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Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

writing.samsonhu.com

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Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#191

Post by FollowingTheDao »

tylermac1 wrote: post #179
_rs wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there any services like 23andme that are more strict when it comes to data privacy or that allow me complete ownership of the data? I would love this type of analysis even at a higher cost but I am scared of what might happen in the future to this data on me and children

Health care providers can order genetic testing to help discover how your body metabolizes tons of things. I recently had it done and it illuminated an entire class of anti-depressant that has very little efficacy for me.

Those tests are so limited in scope, I would not bother.

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#192

Post by m0llusk »

bboygravity wrote: post #27
Wagthesam wrote: post #3

This is quite raw and I'm actually somewhat afraid to share this. But I think sleep apnea is criminally under-discussed and underdiagnosed. It can f your life up sideways and can take years to diagnose. So sharing my story and hope I can advocate for it. If you have sleep apnea, no amount of sleep gadgets, good habits, exercise, will help you. You must fix the root cause

Interesting. I bet close to all young skinny people with sleep apnea must remain undiagnosed. My generalist doc basically said "if you really insist we can do a polysomnography, but I'm pretty sure you don't have it, you're young, skinny and sporty. There isn't really much that helps that you can do about it anyway". I did insist and it turned out that I do have it. The changes in life I experienced are similar to yo…

Apnea is nearly universal among older weightlifters. It is not well understood, but it seems that relatively small changes to the physiology of the neck end up interfering with breathing. Many healthy and strong people don't have any idea what is making them feel bad until many other alternative explanations are eliminated.

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#193

Post by CamelCaseName »

Balgair wrote: post #188
aantix wrote: post #146

I recently discovered that I’m a slow metabolizer of caffeine. Via my raw 23andme data. https://you.23andme.com/tools/data/?query=rs762551 C/C genotype. https://www.geneticlifehacks.com/liver-detox-genes-cyp1a2/#C... Instead of coffee being a net positive, it actually takes caffeine 4X the time to process through my body and increases my cardiac event risk by 2X. I can drink a cup of coffee at 8am and it still impact…

I did the same, but without any of the data here. Quitting caffeine got rid of my anxiety nearly entirely and my sleep quality was noticeably better. Literally changed my life. The 3 days of headaches were very bad. But worth it beyond anything for me. Open to questions if you have them, though it may take a bit to respond.

I feel pretty bummed about these kinds of stories.

I quit coffee for all of January, and I felt absolutely no difference. When I started again in February, apart from the first coffee feeling a little gross, I again felt no difference.

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#194

Post by wahnfrieden »

theonething wrote: post #88
wahnfrieden wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as I realized my healthy sleep and wage work were incompatible, I quit working for others permanently and have been far healthier since then. Overnight and persistent improvement. Now I sleep well and when I don’t at night I just sleep when I want to. Simple

I assume you mean freelancing. I tried that too, but found that I'm not good at sales/marketing side of things, so I went back to a regular job.

I don’t freelance / sell my time

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#195

Post by brailsafe »

culebron21 wrote: post #63

Very useful read. My friend, an osteopath, says neck issues also can create breathing obstructions, and it makes a good deal of people wake up in the middle of the night and stay awake, even though they don't even think it's a problem. Symptom to watch for: you wake up and your nose is stuffy, can't breathe through it, but there's no snot. And in 5-15 minutes it gets clear. If you have it, it means lymph flow out of…

This sounds like some of the pseudoscience my friend was talking about before he had psychotic episode. Is there any legitimacy to Osteopathy?

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#196

Post by wahnfrieden »

kortilla wrote: post #83
wahnfrieden wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as I realized my healthy sleep and wage work were incompatible, I quit working for others permanently and have been far healthier since then. Overnight and persistent improvement. Now I sleep well and when I don’t at night I just sleep when I want to. Simple

How is an 8 hour a day shift incompatible with healthy sleep?

You don’t know many full time workers who struggle with sleep?

Sometimes I find myself awake and alert after 4 hours of sleep. Now when I crash some hours later after that, I sleep for a couple more hours and work more after instead of suffering through meetings and commute without break. I no longer use an alarm and let myself wake naturally. If I'm incapacitated from insomnia, I do housework or rest and work as my energy returns. Employers have no tolerance for this kind of flexibility beyond some isolated incidents. Yes I work with others too, this doesn't only work for lone wolf arrangements.

I'll add that I also suffer from RSI and the same applies there: if I injure my hands, I can make my own decision to use them less for some time to give them the rest they need, and shift what sort of work I do or how I spend my time meanwhile to accommodate (because I don't have rigidly defined role expectations as wage earners do).

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#197

Post by crypot »

agloe_dreams wrote: post #178
oarfish wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you have sleep apnea, no amount of sleep gadgets, good habits, exercise, will help you Probably not what you mean, but this is untrue as there can be different causes for sleep apnea. For instance obesity, which would be helped by exercise.

Correct. Obesity is the leading cause in the US. A vast amount of anyone overweight in the US have sleep apnea, diagnosed or not.

You are asking for the weightist police to show up.

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#198

Post by carlosjobim »

mola wrote: post #93
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But I think sleep apnea is criminally under-discussed and underdiagnosed. I agree that it’s under-diagnosed in people who have it, but it’s actually discussed very widely across social media and in person. I have some sleep medicine professionals in my extended social circle. It’s common to hear stories of people coming in convinced that they must have sleep apnea after reading about it online, but their sleep stud…

This comment is very important. I wouldn't trust social media reports as a source for understanding prevalence of conditions. The mimetic dynamics can cause severe exaggeratiobs and over representation. Even the thread here can make a large effect on baseless self diagnosis (I'm not doubting the OP) which many actors will happily take advantage of for their own personal gains.

Try to compare worst case scenarios of the outcome of these discussions that are unapproved by you personally:

1. Somebody who has sleep apnea but didn't know it until now can get diagnosed and massively improve her life without any negative side effects.

2. Somebody mistakenly thinks they have sleep apnea and might waste some time and a little money until they understand they never had sleep apnea. No other negative side effects.

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#199

Post by rednerrus »

M5x7wI3CmbEem10 wrote: post #141
culebron21 wrote: post #63

Very useful read. My friend, an osteopath, says neck issues also can create breathing obstructions, and it makes a good deal of people wake up in the middle of the night and stay awake, even though they don't even think it's a problem. Symptom to watch for: you wake up and your nose is stuffy, can't breathe through it, but there's no snot. And in 5-15 minutes it gets clear. If you have it, it means lymph flow out of…

what’s the solution to congestion?

My CPAP with warm wet air in it has fixed mine.

Re: Poor sleep drove me insane, and my long path to recovery

#200

Post by sumtechguy »

monroewalker wrote: post #42

Thank you for sharing! Skimmed for now, but saving this to read later. I've had a history as well of never getting good sleep so I'm curious to see what your experience was and the steps you've taken. A few things I've done that have helped a bunch: - Using BreatheRight nasal strips every night - Latex earplugs ("Mack's Pillow Soft Silicone Earplugs"). I could never sleep with foam earplugs in my ears but these are g…

Good ideas. Also review your diet. For me I found out I am slightly allergic to HFCS. Which was causing mild acid reflux and making me sleep very poorly. Easy test is if you take a tums before sleep and you sleep good you are good candidate for something like that.
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