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The Big "I Can't Sleep" Thread - Insomniacs Unite!

I have never taken it personally, but I would take whatever the directions on the bottle say to do.

A quick search on mayo clinic suggests that adults can take up to 5 mg daily for difficulty sleeping. You should probably talk to your doctor before taking it (since we don't know what other medications you're currently taking and how they'll interact).
 
Thanks :) im on effexor XR 75mg i found this although i take it for anxiety its still an anti-depressant right?
Anti-Depressants.
People using antidepressants have also been cautioned against the use of melatonin as adequate information has not been gathered about it’s interaction with melatonin. Few studies have only reported that some people complained of serious drowsiness, confusion, memory loss, breathing difficulties, itching and vomiting the day after, due to the fact that antidepressants already increases the level of melatonin production by the body.

The worst thing that can happen is difficulty breathing, also i found this
Oral caffeine may significantly increase the bioavailability of melatonin. The proposed mechanism is inhibition of CYP450 1A2 first-pass metabolism. After administration of melatonin 6 mg and caffeine 200 mg orally (approximately equivalent to 1 large cup of coffee) to 12 healthy subjects, the mean peak plasma concentration (Cmax) of melatonin increased by 137% and the area under the concentration-time curve (AUC) increased by 120%. The metabolic inhibition was greater in nonsmokers (n=6) than in smokers (n=6). The greatest effect was seen in subjects with the *1F/*1F genotype (n=7), whose melatonin Cmax increased by 202%. The half-life did not change significantly. The clinical significance of this interaction is unknown.
 
I took 6mg of melatonin lastnight went to bed at 9pm and wokeup at 9 am :D

hooray! good for you! :D


and to answer your question, yes effexor is an anti-depressant. just watch your dosage, that's kind of high considering that antidepressants already increase the level of melatonin produced by your body. how long have you been taking effexor? a very common side effect of ssri medications is restlessness or insomnia. You might need to adjust your dose or the time of day that you take it.
 
hm, have you ever tried switching to taking it at night instead? I take 200mg zoloft every night... when I started taking it I took mine in the morning. I had a LOT of trouble sleeping at night, because it would at first make me very drowsy then I'd get almost hyperactive by the evening time. And very restless. Once I switched to taking mine at night it helped a lot.
 
I dont feel stimulated or hyperactive on it at all i think its just my fucked up brain being..fucked up.I smoked so much weed my brain pretty much quit making its own cannabinoids and quit telling me to goto sleep, its only been a month since i quit so i figure its going to take some time before it gets back to normal.
 
Merging this into the "I Cant Sleep Megathread", it could be a messy merge with the post dates so we'll see how it goes....
 
The melatonin seems to have straightened out my sleep cycle :) I goto sleep between 11:30-1 and wakeup around 10am-11am alot better than before :D
 
I currently take 20mg methadone and 1 - 1.5mg of clonazepam. Thinking about getting rid of the clonazepam, and just using that for anxiety as needed (aka just keep the script and create a stash). The methadone stops my RLS dead in its tracks, and prevents my legs from waking me up in the middle of the night. Its wonderful
 
I currently take 20mg methadone and 1 - 1.5mg of clonazepam. Thinking about getting rid of the clonazepam, and just using that for anxiety as needed (aka just keep the script and create a stash). The methadone stops my RLS dead in its tracks, and prevents my legs from waking me up in the middle of the night. Its wonderful

Do you exercise during the day?
 
Yeah, that doesn't really help to much. I always make sure I at least take a mile walk a couple hours before I go to bed. I've cut out alcohol, and cigs (maybe one or two a week), take warm baths at night, etc. Methadone I've found to be the most effective treatment. It has helped so much that my ADHD has gotten a bit better because I'm actually getting a good nights sleep.
 
Can anyone recommend anything to help me sleep?

I'm really sick of staying awake to the point where my body aches, I usually am up for 30+ hours before I'm able to get some rest and it's really starting to get old now.
 
Can anyone recommend anything to help me sleep?

I'm really sick of staying awake to the point where my body aches, I usually am up for 30+ hours before I'm able to get some rest and it's really starting to get old now.

It's hard to say without knowing your circumstances. Everyone has their reasons for not being able to sleep. I couldn't sleep because I was so stressed and nothing that's been said on here really worked. I tried everything- exercising, cutting things out of my diet, bringing new things in etc. I ended up going to the doctor and was put on zopiclone for a while. It helped me sleep, but I still felt like shit. I just felt sedated all the time and couldn't bring myself to do anything. I only ended up being able to sleep again because the major cause of my stress went away. Insomnia's a tricky bitch.
 
I'm prescribed 3 mgs of xanax a day and that used to make me drowsy, but not anymore. I've been put on lunesta, which kinda sucks IMHO. but what I've found works best for me is lunesta, 50 mgs of benadryl, and 3 mg of melatonin. I feel very relaxed and my mind just starts to slow down. I've only got one more refill on my lunesta and don't think I'm gonna have the doc write me another script. That shit kinda sucks on its own; I've taken 10 mg before to try and sleep and didn't even get drowsy (2 mg is my dose).
 
I'm prescribed 3 mgs of xanax a day and that used to make me drowsy, but not anymore. I've been put on lunesta, which kinda sucks IMHO. but what I've found works best for me is lunesta, 50 mgs of benadryl, and 3 mg of melatonin. I feel very relaxed and my mind just starts to slow down. I've only got one more refill on my lunesta and don't think I'm gonna have the doc write me another script. That shit kinda sucks on its own; I've taken 10 mg before to try and sleep and didn't even get drowsy (2 mg is my dose).

So you're on 3mg of alprazolam a day plus Lunesta? That's toying with fire, my friend. (I'm not talking out of my ass, either - I've been on so many combinations of sleeping medications, from Trazadone+Halcion to Zopiclone+Ambien+Klonopin [talk about disrupted sleep architecture...]). Just be careful, not only of dependency on the medications which is an obvious drawback but also on the significant impact on the normalcy of your sleep cycle imposed by these medicines. At this point I still require triazolam (halcion) to fall asleep, but I supplement it with 5mg sublingual melatonin which can (and, for me, does) help to restore the sleep architecture disruption caused by the benzodiazepine.

~ vaya
 
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