Have I lost the ability to sleep now?

[Smiley2000]

Hi there,

For the past 5 years + I have been taking 10mg Zolphidem and 25-50mg Endep for Insomnia.  I've had 2 open-heart surgeries and some other major medical issues and my Doctors were just to willing to give it to me as I also battled with depression at some stage.

About a month ago I decided to destroy all my sleeping medication and Endep and after 3 days of not sleeping and feeling very happy about it!  I went to the Doctor as I also had an over-active tummy and got diagnosed with having Bipolar Disorder and that was hyper-mania.

I am now on 1200mg Valproate and took 25-75mg Seroquel but at some stage I felt really sleepy during the day and the Doctor stopped that, so now I was ordered to only take the Valproate.

I still can not sleep at night.  It is lights-out at 10pm for everyone, but I don't get tired at night.  I wake up every morning at 7am to get kids ready and then I am busy and on my feet during the day, but I don't get tired enough at night to sleep a full night!

Last night:  I took 10mg Temazepam and by midnight I was still not sleepy enough/knocked out so ended up taking 25mg Seroquel.

This is not working for me!  I want to sleep like a normal person and if I take the Seroquel, I feel terrible during the day!

Anyone with advice?

[flipper336]

Smiley,
If you have not done so yet you could try using a natural sleep aid called Melatonin, in the vitamin section of a store. The days that I need to get some sleep, it normally knocks me out for a good 7 hours.

[skydnsr]

You've got two things to consider.  One is that if the diagnosis of bipolar disorder is accurate, then difficulty sleeping is understandable, because that is one of the symptoms of the disease.  The other thing is that one month of cold-turkey abstinence from zolpidem and Endep is not nearly long enough for your brain to recover from 5+ years of taking those drugs nightly.  I would consider getting a psychiatric consultation and, depending on the outcome of that, perhaps a sleep medicine consultation.  Good luck.