I’m trying to get to sleep so I’ve taken an Ambien but nothing has worked yet. I am getting weird visual effects, like seeing 3D depth effects with only one eye open, the text on the cover of a book floating left and right, up and down. Weird.
Yep, Ambien can make you trip. You didn’t know that? If you see this after getting up, really check yourself before deciding whether or not to drive.
When my mom was alive, she had dementia. At one point, her doctor put her on Ambien. Thank goodness, she was living at a wonderful home at the time, because one night she put her coat on and was ready to leave the building to go who knows where. I should mention, mom was never a wanderer with the dementia. Anyway, a nurse gently got her back in bed and first thing in the morning my sister called the doc and said never again.
Exactly same experience I had with my ex wife recently who I have been helping in recent years. Diagnosed with dementia a few years ago. She recently took a turn for the worse and no longer knew who people were and where she was. Her daughter put her in a convalescent home where she continued to decline. I was suspicious of the meds and took her home. I took her off all meds except statins and blood pressure. Ambien, adavan, and some bladder frequency pill. Within 72 hours all symptoms of dementia have left, Vision is back to normal, memory is back etc. Also changed her anti depressant to seraquil. Doing great now after a month at home.
Yeah, I’ve had that on occasion. Couldn’t read while waiting for it to finish kicking in.
Have you ever asked your doctor to investigate other types of meds? I used to take clonidine for high blood pressure and weaned off it when I no longer needed it. When I was originally taking it and they were working on getting the right dosage, I had amazing nap attacks, I would drop off if I wasn’t actively doing anything about 30 minutes after taking it. I had been off clonidine for about 5 months when I accidentally took 3 mg [looks just like a different med I take, mrAru got the bottles mixed up] and off I dropped to sleep - an off use for the med is as light sedation. It might be enough to get you to sleep without the hallucinations or other ill effects, at least you might ask your doc for some options…
We discovered I was hyper sensitive to elavil when it was prescribed to me - I slept about 22 hours out of 24 [my mom effectively forced me to get up and go to the bathroom a couple times a day and made me shower otherwise i would have just lain in bed] and it gave me the same sort of hallucinations. Not a med I was happy to take, I was thrilled when they finally admitted my headaches that were not my normal migraines were 1,1,1-trichlor exposure.
I took it briefly and saw transient movement hallucinations, like the sense that a creature was moving in my peripheral vision. Rather than being scary it was pretty entertaining.
Do you mean Ativan? I am glad things worked out, but I hope you had a doctor’s influence as that is not the type of drug you should just quit cold turkey.
I tried Ambien. Never again.
Since the pill is so strong, I only took it on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. The rest of the week I took an OTC sleep aid.
On Monday I was in such a black pit of despair I could hardly function. By Wednesday I was back on an even keel, but by the next Monday, suicide seemed quite attractive.
It took me a couple of weeks, but then I googled the side effects and yep, depression is one of them. I’m now on generic Lunesta, which works just as well.
Luckily, I don’t know how to drive and don’t have access to a car even if I did. I know it’s strong, so I cut them into quarters. I only take them when I’ve over-indulged in caffeine during the day. Usually it knocks me out pretty quickly, but I got up to pee before it really did, and a book was sitting on the lid of my toilet tank and got the visual effect I described.
OK, by that standard, I was doing pretty well. Probably because I was only on a quarter of a 10 mg tablet.
The Ativan was only one pill per day and the Ambien I don’t know how much they were giving her in the hospital. A medication to calm her bladder was another major culprit. oxybutynin I think. Once she was off this the improvement was rapid and dramatic. She hasn’t had any short term memory in a about 2 years.
My daughter is proscribed Clonidine for her sleep issues (works well to cause one to fall asleep and not so well to stay asleep. And is the most mild prescription drug in treat children arsenal owing to the sleepiness side effect.
There are other Ambien like drugs but affect different receptors in your brain. Sominex, lunestra, zopiclone, etc. Ask your doctor.
There is a small set of folks where Ambien does weird ass stuff that they have no memory off.
You figured out the trick that I use. I take a 1/4 10 mg tab to help me fall asleep. If I wake up at night and can’t get back to sleep, I take a 1/4 tab. What I really use it for is jet lag. A half tab or a quarter tab lasts the corresponding amount of time. If I wake up at 2:00am with jet lag, then it’s half a tab and I usually then can sleep until about 6:00am. Life changer with my international travel.
I took Ambien for a couple of days after my Scotty died. The first night, I was instantly out. When I woke the next morning, my bod was so stiff it seemed I hadn’t moved all night. Second night, took a few minutes to fall asleep, and my sleep was lighter. Third night, given the addiction gene in my family, I stopped taking it.
I took some, then proceeded to work on a painting. It was interesting how the paint molecules formed cliques and trash talked each other. The painting still turned out well and I got it into a juried show.