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Be Thankful If They Just Snore
The NYT is running has a lengthy piece in their weekend supplement about sleep disorders. Besides a certain amount of humor value, the article covers sleep terrors and sleepwalking and even weirder disorders.
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AHHHH AHHHHH AHHHHHH!
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
Michael posted this somnabulistically.
having had some problems sleeping recently due to stress I can tell you it ain't funny...
can't sleep cause you're stressed...
this stresses you...
cant sleep cause you're stressed...
not much fun..
and *everyones* got a cure:
"tried lettuce sandwiches"
"tried a piriton" etc etc.
thankfully i'm sleeping again, but I don't envy anyone who has this all the time.
Acid House saves Souls
Back when I was around 7 or 8, I used to get 'night terrors', at least that's what the ER doctors called 'em, all the time.. They were incredibly realistic, and scared the hell outta me. I still remember running around the living room couch, screaming at the top of my lungs, because I thought an airplane was gonna fly through the window.. ..turns out it was the ambulance my Mother called. :)
RaGe
We're all just noise on the wires..
Why, God, do New York Times articles keep getting posted?!?!?! It sounds so interesting, but I refuse to sign up for this stuff!!!
Can't anybody ever just give news away for free anymore? I don't have to pay for CBS!
and I'll believe none of it until they produce a cure for sleep-kicking-your-boyfriend-in-the-shins.
--Just because you can doesn't mean you should--
If you can't sleep well, you may be snoring and not know it...waking yourself before you enter REM sleep, restful sleep, etc.
Try one of those over-the-counter throat sprays [Breathe Right - Snore Relief] that claim to reduce snoring. You might find yourself getting more sleep than you've had in years.
What do you call a nun who sleep walks?
A roamin' Catholic
source: joke.com
YarrRrr
here
using the archive.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
At least I posted the archive. link A/C.
There used to be this kid, can't remember his name,
that hung out with me and my friends when we were
between the ages of ten to thirteen. He didn't go
to our school, but he was a friend of another kid
that was a neighbor of a friend or something.
I think that made sense. Either way, he would
QUIT BREATHING COMPLETELY when he slept and you'd
have to wake him up or he'd DIE. I can remember his
mom explaining that it was some sort of condition
and we'd have to be careful to watch him when he slept
over. Needless to say, how the fuck are you going to
sleep at all if you are worried some kid you hardly
know is going to die on you? We'd take turns watching
him sleep. I can remember him turning blue a few times
because someone dozed off that was watching him.
Sometimes we'd all stay up together bullshitting
about life and watch him. We started to resent the
fact that we had such a huge responsibility thrust
on us just to hang out with some kid we didn't
even like that much. It didn't help that his
attitude was along the lines of "Oh well, if I
die I die" and we were like "We are saving your
life asshole!". I can remember when he just quit
showing up one day and I made the joke that he
probably died. There was one of those 5 second
pauses then everybody busted up laughing because
when you are young, cruel can be funny. We never
did find out what happened to him.
The most important thing any republican needs to know.
check out the cool things they did to cats from the article:
;-)
Michel Jouvet and his colleagues in France in the 1960's made lesions in cat brain stems that prevented muscle atonia. When the cats went into REM sleep, they didn't lie immobilized in the dream world; they scrambled up, arched their backs and acted out all sorts of aggressive automatic behaviors.
I was sleeping in a youth hostel once, and when I woke up, some of my roomates told me my "girlfriend" has visited at night.
I've been meaning to record myself in sleep...but have been so lazy about getting a microphone
-- -- --
Help my mini cause: My journal
Dion McGregor was like that guy who narrates his dream about the bowl ("Quit using the goddamn bowl for banging like that", from the front page of the article) and his flatmate recorded his amazing, bawdy, crazy dreams. I just bought the second CD (I don't think the first is available.) Amazing stuff. That link has some cool stuff and samples.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
Michael don't you need a sleep? You have done all the posting for more than 24 hours...
Ohh that's why you post this one...
Edna: Alright, now who can pick up the predicate in this sentence. :screams in sleep:
Homer:
Edna: What's wrong with him now, Bart?
Bart: Night terrors, ma'am.
Homer: AHH! Cobras!
IN SOVIET RUSSIA, sig changes you!
At about 1 in the morning one of the guys got up and proceeded to walk down to the toilets. He walked straight passed us, ignoring everything we said to him.
So we ran after him and he was completly asleep. Freaking scary because he got all the way to the toilets, about 200m away through trees and over guide ropes. He then walked all the way back moving around the trees and steping over the ropes again, completly oblivious to us talking to him and trying to figure out if he was awake. He proceeded to get out his sleeping bag unroll it and climb in and go to sleep(some more sleep anyway).
Nothing is worse then sleep walkers cause they move around normally but act as if you are not there if you try and talk to them.
37 - what does it stand for really...
I've lost jobs because I fall asleep at work, because I don't get any rest when I sleep at night. My marriage ended because my wife was afraid that I'd do something to her or to the kids while I slept. My health is in the crapper, and treatments I've taken for this hasn't had any affect. I've slept 14 hours and still felt tired when I woke up.
The article doesn't quite fully describe how hard this is on the patients. You are told that you do things at night, and you have no memory of any of it. I have accused my wife of lying to me when she told me I screamed at the wall for two hours one night. Things are happening, you are told you do things, and you have absolutely no control because you don't even know you do any of it.
My doctor is close to recommending that I undergo another surgery to try to take care of this. I've already had my tonsils and adnoids removed. Now, he's recommending a surgery that would actually scar the tissue in my throat, causing it to tighten up and open the airway.
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. There's always a boom tomorrow. - Cmdr. Susan Ivanova
I have sleep apnea. The fix for it saved my career, my marraige, and maybe my life. For years, I woke up 2-3 times a night. My wife told me of my snoring, my stopping breathing & gasping for air while asleep, etc. I was always dog-tired, taking naps every opportunity, etc. Went to the doc. He sent me to a sleep study clinic. :)
Turns out a flap in my throat closes off and prevents breathing while I am sleeping. I thought something like that happened, but I thought it happened like one or twice an hour. Turns out, if untreated, it happens about every 15 seconds while I am asleep. The "cure" is a CPAP machine (controlled pressurized air pump, I think) that keeps a very small steady air flow (about 1/10th normal) down my throat while sleeping, to keep the flap, that closes off my breathing, open.
Since using the CPAP, I now sleep normally. 8 hrs and then I am truly awake and alert, for the first time in maybe 15 years. This is a new thing for me. My medical insurance covered every penny of the clinic visits and all the CPAP stuff. (Since using this, I have gotten 3 doctorates, made $30B, and sired 47 children.;P) I do think that the life of my family has improved by finally having a husband and father who is "there" all the time. Well, as "there" as a geek gets.
If you don't feel alert all the time, go to the doctor. Find out why. And if the doctor does not help you, dump him or her and go find one who will help you. Keep looking until you do. It really is worth it to see life without a haze of sleepiness.
In Mel's dream, he was struggling with a deer. He awoke with his hands on his wife's head and chin
That sounds like something Homer would to in The Simpsons to his pillow... not a real life disorder. Some of the storys in the article are quite horrific - good read though.
Anyone who cannt be bothered to register and give your personal details the the New York Times remember you can use this login generator.
1. The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Deer is a play on The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks.
2. I can't believe that this article doesn't mention William C. Dement. He's basically the father of modern sleep research.
How to Download YouTube Videos
A man is known by his tools
I earn my keep with my tools
Fools, you fools, you fools, you fools
You will not touch my tools
I want to know what you do with my grinder
A man is known by his tools
I earn my keep with my tools
Fools, you fools, you fools, you fools
You will not touch my tools
I want to know what you do with my grinder
Sleep disorders are a simple physical phenomena which is caused by a wrond placed sleeping location. Sorry, I won't call a wrong placed bed an illness.
Most slashdotters come from an academic background and therefore know some simple fact about the human brain. Information processing in the human brain is done by electrical signals. These are rather weak signals with an energy about 0.27 mW. The part of the human brain which is responsible for movements and basic body states like "awake", "asleep", "aroused" is the cerebellum.
An important part of the cerebellum is it's main cortex which is coincidentally build like coil (from an electr-chemical point of view). This enables it to react very fast to changes of the surrounding but unfortuantely makes it work like an antenna, too. The neural structures of the brain are of course able to filter of most induced noise from the cerebral cortex, but some special signal get trough. That means especially:
- Vertical slow frequency (0.0045 Hz) noice induce e.g. from the moon passing through earths magnetic field (moon has a metallic core like earth)
- 50 Hz left-right oscillations (for example if you have a power plug left to your ear when you are sleeping)
- 120 Hz radial oscillations (for example from a computer screen, therefore you should never sleep in front of your computer)
- 9485 Hz oscialltions at head height (therefore many people have problems relaxing at the dentist)
Note that most interferences are basically directional so just moving your bed might help alot. For the interferences caused by the moon the best thing would be prtective shielding like a nightcap made of wires (Faradays cage for the brain).Owner of a Mensa membership card.
Then, a hand came out from the sky and grabbed me. Naturally, I began screaming at the top of my lungs, continuing to scream even as I was awakening, only to find my lover shaking me: "wake-up! wake-up! you're having a nightmare!" (no kidding!!!).
I then realized that the "hand from the sky" was my lover shaking me... I started laughing, pissing-off my lover you would'nt believe (after that, I slept like a baby)...
Regarding the 50 Hz:
If you live in the US (since we operate at 60 Hz) does that change anything?
--Jubedgy
Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis hebes
There are a LOT of people that have a problem with snoring. Apart from disturbing your partner (which is really bad for your relation in the long run), you don't get the sleep you need, which will make you tired.
For many people, just loosing a few pounds will help.
What helped me was snorban. (I'm not in any way related to the company.) My problem is that when I sleep, my jaw falls back, which reduces airflow and makes me snore. The snorban thing makes sure my jaw is in a forward position during sleep.
Downside is he can't go into water above his shoulders.
Best Slashdot Co
My girlfriend sings japanese pop songs in her sleep...
Feel that power? That's mah MOUSING FINGER
40-60 seconds tolerance is optimal. If you have a low tolerance your "carbon dioxide thermostat" (capnostat) is out of calibration, and your body will start doing defense mechanism to counter the Co2 depletion by way of blocked nose, asthma, sleep apnoea etcetera.
This kind of thinking is admittedly a bit unorthodox, but more and more people belive in it and practice breathing re-training, particularly in New Zealand and Australia. I am a firm bliever in it and practice it myself.
The best info site on the net about it is
this site
If you speak Swedish check out my site andas mindre nu on the topic
(Both sites are non-commercial)
The technique of calibrating your capnostat back to normal is called the Buteyko technique after a Russian doctor who discovered the connection.
Sleep paralysis.
From the time I was 18 till 22 or so, I would occasional wake from a dream but still have the paralysis from REM sleep.
It is the opposite of fun waking up and being totally paralyzed. Couldn't even talk. It would happen within a dream first as well. One time in a dream I was being chased up a hill by *something* and I slowed down to a crawl. Before long I couldn't move. Woke up. Couldn't move.
Usually took about 5 minutes to wear off. The worse was when I woke up paralyzed one night face down on the inside of couch with my (now) wife sleeping on the outside but basically on top of me. My face was wedged down between the back of the couch and cushions. Could barely see anything, but I knew someone was on me. Nope, didn't like that one at all.
http://www.stanford.edu/~dement/paralysis.html
I have OSA as well. In my sleep study I stopped breathing well over 100 times per hour. I didn't have any episodes of wierd behaviour like you, and I don't think that is very common for OSA either.
/
Anyway, you should have been given a prescription for a CPAP. It's a machine like an oxygen mask except it just blows air from the room into your airway so it has a higher air pressure to keep it open. You sleep study should have determined what pressure you need to prevent blockage.
CPAP is considered the 'gold standard' treatment and although it's kind of a pain in the neck to use, it give you a good night sleep and is worth the hassle. I never realized how run down I was from OSA untill I started using it.
Surgury is not very effective at all as a cure and the worse your OSA is, the less benifit surgury will give. If you doctor is pushing surgury over CPAP, get a second opinion.
Check out these links for more info:
http://www.sleepapnea.org/dearfriends.html
http://www.apneanet.org/
http://www.cpapman.com
One of the more interesting phenomena they don't discuss in the article in something called Sleep Paralysis. You wake up fully conscious, but are completely incapable of moving. This is accompanied by a feeling of almost indescribable dread, and in some cases hallucinations of various sorts.
I used to get the non-hallucinatory version every once in a while as a kid, so can testify that this is real. From what I've read online, it isn't a terribly uncommon experience either. Anyone else on Slashdot have it?
I thought he was a puncher...
Columbia's lost, maybe Slashdot should runa story or somehting?
I used to sing in my sleep (or so I'm told :). In sixth grade at a camp with my class I sleep-walked. The next day I was told by the teacher that I had sleep-walked (she met me in the hallway), but I have no memory of that.
Kent Brockman: "And as you can guess, this barely qualifies as news."
My other comment is funny
That sounds very strongly to be pseudo-scientific nonsense. Are youa troll?
I'm not one to have a great deal of nightmares, just once in a while. Usually your average something's-chasing-you-can't-get-away type (well, average been a very relativistic term of course).
Anyway, over the last few months I've had a rather interesting change. For some reason I am now able to control the outcome of these nightmares, as well as a lot of details in them. It's almost like going over a threshold - at a certain point I do not want the anxiety levels that the dream is causing, and I force a complete turnaround of events, completely dispelling the threatening nature of the dream. For lack of a better analogy, think Neo after he comes back to life - it's like I have gained a subconscious insight into the very structure of the dream, and can use that knowledge to manipulate it to my will.
What I'm really curious about is if anyone else has/have had the same experience?
From the responses I have read peopel need to take these thigns more seriously. While the unusal conditions like sleep walking, sleep terrors, and narcolepsy are interesting, it is obstructive sleep apnea that is the most common and dangerous.
You can die from it! that's how dangerous it is. apnea is an interuption in your breathing. usually from a blockage in your airway.
when this happens at night several things happen;
1) it wakes you up. not to the point where you are aware of it, but it waks you out of a deep restful sleep to a light stage of sleep. this is why people are so tired all the time. this can happen hundreds of times an hour.
2)it raises your blood pressure. when the apnea occurs it spikes your bloood pressure. it has been
measured up 60 mm of Hg. this is what can break loose blood clots and cause stokes in the middle of the night.
these are the 2 most dangerous affects.
the number 1 cause of sleep apnea is being overweight, even as littel as 5 lbs overweight can cause it. and those of you who snore are suspect, snoring and apnea usually go hand in hand.
how many slashdot readers sit in front a computer drinking soda all day? that doesn't help your weight.
there is help though, there are doctors who specialize in sleep disorders. there are labs and hospitals that do testing like I used to do.
there is surgery (I don't reccomend) and devices like the CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) that keep the airway open at night and stops the apnea from occuring.
BTW my mother-in-law, uncle and father all have sleep apnea. it's more common than you think.
there are many things medicine can do for sleeping problems but you have to go see a doctor that knows about sleeping disorders.
google search
"I drank what?" - Socrates
I thought I'd share my own experience with sleep disorder.
About 2 years ago, extensive snoring, driving my wife nuts and keeping me from sleeping more than 5-6 hours or suffer intense headaches pushed me into seeing an ear-nose-throat doctor?an otho-rhino-laringologist.
After discussing the situation, and examining my throat, he thought he'd knew what to do, but some tests had to be done to make sure of the steps to take to fix the issue.
First, all wired-up like your typical Hi-Fi system back panel, and a forced-fed breading machine (augmenting the air pressure as you bread through a mask), I spent a night at home while being monitored. Back at the hospital (after some weeks--the free healthcare system in Quebec has it's drawbacks), the doctor just wasn't sure about the readins he had on the small "portable" machine. So, he suggested we redo the test in the sleep clinic of the hospital, using better equipment (aka, much less portable).
In the ORL sleep disorder business, an "event" is a sequence of 10 to 15 seconds of halted breading caused by blocked airways--this is referred to as apnea. From 0 to 5 "events" per hour, it's considered normal (none being ideal), and can be caused by a bad sleep position, your dreams etc. In the province of Québec, at 15 events per hour, the government feels it's serious enough to do something about it and pay for it. I was doing 32.
The ORL confirmed this to be the source of my headaches fatigue (due to restlessness and lack of oxygen during the night). In my case, the snoring was caused by oversized amygdalaes, and a soften (over time) soft palace due to years of snoring--as times goes, the situation usually worsens.
If you want to know where the soft palace is, stick your figer up the roof of your mouth and slide backward (towards the throat). Where it gives in, that's where it is.
My soft palace was weakened over the years because of the snoring, causing, by ricochet, the uvulae to swell up and further blocking the airways at night. Sleeping on your back worsens the situation because all the soft tissues fall back as you rest.
Now, before you're too amused by the Fred Flintstone images and sounds, be aware that acute snoring can lead to severe health problems and ultimately, cardiac problems and even cardiac arrest. It's VERY serious.
What was prescribed to me was what is known as a UPPP, an uvulo-palato-pharyngo-plastia. After documenting myself on the procedure and consulting a number of web sites about the issue. A google search on UPPP can lead you to interesting sites, such as this one or this one.
The alternative was to spend the rest of my life with a breathing machine, or to suffer the consequences of ignoring the remedes.
I finally opted for the procedure. The first web site I refer above has a throat photo of the before/after surgery, which illustrate a bit what they did. They took out my amygdalaes, part of the soft palace (including the uvulae) and tightened the back throat tissues. Recovery from this was a snap (about 16 hours after surgery I was eating toasts--although I was told this wasn't typical).
The result are amazing. I can not do the same 5 hour nights but be completely rested! I can do 12 hour nights if I want to lay down a bit, and not have headaches. I can concentrate better, I don't make a single whistle as I sleep, and overall feel healthier.
There is a slight (5-10%) chance of occasional nasal-reflux with the UPPP procedure. Nasal-reflux is food that shoots up your nose if you're not careful as you eat. I've only gotten this twice since the procedure, about 16 months ago. It's easily avoidable, and basically involves changing your swallowing timing (the absence of the amygdalaes causes food to go down quicker in your throat).
Another possible side effect to this surgery is not being able to pronouce the R (as in "farce") as we do in french (rolling the Rs). This is of no concerns for the anglophones, however. Hispanic might be affected. You still can pronounce Rs, but it's hard to roll then as we do in french.
If you think you have a sleep disorder, ACT ON IT. Ask questions, get doctor referrals and begin your journey to a healthier life.
wonderful.
Mahowald said that when the patient saw himself on tape he was ''horrified'' but finally understood why he'd been kicked out of so many hotels.
San Fran, April, 2000! I the guy in the room next to me (Sir Francis Drake, not The Drake) was Ho. Ho, Hoing all night. I went to the Concierge the next morning and mentioned it, and he told me the "Guest had been removed."
This
My brother used to do things like this when he was younger. There were a few weeks when almost everynight, he'd wander out into the hallway and start screaming and crying at the top of his lungs. Not the most pleasant thing to wake up to at 4 am.
One time, he went into my parent's room and woke them up. They asked what it was he he needed, and he replied, "I have to do a walk around."
"What? What are you talking about?"
"I HAVE do to a walkaround!"
At this point, he went back to his room, picked up a duffel bag, placed it in the center of the room, walked around it, then went back to bed.
One time, while staying at a hotel during vacation, he starked walking around the room mumbling and talking to himself in an agitated manner. My parents woke up and asked him what he was doing.
"I'm looking for MY SHOES!"
"Why?"
"BECAUSE I HAVE TO GO SOMEWHERE!"
Then he walked right out of the hotel room, and started wandering around the hallways.
He never remembered doing any of this, and eventually he just stopped sleepwalking (the article said that it's fairly common for children 4-12 years, which fits). According to my dad, my grandfather used to sleepwalk as an adult. One time he got up in the middle of the night and peed on the family television. My dad claims it was becuase he secretly hated TV.
Vote Technocratic! Government by killer robots!
I can relate to the Lindsey chick the article mentions. I sleep 3-5 hours max per day. Sometimes I'm doing good to get 3. Either 3 before work, or three after work, or 3 sometime in the middle of my off-time. It just always depends on how I feel. I have no regular sleep schedule because I rarely get "sleepy" unless I've been drinking alcohol.
When I force myself to lay down and sleep knowing it's for the better, I toss and turn for a good portion of the time, thinking. I can't say with any certainty how long it takes me to fall asleep. It's a very gradual process by which I go from being fully awake and aware to being in a surreal life. Sometimes life resumes as normal. The pizza I put in the fridge is still there and I go grab a piece because I thought I couldn't sleep, only when I put it in the microwave the microwave flashes bright blue (like a burnted lightbulb) and the pizza explodes. I realize it's a dream, and surreality insues.
Sometimes the dreams are very mild and uneventful. My house is filled with flowers and exotic insects or I live underwater. Sometimes there is alot of bizarre action, and Escher like architechture isn't so uncommon.
The article mentions attending one's own funderal? Done it. Killed myself. Killed people I know. Witnessed murdered. Witnessed my own, even. Plane crashes. Car wrecks. Natural disasters. But sometimes I have great dreams too. Sex dreams with famous beautiful women, or women I know in real life. Dreams about eating good food, or going on cool trips. Just about anything you could think if, I often experience in my dreams.
It is a mix of both good and bad. Whichever it is it is very lifelike, and while I often know I'm dreaming and sometimes can control it, even that too varies from time to time. It has bled over into my view of the real world so that I remain calm in the most bizarre of situations, or the most tragic crisis. Sometimes I do this the whole forced "wake up" thing. Waking myself from inside the dream. I once thought just anybody could do it at least some of the time. I can do it a good portion of the time. I try and do it sometimes while awake, which leads to some very akward situations when I find that what I thought was naturally a dream was in fact real. (This works against me in dreams where I think I'm dreaming in the dream but try to wake up and can't, proving that I'm awake while still in the dream.)
I've had long discussions about my lucid dreams with people, but it wasn't until my late teens that I realized how uncommon the whole thing is. Both of my parents and one of my brothers dream lucidly. I thought it was normal.
The dreams have only become more intense as I get closer to my 30's. I sleep much less now and dream much more vividly for what seems like longer periods of time but is actually in shorter time spans. I have considered seeing a doctor, but I feared they would give me a medication that would "take this away". The article clearly gives the caption "is it a gift?" and I ask myself all the time.
The dreams force me to "wake myself" so essentially my dreams are keeping me from getting good sleep. This is true. But it's not like I really feel like I'm doing so bad. I'm certainly not walking around in a total daze from sleep deprivation, at least not often anyway. As I said earlier on I don't "get sleepy" really.
The only other "negative" thing mentioned that I think really applies to me is sleep talking. I have occassional bouts of two sided conversations with myself. I often wake up in hysterical laughter from very amusing dreams. I answer the phone (in my dream but also while doing so in reality) and have conversations with people that I only vaguely remember later on (more on this in a bit) and am later reminded of. I'm told I say some very bizarre, off subject things, make no sense (duh!) and often believe the other person is someone they are not.
As for what I remember, I remember almost all of my dreams at least partially. Exact details aren't always retained beyond the first few hours after waking. If I don't dwell on a dream, I lose it within a few days and it becomes a fuzzy mess. Normally I remember most of the dream though, and if asked what I dreamt immediately after waking I can recall very sharp and precise details. As if whatever I dreamt of actually did just happen.
I dream in color. I dream in stereo. I taste. I feel. And to top it all off I remember events of the real world, events that often happened in toher dreams, and (not so suprisingly) have sometimes had dreams that I know what's going to happen later on in the dream (think about that, and it's really not that strange).
All in all I'm bothered by my dreams but I don't want to lose them. If I were to see a doctor, they would almost certainly make some attempt to make me "normal", and I'm not sure I'm willing to trade this "condition" with one where I simply don't remember anything for a good chunk of my life.
Having said all this, gift or course, I wish I better understood what's going on. And I would gladly give myself to dream research if I felt I myself as a specimin could be useful to researchers. I just wish everybody could have a good "lucid dream" a few times they they would understand why I don't want to give up the great ones dispite all the bad ones.
Flying over your home town with a sickening sense of realism is indescribable, even if it often ends in a dream about falling.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Isn't any of this sort of irrelevent?
The damn shuttle blew up.
13 years ago this was a national tragedy. Is it any less now ?
Nice timing for this article for me, and an interesting read, as I'm due to see a doctor in a few days about some sleeping problems... namely sleep paralysis and possible sleep apnea, I seem to be having symptoms of both - about once a week I'll wake up with a pins-and-needles sensation all over me, completely frozen stiff, and unable to breathe. I think the pins-and-needles must be from lack of oxygen. But it takes me a while to start breathing again - it's quite a struggle. One time I had an intensely loud ringing in my ears as well as the pins-and-needles. I'm starting to wonder if I'm stopping breathing a lot during the night without waking up, as I am quite literally always tired, no matter how much sleep I get! I wonder if anyone of you has had the same thing? I'd be interested to hear what you discovered if so...
I'm still there with the sleep terrors. Usually when I'm overtired. 1/2 hour after I fall asleep I have a vivid dream, something usually along the line of hundreds of piano wires slicing through my room, me included, or somebody drilling my room with lasers. I wake up and it takes me a full 10 minutes for my mind to clear to where I'm not looking for those wires or laser beams. This causes me to get less sleep, which causes me to have worse night terrors, which, well, you get the point. Where are the Dream Police?
The meme police, They live inside of my head
I lived in an apartment right next to some elevated train tracks a few years ago. Since I lived on the second floor, my bed was literally 20 feet away from the train tracks, as well as the electrified third rail. Whole place would vibrate every time a train went by, the sparks from the tracks would illuminate my bedroom at night.
Not only that, this was an old apartment, railroad car style. My bedroom was only 7x10 feet. Since I lived with a Nazi female at the time, I never could watch TV in the livingroom, since she practically lived on the couch. So, I ended up using my computer as a TV all the time.
Do you have any idea how many nights I went to sleep without difficulty with trains driving by all night, and having my 21" monitor running at full power?
I slept every single night within 15 feet of train tracks electrified to god knows how many volts, and a huge monitor only 4 feet away. The only time I sleep problems was if I took some amphetamine too late in the day.
But then, I come home to my parents house in rural Connecticut, on 3 acres of land, with every home in town zoned to minimum 1 acre, and my father snores all damn night and can't sleep. Who knows?
Anyway, I am not convinced. Good guess though!
I don't read or respond to AC posts
I'm 31 and started sleepwalking when I was 12. Sometimes I will wake up during the experience and I have a fuzzy memory of the 'dream' that I've been acting out. Other times I will wake up in the morning with a huge bruise somewhere (one time I woke up with a broken toe) or things in the bedroom are broken and I have no memory of what happened. The scariest thing that has ever happened to me was when I spent the night at a girlfriend's house and woke up the next morning with a fuzzy recollection of sitting on someone's chest and choking them. I asked my girlfriend about this and she said she didn't remember anything but that her throat and neck were extremely sore and bruised. We were both pretty freaked out and I went to a sleep center after that but they didn't detect anything unusual (after all, I don't sleepwalk *every* night and it was hard to sleep at all with all the crap they had hooked up to me). I took the sleeping pill they prescribed for awhile but it didn't stop the sleepwalking and made me drowsy the next morning so I eventually stopped taking it. The doctors at the sleep center didn't seem to really have much experience with this sort of thing (I think they mostly had people in for insomnia and sleep apnea) so they didn't really have any real idea about how to treat it (since they hadn't detected anything in the study there's wasn't much to go on anyway). Im glad to see an article like this give more attention to the issue, although now Im worried Im going to get Parkinsons Disease! I got married a year ago and I'm terrified that one day I will wake up and my wife will be dead in the bed next to me. Perhaps Ill visit the sleep center again (it's been 8 years since I went last time) and maybe they'll have a better clue about how to treat me.
yeah... I used to have night terrors as a child. most people don't know about the condition. It's a mild night terror when it takes 10 minutes to shake it off. Some poor unlucky souls (not me) actually are a danger to themselves and anyone else. Some wake up and are running so hard that they crash through walls. An average night terror doesn't stop when you open your eyes. You hullucinate and panic for some time yet. Some of my worst ones I still can't remember. It was described to me once as me screaming and beating myself. Occasionally I would say "Get them off!" Other times that I can remember, I was afraid that a bicycle was going to fall over and hurt my dad. Once, I saw gold coins chase me and I just kept trying to run. All this occurs after you are awake usually. Some people, with more mild forms of it panic for about 10 minutes in terror when they wake up. None of it is much fun. Most people, like I did, grow out of it. If you do have them, all I can say is they are often triggered by heat or fever. If you are hot, you are much more likely to experience a night terror. If you want to read some more about them: www.nightterrors.org is the best place. Be sure to check their message board for some real stories of how bad they can get.
Karma Clown
Before I got my CPAP machine, I used to get told all sorts of weird things that I supposedly did whilst asleep... Even complete strangers would tell me odd things about my behavior. Sometimes young men would treat me with an exceeding amount of respect and refer to me as "Mr. Durden." What do you think that was about?
--Jack
sounds like you need a tin foil hat
A name you can trust.
This is where Al Qaida sneaks into your room and cuts your throat...
Or is it where the CIA sneaks into your room and cuts your throat...?
Or is it where George Bush dreams how his father had a high approval rating immediately after the Gulf War, and then a year later during the election he was considered a liability to his party because the economy sucked...?
I can never remember...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
The term for this is Restless Leg Syndrome and is treatable. It's similar to spasms in the legs. This can not only cause your partner annoyances, but can keep waking you up many times a night, keeping you from getting a proper night's sleep. (sleep that follows a restful pattern through all the stages of sleep).
I am treated for this with medication and it has done wonders for my energy level. If this seems like a serious problem, find a sleep disorders specialist in your area. More information is available at Restless Legs Syndrome Foundation.
I am, and always will be, an idiot. Karma: Coma (mostly effected by
In the words of a friend currently going through the exact same thing I'm going through, "you'll soon discover why sleep deprivation is one of the world's purest forms of torture"...
Cheers,
Ian
Sleep apnea is one thing ... my husband has that, and can talk to me (or fight with me) in his sleep and not remember a word. But I had a uncle with severe sleep narcolepsy - and let me tell you that is such a trip. He was the type that would come over for family festivities, and you would always find him sprawled out in the middle of the floor of our basement. You could jump up and down on him, and he would never wake up. We were kids, and we would go upstairs to declare, 'Uncle Eddy is sleeping again.' But sometimes, he would sit in a chair, be half asleep (we were never sure) and start gabbing. We swear he was speaking a foreign language sometimes. He would have full conversations with you - it was very weird. His head would move back and forth, like he was really into this conversation he was having. You would try to talk to him, and sometimes he would respond, but always in a language of his own. Diagnosis wasn't good back then, but finally after many years, he was diagnosed, and put on breathing machines (same as sleep apnea) and such. But it was so bad he was not allowed to drive, because he could fall asleep at the wheel in an instant and not be in control of sleep. He never hit drowsy, he either slept in a dream state, or he didn't sleep at all.
just go over to the corner, thanks.
use login: "slash??" and password: "slash??", where ?? is the year. I read this story under username and password "slash2003" for example. Stick it to the man!
I only smoke weed when I need to
And I need to get some rest
I confess, I burnt a hole in the mattress
Yes, yes, it was me, I plead guilty
And on the count of three I pull back the duvet
Make my way to the refrigerator
One dry potato inside, no lie
Not even bread, jam
When the light above my head went bam!
I can't sleep, something's all over me
Greasy, insomnia please release me
And let me dream about making mad love on the heath
Tearing off tights with my teeth
But there's no relief
I'm wide awake in my kitchen
It's dark and I'm lonely
Oh, if I could only get some sleep
Creeky noises make my skin creep
I need to get some sleep
I can't get no sleep....
CPAP: Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (helps to have a dad that runs a sleep lab ;-)
Yet another Physics Genius wannabe.
Those who sacrifice security to condemn liberty deserve to repeat history or something. - Benjamin Santayana
I like to dose alot, both before falling asleep and after having woken up. Over the last couple of months, I've been having these weird things happen. While on the virge between falling asleep and being awake, I'll have a highly vivid and realistic vision of something, such as water running. It's kind of like a dream, but I'm not quite asleep, and my dreams aren't that realistic, but these pictures in my mind are a creation of my imagination, yet I can never visualise anything that realistic neither while awake nor while asleep.
What kind of thing causes this?
Really tho - that's not normal for a healthy adult... get a dog - they listen better and they're cheaper than shrinks!
Visit us at http://www.iblist.com!
1) It let's you know the other person is still there. (for those couples with troubled relationships)
2) It let's you know that the other person is still alive. (for those couples that are very old and near death)
3) It let's you know when the other person is dead. (for those with troubled relationships that are very old and near death.)
I don't have any sleep disorders or anything , but on a recent work trip to Nigeria I had the weirdest, most vivid dreams. I thought it had something to do with the location. But I have travelled before and have never experienced something like that. When I spoke to a co-worker about it , he said that it was the same for him. We concluded that it must've been the malaria tablets as it really fucks your system up. I just thought it was really strange.
"I used to have that really cool,funny sig