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Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

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Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#131

Post by Perceval »

in3d wrote: post #126
bxtt wrote: post #44

I’ve been taking Zolpidem for about 13 years now and suffer from addiction. I’ve sought treatment for this but it doesn’t work as now I cannot sleep without taking something. If you haven’t taken Z-type sleeping aids, I would definitely suggest not to start, as from experience the consequences outweigh the benefits. I’ve lost a considerable amount of friends/reputation/etc. from the abuse. Every experience that you h…

Take this with all the weight a message board advice from a non-doctor is worth but have you tried Trazodone instead? It’s used widely for sleep issues and it’s effective for many. And have you looked at something like Ketamine for a possible long-lasting solution?

I had a good experience with Trazadone. Very easy to get to sleep, eliminated anxiety about going to sleep, and got restful sleep, with only a little grogginess in the morning. No withdrawal when I stopped cold turkey after 2 years. Nowadays I just have valerian tea or magnesium before bed.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#132

Post by cobolcowboy »

To the people in this thread advocating antipsychotic medication for anything other than treating psychosis and as an adjunct for severe depression, don't. These medications are serious things for serious situations and can have unexpected effects on you mentally.

I went on them in my early twenties due to a nervous breakdown, and while they stopped the endless loops of thought and insomnia (I ended up sleeping ten hours a night without breaking a sweat), they reduced my libido, made me gain weight, and worst of all, robbed me of my natural sharpness and creativity. It was as if my brain had been wrapped in a layer of bubble wrap, and my ability to come up with those sparks of inspiration that you need to do intellectual work was almost extinguished. I'm 100% now, fully recovered, but it took me about 3-4 years to get back where I was before it all happened. If your doctor thinks you're right for them, go for it, but only as a last resort.

They do work, but they're the last tool in the box that you only want to use when everything else has failed.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#134

Post by foxhop »

My guess is the damage was primarily on the conscious parts of the head, my guess is the sleeping pill (I'd wager canibus may also work) allows the more unconscious "dream-like" side of the brian to temporarily fill-in on executive functions.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#135

Post by mariopt »

ed25519FUUU wrote: post #19
mariopt wrote: post #11

Zolpidem, I use this pill to sleep and works fantastic for me. My MD told me that regular use could lead to dementia and the risk for addiction is considerable. I've tried antidepressants to sleep but always wake up with a headache, the feeling of it it's not great either. But with this one, never had an issue.

Dementia as a side effect? Aren’t you scared of that?

Of course, that is why I only take it strictly when I need it.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#136

Post by mensetmanusman »

rdevsrex wrote: post #102
irrational wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can understand the strange fascination with Ambien. My wife was prescribed it one time. She would take it and then soon after want to have sex. Mind blowing sex (for me) every time. She was insatiable and wanted to do things way outside her norm. But the next day she had absolutely no memory of any of it. That weirded me out and I encouraged her to stop taking them. Though to be honest I wouldn't mind one or two of…

That really makes you question how much free will we have, if a drug can produce that kind of behavior and affect short term memory. But more fascinating still is what functionality in the brain even enables that.

It’s often a question of how much.

Do we have free will when sleeping? No. There goes a large part of our life.

How about when zoned out? No.

Do we ever have free will? Atheists looking at the scientific evidence argue that we never have free will.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#137

Post by foxhop »

rdevsrex wrote: post #102
irrational wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can understand the strange fascination with Ambien. My wife was prescribed it one time. She would take it and then soon after want to have sex. Mind blowing sex (for me) every time. She was insatiable and wanted to do things way outside her norm. But the next day she had absolutely no memory of any of it. That weirded me out and I encouraged her to stop taking them. Though to be honest I wouldn't mind one or two of…

That really makes you question how much free will we have, if a drug can produce that kind of behavior and affect short term memory. But more fascinating still is what functionality in the brain even enables that.

I'm of the school of thought that we have at 2 minds, my guess is this drug inhibits our egoic executive mind and our unconscious mind takes over.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#138

Post by mariopt »

uberduper wrote: post #41
mariopt wrote: post #11

Zolpidem, I use this pill to sleep and works fantastic for me. My MD told me that regular use could lead to dementia and the risk for addiction is considerable. I've tried antidepressants to sleep but always wake up with a headache, the feeling of it it's not great either. But with this one, never had an issue.

Ever tried Hydroxyzine for sleep? It's an anti-anxiety med that was prescribed to me for insomnia after zolpidem and the other popular non-benzo hypnotics had the opposite effects on me. Hydroxyzine works ok for me. Not great. Flexirol + hydrocodone work fantastic for me, but that's not a viable option.

The only one I tried was trazodone, half a pill is enough to induce sleep but falling asleep and waking up doesn't fells nice. 15 minutes after taking the pill I get a sensation that I can only describe as "being poisoned", in the morning I get a long lasting headache for 4+ hours. Antidepressants are prescribed as a "safer" alternative to zolpidem/dangerous medication but there is some controversy in the medical community about it. Some people developed a zolpidem addiction up to the point where they need it or won't sleep at all.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#139

Post by mentos »

nucleardog wrote: post #121
centimeter wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Several years ago I experienced a (thankfully temporary) severe reduction in brain function, for several weeks. I was shocked by the truly abysmal diagnostic capability of modern neuromedicine for anything less than large-scale physical trauma. In my case, they couldn't pin down a cause at all, except to say that the symptoms were consistent with a viral infection of the CNS. What virus? Who knows, we can only test f…

We have the technology, it's just... not widely available yet. There's a lab at UCSF[1] that actually specializes in doing genome sequencing of cerebrospinal fluid specifically for cases like this. They're talked about pretty extensively in Adam Savage's "Still Untitled" podcast[2] and all the crazy weird things they managed to diagnose this way. We all have the impression that medicine is a solved problem, but we've…

Thank you for that link to the Adam Savage podcast with Joe DeRisi. I watched the whole thing absolutely incredible research he is doing from a layman’s perspective it seems like a very bottom up approach that could take all of the guess work out of disease diagnosis.

Re: Severe brain injury and paralysis temporarily reversed with a sleeping pill

#140

Post by costcopizza »

cobolcowboy wrote: post #132

To the people in this thread advocating antipsychotic medication for anything other than treating psychosis and as an adjunct for severe depression, don't. These medications are serious things for serious situations and can have unexpected effects on you mentally. I went on them in my early twenties due to a nervous breakdown, and while they stopped the endless loops of thought and insomnia (I ended up sleeping ten h…

What helped you in your 3-4 year recovery?
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