. He said that even that much is high.

They put me on Prozac when I was thirteen. Made me worse. That was the beginning of the time when they started advertising for medications on television and magazines. That was also before they realized that giving antidepressants to children and young adults could increase risk of suicide. I was a little guinea pig.

Yeah, that was the time period they were just shoving meds down kids throats willy nilly. They were prescribing all sorts of meds for things like weight loss and other crazy things at that time. Worse, they really had no idea what most of it would do to children.

I was fortunate, I was well into my thirties when I first had it. And, I'm rare. I don't have any of the side effects.

What's funny is that I am the rare individual that will metabolize wellbutrin as a false positive for amphetamines.

Go figure.

I used an over the counter antihistamine, chlorpheniramine, for years as a sleep aid, but now I take melatonin every night and sleep very well. Have you tried melatonin?

I hated Wellbutrin. It made me so hyperactive, that I was practically bouncing off of the walls, and I couldn't even write because my hand would shake so badly. I was in my twenties, and my behavior became that of a hyperactive child. I definitely made a fool of myself during that period, which was thankfully not very long.

Paxil did that to me. It was horrible, and when I ran out, I got really, really bad. That's when they put me on wellbutrin. But, although not as bad as Paxil, it still took three other meds to counter the effects. They also had to adjust the time to take it to just once a day, in the morning. It did wire me out.

To counter it, they put me on Trazodone, Neurontin and Attorax.

Attorax = Hydroxyzine

As I evened out a bit, they had to cut the Trazodone back.....it really made me stupid.

Not sure who you were asking. But, I don't.

Another problem with medications is that a lot of them affect sleep architecture. I had a sleep study done recently and apparently I had adequate amount of stage 1,2,3,4 sleep but I had absolutely no REM sleep at all because the meds I was on surpressed REM sleep.

I'm beginning to think me and this LPN may have difficulty. I called today because I'm still feeling drunk today. I thought it was ok yesterday, but I wonder if that was comparative to the night/day before. I've taken half for two days now and I'm still feeling drunk, slow and unfocused.

I called, she called back. Now, here is where I need a reality check.

I've been telling them I'm hypersensitive to any downer or speed. Hence my apprehension of anything that depresses the system.

So, I tell her that I'm feeling drunk. She asks if I slept. I told her about an hour or so more, but I'm useless and cannot function well.

She says that it should not affect me that much. WTF??? I don't know if she's thinking aloud or what. But I am telling her the effects, telling me what it should do or not do is beside the point and useless.

Then when I tell her that I'm cutting a 25MG pill in half and it's still too much, she says, "Do you want me to prescribe the 10MG?"

Ummmm, I kinda don't think that difference between a half 25MG tablet (12.5MG) and a 10MG tablet will make a difference.

But, what got me was I'm telling her that it's still making me drunk feeling. It is 3PM, I took half the danged pill at 11:40 last night and I'm still dizzy and I have that bad 'drunk' feeling that when I turn my head too fast, it spins the world slightly.

I am not smoking pot with it. Did not do that after Monday. Only had a little to kill nerves to get out to work. Took the pill 9 hours later. So, doubt that would affect it, but did not have any Tuesday or Wednesday and today. So, still drunk.

And, it ain't a pleasant feeling either.

THEN she asked if I wanted to use OTC Benadryl......no.......It actually causes my legs to feel odd and spasm a bit. Restless leg syndrome.

Then got lectured about how important sleep is.

This is not going to go well if they don't listen to what I am saying. If I am telling you, as a person who used to party very, very hard, that it is making me very high and nonfunctional and it is making me 'drunk', you should listen. Maybe I'm even more sensitive due to my dietary issues. Maybe I'm just very sensitive to it. Maybe something else is at work here.

I don't know, but, I feel they should listen, ask questions and not lecture me. I eat about 2,000-3,000 calories a week. I don't feel weak or anything. Losing weight. Able to test very high on problems, and can work....to a degree.

Something is going on. And, I lose faith very quickly if someone doesn't listen.

The advantage of being prescribed 10mg instead of your 25mg cut into pieces is that you can easily chop the 10mg in half for 5mg, which would be a lot more difficult of a dose to achieve by cutting a 25mg into pieces. Start with 5mg and see how that works until your body becomes tolerant to it. For me, I built up almost a complete tolerance to the sedation of Hydroxyzine at 25mg within 2.5 weeks of taking it every night, you may take longer or shorter, but generally tolerance of the sedating effects of it build rather quickly compared to say Ambien or Remeron.

I was thinking the same thing about the 5MG tablets later. But the problem is that it completely interfered with my ability to do work. I've already got a few cut in half. Next appointment is on the tenth. And I have a couple of big jobs I have to be in full control to do. Very technical, very specific.

If you want to know the truth, I was amazed at how hard it hit me. It was really scary. I literally thought to myself that I could not believe I chased that high before.

That's unsettling. I just hope they actually believe that. We'll see.

But, I think that's a good idea about the 10mg tabs for Tuesday. I'll take the old meds in for their disposal.