I've never had a problem with falling asleep and staying asleep all night. I can just put my head on the pillow and within about 15 minutes I'm out. Hubby on the other hand cannot do that, he always asks me, "How do you do that?", "I don't know it's easy". For as long as I can remember he has had sleeping problems. Initially we would chalk it up to all the different shift work he's had over the years, days, swing, graveyard, then back to days, then swing, then days. But he can't use that as an excuse anymore, he's been on dayshift for over 15 years now. He falls asleep then wakes up about 4 hours later, wide awake, not able to go back to sleep until early AM just before his alarm goes off for work. He has tried most every remedy out there to promote sleep naturally, like no alcohol after certain time, no late dinners, melatonin tablets, benadryl (hypes him up instead of knocking him out), warm milk . . .you name it, he's tried it. So after much suggestion I said, "Just go to the doctor and see if they can give you a mild sleeping pill to try", he says, "I don't want to get started on any sleeping pills", I say, "You better try something because lack of sleep is making you a bit irritable (understatement) and then you fall dead asleep in the chair waiting for dinner at 5:30 in the evening and I can't wake you up, you need to do something!". So he finally calls the doctor's office and they write him a prescription for Ambien. He brings home the prescription bottle and says, "YOU need to read this!"...."What? Why? alright."..So I read the things he should know about taking Ambien and I quote from the label:
"After taking Ambien you may get out of bed while not being fully awake and do an activity that you do not know you are doing. The next morning, you may not remember that you did anything during the night". Interesting.
"Reported activities include: driving a car (sleep driving), making and eating food, talking on the phone, sleep walking and having sex (ha!)" "Call your doctor right away if you find out that you have done any of the above activities after taking Ambien"...Now that's funny...don't they just tell you that you are not going to remember doing these things?? At least the activities list did not include: Robbing a bank, Peeing in the corner of the bedroom, Coveting thy neighbor's wife ( I guess it did mention sex, just not with who!).
Other side effects include but are not limited to: more aggressive behavior than normal, confusion, agitation, hallucinations, depression, memory loss, anxiety, severe allergic reaction, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, dizziness, and trouble breathing. Well isn't this just wonderful???? After reading all this I look at hubby and he says, "Kinda scary huh?", and I say, "Yeah, I think you just need to leave this in the cabinet and I can put up with irritable some days and you falling asleep in the chair at 5:30pm and the sound of the TV at 2:30am in the other room, if you can?". If anybody ever needs a sleeping aid, we have a full bottle of Ambien in our medicine cabinet. Be our guest.
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